KBS Tour Hybrid Golf Shafts
By Russ Ryden, A Golf Digest America’s 100 Best Clubfitter
Fit2Score, Dallas Fort Worth, Texas
The KB in the KBS brand stands for Kim Braly. In the 80’s Kim and his father, Dr. Joe Braly founded Precision Shaft Corporation. Together, they created one of the first ever PGA Tour vans and did research on PGA players that established many of the core design principles of golf shaft stiffness. The company eventually became Royal Precision. At Royal Precision, Kim Braly created the stepless Rifle Golf Shaft and the Project X Golf Shaft. Those brands are now owned and produced by True Temper which acquired Royal Precision in the early 2000s.
In 2008, Kim Braly joined Femco Steel Company and the KBS brand was launched. The combination of FST manufacturing technology and Kim’s knowledge of golf shaft design quickly made the KBS brand one of the leading brands on the PGA Tour and among golfers of all skill levels. Shaft to shaft consistency is excellent, Radial quality is excellent. The designs are easy to understand and flight. They are club makers / club fitters shafts.
The KBS Hybrid shaft is what can now be though of as a first generation Femco Steel / Kim Braly design. It was the first stepless design produced by the partnership. Compared to later designs, it is softer. It is a great companion to lighter weight steel, like the KBS Tour 90. It has the same bend profile as all the KBS products, a consistent, stable change of stiffness from point to point down the entire length of the shaft.
The torque ranges from 2.3 in the R flex to 2.1 in the X flex. A very low number, found in very few graphite shafts. I have fit this shaft into the hybrids of some strong players. They gained control unlike anything they had ever experienced in their hybrids.
In a discussion a the 2011 PGA Merchandise show with Kim Braly about Hybrid shafts for strong players he suggested the C Taper 2 iron shaft. A look at the EI and GJ profiles showed it to be a stiffer version of the KBS Hybrid. The torque numbers of steel are naturally low, and the KBS Tour C Taper torque ranges from 2.1 in the R flex to 1.6 in the X flex. Radial quality is excellent allowing the shaft to be installed in any orientation.
Iron fitting experience with this shaft has shown that I can ‘tune’ launch with flex. Having R+ and S+ sub flexes makes this easily to test during a fitting. If you are strong enough for this shaft in your irons, you will be amazed at how accurate your hybrids can be with STEEL.
