Adjustable Headed Drivers

Quick question, in peoples opinions are adjustable headed drivers just a gimmick or do they actually work?

 I generally hit about 55% FIR using my current driver due to a slight fade (about 20yards) i know you traditionalist out there will say "work on your swing to straighten out your shot shape" and "its because you are swinging on an out to in plane" ect but i am just starting to improve on all other aspects of my game and i dont want to mess around with changing my current swing patterns so i am thinking of purchasing a new driver possibly with adjustable head technology.

 So what are you thoughts people?

Martin, I have no idea whether or not these adjustable drivers are a gimmick, but I will say that if further progress is to made in your handicap then it would be better for you in the long run if you did learn to hit the ball correctly as I assume your irons suffer the same fate.

I have a very good friend, David Marshall who also plays with the same method as you and he knows only too well that it is preventing him from getting into lower single figures.

Thanks for the advise John, strangely my irons are generally very dependable with a nice stright flight i can fade the ball if required but cannot draw the ball, i am thinking of lessons but have always enjoyed the test that is trying to fix the problem myself, i understand all the mechanics needed for a good swing and try to put these into practise. Along with only being able to play twice a month with maybe the odd range session thrown in i dont play nearly as much golf as i would like.

To play to 11 handicap playing only twice a month tells me you have some natural abilities, Martin, but I honestly feel that a player who cannot work the ball when required does not have a full armoury and is one of the reasons why getting into single figures is difficult.

Nice view Lewis and it made me think about these in a way I hadn't before.  I'd always took the "just a gimmick, just get fitted properly" mindset because I feel that you will find a setting that works for you and never change it.  Therefore, if you get fitted properly in the first place, you wouldn't need the adjustment.  However, the view you have just put forward actually makes good sense

IMO ...If you spend half the time on your swing as you would on fine tuning these way to many combinations drivers  you would have achieved a decent swing!!

Martin nothing wrong with a slight fade , If I have a must hit fairway I play a fade, If you have a consistant 20 yrd fade I would be inclined to think your FIR would be higher than 55%. I can only think that you don't have a consistant setup so check out you alingment,good luck.

My veiw on the clubs : Sales Gimmick.  

The first myth that I’d like to cover is that “bigger heads have larger sweet spots and are more forgiving”. First, all clubs have the same size sweet spot. The sweet spot is equivalent to the club head’s center of gravity. This spot is about the size of the tip end of a needle. Also, the club only has one sweet spot in spite of one company’s advertising that their driver has 9 different sweet spots. If you hit the ball squarely and in the center, the ball will fly straight and true and as far as your club head speed will allow.

However, what happens when you miss this spot? Miss the center by ½” and you’ll lose 5 yards. Miss by ½” and you lose 10 yards and so on. Also, the club head will start to twist and impart side spin on the golf ball. What can you do to prevent this from happening? Well, club designers found that if you make the MOI (Moment of Inertia) of the club higher, it will resist this twisting to some degree. How do you increase the MOI of a club head? The way to do this is to take the center of gravity and move it further out from the axis of rotation and also move it back from the face of the club. The resulting head design then is the “bigger” “clunkier” club head. What happens when you make the MOI of the club head higher is that it takes more effort to square the club face. In essence, you’ve created a club head that in effect gives you a bit more distance and less side spin on off center hits but also cause those off center hits due to not being able to square up the club.

Also, just how much more distance does one get from misses with the large heads as opposed to the smaller head? It’s a matter of just a few yards. You have to ask yourself, if big is really better, why are players not improving consistently? I will give you a bit more insight into the main feature of a golf club that will be of the most benefit to the majority of players. That feature is called offset. If you have trouble getting the hands through impact and squaring the club head, offset can be a valuable feature.

That’s it for the first myth. Look for the next chapter of the PPGS Myth Busters where we’ll be talking about the length of shafts.

J. Griffin, Master Fitter/Builder & PPGS Instructor

This guy advocates using offset to help square the clubface due to the MOI being moved further back in manufacture, not to correct a poor swing.

Lewis ,If the manufactures believed this for one second 

"This type of driver 'may' be a cheaper way forward as the club can grow with you"

 the club would never have been put into production. You only need to check out the auction houses to see how many used ,latest adjustable drivers there are for sale.All they do is confuse the guy swinging and they adjust them constanly for a quick fix, human nature i'm afraid,

In my humble opinion this is just something else for the golfer using this sort of club to worry about. (i've never used one so not sure if it can be adjusted quickly and by hand) but i know what i would do with a club like this in my bag, my first drive would be ok but i'd think i can do better than that lets adjust the club, this would go on from hole to hole (or round to round) and all i would do to sort out my drives would be to adjust the club head, sending my little brain into overdrive and making me eventually rap the bloo*y thing round the nearest tree.

We have enough to worry about on the course without having the ability to change the club head giving us a whole other dimension of things to think about and blame an inconsistent game on, i'd think it would be better for top players who understand what these changes actually do.

So you may of guessed - an absolute no no from me.

If your struggling with your driver - use a 3 wood and sort your short game out!!!!!

Paul,

You cannot change the characteristics of a club during a round, it's against the rules.  You can adjust it before you play but once you hit your first shot off the first tee you cannot adjust it until you have putted out on the 18th

of course showing my lack of knowledge of the rules there!

So your first drive goes to pot and the driver gets left in the bag for the rest of the round then, or it just gets wrapped around a tree there & then!

Still something else to worry about/something else to mess with your head in my opinion but each to there own.   

just a gimmick in my opinion just like all the other so called game improvement rubbish. We have balls that travel miles and straight with no spin so you can't shape the ball but how many do you find in the rough or in the trees because they sliced or hooked, we have tees that make the balls go further and also anti slice tees, a load of old bollocks, if any of these gimmicks  actually worked why are there still so many higher handicap golfers, we should all be brilliant,  if you want to improve then you need to learn to swing the club correctly, The fact that you are slicing the ball tells you there is a flaw in your swing.

I can go out out and drive the ball straight and long some days which means I am swinging well, and on other days slice and fade the ball which means I am swinging poorly, I don't go out and buy a new anti slice driver I go and fix the fault in my swing or set up then start hitting the ball straight and long again. If you want to improve learn to swing properly. SIMPLES.

But thats just my opinion.

Mine as well, Russell, well said.

My thoughts (oh, here we go...) on adjustable drivers.  Your golf swing (good or bad) is a wonder of physics, Your brain is capable of computing and adjusting itself many times during the 2 or 3 seconds it takes to go through your swing in order that the C of G of the ball and club head are aligned along the polar moment of inertia.  For someone with a consistent swing (a top pro) this means that there is very little difference between strikes with the same club in terms of mechanics, with the exception of the striking force to control the distance and/or spin.  Us hackers, even the best of us, do not have consistent swings so reducing the number of variables can only help - exactly the opposite affect you get with adjustable drivers.  Effectively what you are doing is shifting the club head C of G (not the club C of G, that's about a foot in front of your knees) and are still expecting to hit through the C of G's along the line of the polar moment of inertia - it ain't gonna happen - waste of money.

Some interseting opinions there, as for lessons i think they are to expensive for meyself only playing twice a month, so i have taken the plunge and have just taken delivery of my new Nike Dymo Str8 fit 10.5 driver, i am off to the range tonight to have a bash and then of for a round on saturday, if anybody is interested i will update tomorrow and after my round on saturday.

Thanks for all your thoughts, now lets see who is correct?

Very confident Mr Santorini

Thing is Lewis it's not difficult to open or close the face or loft or de-loft the face just by set-up (or in my case just by being inconsistent), it just needs practice and your brain will do the business for you.  In my case I used to slice my driver every time, to the point where I was aiming far left to compensate for it, but gradually I'm getting it under control to the point where it's now a pretty predictable gentle fade - and that's come from practice.  If I'd have had a driver that could initially compensate for that slice (and I'm not sure that the claims made by the manufacturer can actually be true) I would never had learned the correct way.  It's a case of technology using you rather than you using the technology, a misguided approach that is all too prevalent today.

Lewis I don't agree with changing equipment because you are not playing well, if you are not playing well or ball striking is poor then there is a fault in the swing or set up, I believe you should be learning from bad shots and correct the flaw that is causing the problem, not change the equipment . If someone is hitting a fade with the driver then the chances are that they may not striking any of the other clubs properly either, it just doesn't show up on lofted clubs, if you just change your driver then ok the ball might start going better with that club but the flaw is still there, learn from the shape of the shot and you may find that the ball striking through the whole set will improve, also if you change the club to improve the flight then there is no incentive to work and improve your swing, chances are that you will just continue to play with a poor swing, but if you continually hit a slice then you will need to fix the flaw, so there is the incentive to improve, the easy way is not neccessarily the right way   

Wayne we both know it's a "no brainer", but getting the message across that one cannot buy a game becomes more difficult everyday, with the constant marketing hype from the manufacturers bombarding the gullible from every angle.

Just an update if anybody is bothered anymore.

At the range last night i left the club in its neutral setting and made a very concentrated effort to swing on the correct path and guess what 80% of my drives where straight down the middle, now i am not sure if the club has made a difference but it gave me the confidence that i can actually hit straight shots, last night at the local range there was quite a strong wind blowing straight in to my face and i was carrying the 250yard marker by about 20 or so yards i was really impressed with my range session (practised some short game aswell) now i am hoping to transfer my new found confidence on to the course on saturday and am hoping to break 80 for the second time.

Well, Lewis, I am sorry that you felt that Wayne and I were having a dig at you. I am sure that was not the intention.

What I will say, however, is that having played this game for over fifty years with the equipment of the time, I have noticed that the modern equipment is hyped up to such an extent, gets improved yearly, yet with this modern equipment I cannot produce the range of shots that I was able to do fifty years ago. That is not progress and can be substantiated by the poorer standard of play these days when compared to previous eras.

One can only improve if one has control of where the shot is going, yet this modern equipment restricts the flair and imagination of players who like to play shots that provide satisfaction and without this ability it takes a lot longer to reduce ones handicap.

I have been on this forum for three years and I have played with many of you and I have not seen much progress in the handicap stakes for that amount of time, why? because everyone seems to be obssessed with hitting a driver 300 yards instead of spending all their time and effort on the scoring end of the game.

Totally agree with John, These days people seem to think that a £250+ driver will make them a better player, I only hit on average about 4 to 6 drivers a round and hit say 50 to 60% of fairways, but the fairways I miss, I have still scored birdies so how many shots can I save by improving my driving, probably none but how many can I save by improving 100 to 150 yards in considering that involves a much larger percentage of the round?

I have a str8 fit and I have adjusted it once closed the face a smuch as possible for a laugh, my good swings were basically hooks and my bad swings were still big slices they just started further left. Closing the face still dosn't stop you going across the ball and putting side spin on the thing.

What is the point of compensating for a bad swing by adjusting the head, all this means is when you make a good swing the ball is going to go in the wrong dirtection.

This may work for a decent golfer who has a really consistant swing who wants to make an adjustmant say on a really windy day take 2 degress of loft off the face and play a draw to avoid the wind catching the ball but this is definitly not a cure for a bad swing.

On the point of advice I don't offer swing tips I don't have the credentials to do so but jsut because someone is a pro doesn't mean they are best placed to either. The phrase those who can't teach springs to mind.

All it takes is a course and you are let lose on the world to teach golf, but all a course teaches is standard methods and practices but not everything in the real world works like that so if you are going to get lessons then make sure it is with the right proffesional.

All it takes is a course and you are let lose on the world to teach golf, but all a course teaches is standard methods and practices but not everything in the real world works like that so if you are going to get lessons then make sure it is with the right proffesional.

 Not strictly true for all teachers Gary,but you have a point about standard methods. Good teachers / coaches study many methods of swinging a golf club and continue to absorb many options through their teaching careers. I can hold my own and tie up some PGA guys with what I have studied over the last few years and I'm a plumber.

Well I know you're a professional something Santo, just can't say what in polite company.....

i have a Nike Str8 fit job currently and it is adjustable, but all i did was find the right setting for me during a fitting sessionthen left it there, i have a fairly decent fairways %age but then I was never the worst driver of a ball to start with.

i dont know how to quote on this thing,

sanderslongdrive's story; best story ever,excellent for so many reasons

theres a wonderful charm about sheer bloody mindedness