ShopTalk: swingweight help

[Jen Kuntz]

Hi guys

I build 3 demo clubs with graphite shafts - the "test" I wrote about a 
few weeks ago.  Something seems wrong and I can't figure out why.  I 
used John Baima's swingweight calculator plus I dry-fitted and measure 
swingweight myself after tip trimming but before butt trimming to 
length, to help decide how much hosel weight to put in.   My aim was 
about D2.  I used a Tour Wrap as the grip for the s/w estimate (an old 
one I had cut off a club).

Here is what I built:
- all 3 have GS Tour Cavity 5 iron heads - heads are several years old 
but at the time I weighed them at 252g plus or minus 1g
- all have standard Tour Wrap grips, they were not weighed but usually 
49-50g right?
- shaft 1 - Tom Wishon's ZT R/H - 40" raw length, came in at 72g raw weight
- shaft 2 - UST Tourforce 80 - 40", 80g
- shaft 3 - PM 40+ - 40", 91g

So, Tom's shaft (1) I put in a 9g port weight, came out to between D2-D3 
(call it D2.5)
UST, put in 6g tip weight, came to D1
Apache, put in slightly less than 6g tip weight (don't have a scale, 
snipped a slight bit off)... maybe 4/5g, came to C9

I just checked John's s/w calc again with my final weights and came up 
with D1, D0, D0 as the respective estimated S/W.  They are "close" but 
all different, I think my scale is ok.  I am surprised (a) that they are 
all light with the exception of the first one and (b) that John's calc 
and my actual s/w don't seem to jive.

Am I missing something that would account for the results coming in 
different than expected/estimated?  Any suggestions for next time?  The 
only thing I can think of that I should have done was once I tip 
trimmed, probably should have butt trimmed to length to get the most 
accurate representation of final length and dry fit the hosel weights 
from there.  ??

As an aside I brought them to Patrick Inglis, clubmaker I know in 
Waterloo (hi Pat if you're reading this)... he "FLO'd" them for me... 
I'd never seen that, it was interesting watching the results as the 
shaft was rotated.  Tom's shaft was the most consistent of the bunch on 
any rotation, all were pretty good though, UST suprised me, for some 
reason I wasn't expecting it to be too consistent.

As another aside, I also took an old Harrison shaft I had from the last 
PGA show I attended, a 2.5 FL Lite, which I have never been able to hit 
and put it in a Super Concorde 9.5 driver... probably will be a real 
ugly combination but they were both on hand.  I wasn't sure what 
possessed me to buy the driver head - I had bought it online a few years 
back and it got crushed during shipping, the shaft was flattened, truck 
drove over it.  The head was perfectly untouched, but I'd never bothered 
to remove it.  So... curiosity got the best of me and we'll see what 
that feels like... feeling the bug coming back... scary! : )

Jen

PS - haven't hit them yet, I will test them indoors today at a dome.   
At first "feel", the first one feels like a telephone pole, the rest 
feel ok, I probably haven't hit anything with that high a s/w yet so 
that could explain my initial reaction... will be interesting to see 
what they feel like this aft.  They are also longer by 1/2" than what I 
am used to in a 5iron... I probably should have checked lie angles first 
.. we'll see!