Shaft Selection and Availability
The Golf Shaft is the Key to Peak Performance
As a Club maker, our Timeatch FitChip offers you the most advanced club fitting system for selecting the golf club shaft available today. Several U.S. patents cover this system, as well as associated foreign patents. The FitChip applies advanced computer technology to a brand new approach to golf club shaft selection. We call it new, because it is a direct system of finding the proper shaft and offers a viable, time saving, cost effective alternative to the trial and error method used by golf professionals and club makers in the past. If you are limited in the amount of time you have for a fitting session, the trial and error process is prohibitive and not necessarily accurate. We also question whether even an accomplished player can maintain the sense of feel needed to accurately distinguish one club to the next during a lengthy trial and error fitting session. It has been found that OEM shafts can properly fit only about 40% of all players. We offer a much wider range of shaft frequencies as pictured below and can fit frequencies not available through an OEM.
Effective shaft fitting is a function of matching the proper stiffness or frequency of the golf shaft to the player's swing timing. Swing timing is defined as the time interval between when the club is loaded to its peak deflection or release point, and the moment of ball impact. The FitChip records acceleration data at every .002 seconds. The computer chip in the FitChip analyzes this data and immediately selects a shaft frequency to match that swing timing. The FitChip stores up to 84 swings that can be downloaded to a PC for further analysis of the swing patterns.
By testing thousands of individuals and identifying the exact cycle per minute shaft frequency that performs best for a given player, we conclude that the maximum effective frequency range is + or - 4 CPM for any given player. The standard club ranges A, L, R, S and X are generally 15 CPM wide. This explains the problem a player has when he hits a Demo Club well, then orders the "same" club, but cannot hit it as well as the demo. The Demo club could have been at the bottom of the range and the purchased club at the top of the range, and be as much as 15 CPM apart.
From the above chart, you can see the shaft availability limitations faced by every OEM for off the shelf shafts. Through our many fittings, it became obvious that a much wider range of shafts were needed. This is also when we determined that a wider range (represented in green) was needed to properly fit 60% of the players tested. After approaching the many shaft manufacturers, we found only one that was willing to meet our manufacturing specifications for a wider range of shafts.
Our shaft specifications not only includes the wider range of frequencies, but also includes sufficient length and tipping room to build any frequency club in this expanded range. The shafts are also specified for high torque resistance and a high flex point. The high torque is specified in all frequencies to minimize dispersion of off center hits, which is better for everyone. If you always hit on the sweet spot, torque is not a factor. If the club is built to a torque that will withstand toe impacts, it will allow only minimal (or no) torsional deflection during the swing. The torsional load during the swing is only a 1/10th of that for a toe impact. Specifying the high kick point insures maximum club head speed. Generally a high kick point is known in the industry for providing more distance but less accuracy. When using our fitting system however, when the shaft is frequency tuned to be straight and square at impact, the high kick point positively influences distance and has no negative influence on accuracy,.
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