Fujikura Axiom Iron Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Builder
The Highlands Performance Golf Center, Carrollton Texas 
Golf Digest Certified America’s 100 Best Club Fitter

The 2023 Fujikura Axiom is a new iron shaft concept. They are parallel 0.370 tips which Fujikura states can be sanded to 0.355 tapers. The wall thickness at the tip is thick and I have no reason to doubt this can be done without damaging the tip integrity. Typically parallel sets are made from a single “blank” tip trimmed to increase stiffness in shorter lengths. The Axiom comes in three different models, short for 8, 9, W, mid for 5, 6, 7, and long for 2, 3, and 4. The idea is to create “specific performance throughout the iron set.” Lets see how this can be seen by virtual trimming a set of shafts.

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Russ

Project X HZRDUS Smoke Blue RDX Golf Shaft Review

TrueTemper Project X HZRDUS Smoke Blue RDX Driver Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Highlands Performance Golf Center, Carrollton Texas 
Golf Digest Certified America’s 100 Best Club Fitter

TrueTemper is releasing a number of new Project X driver shafts in 2021. This is the first set I have measured. It is offered with several graphics. Lets listen to what TrueTemper has to say about this 2021 Shaft.

The Project X RDX Smoke Blue is available as a no charge option from some of the brands. Several models are available from TaylorMade. To compare the Project X Smoke Blue RDX to other shafts, lets look at the measurements.

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Russ

KBS $-Taper HT Iron Shaft Review

KBS $-Taper HT Golf Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Highlands Performance Golf Center, Carrollton Texas 
Golf Digest Certified America’s 100 Best Club Fitter

The Covid-19 virus has had a profound effect on the golf season and the golf equipment vendors. The beginning of the year was slow and many equipment companies slowed factory and assembly production. Then, golf was recognized as a “safe” recreational activity and golfers escaped the isolation of their homes to the golf courses. Many looked at the 10+ year old set of clubs they owned and decided to update them. The equipment business was struck by lightening. As of the publication of this review, most are backordered 3 to 4 weeks.

The January 2021 PGA merchandise show, an annual event that bring together the golf suppliers and golf professionals will be virtual. New product releases will also be virtual. GolfShaftReviews and Devoted Golfer will be producing virtual interviews in place of the interviews we have traditionally shot at the PGA Merchandise show.

Here is our first look at a new shaft from KBS, the $-Taper HT. The shaft was designed in response to feedback from tour players. It is only available in Tour weights, 120g, 125g and 130g. Let’s take an look at it’s profile and then compare it to the $-Taper and the CTaper.

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Russ

Oban Airburst Burgundy Golf Shaft Review

Oban Airburst Burgundy Driver Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Highlands Performance Golf Center, Carrollton Texas 
Golf Digest Certified America’s 100 Best Club Fitter

The Airburst Burgundy is the second shaft made by Olympic for Oban. Olympic is a premium Japanese fishing rod company. They specialize is fishing rods which are much like golf shafts, hollow carbon fiber tubes. The Olympic website has an in-depth discussion of carbon fiber properties of tubes. If you have never seen the manufacturing of a graphite golf shaft I recommend you watch this video about fishing rod construction. From 0:56 to 5:30 you are watching the process of the making of a graphite golf shaft. Graphite shafts are with few exceptions hand rolled. No one in the golf shaft business will publish a video about the manufacturing process they use. This is how it is done:

Ralph Reichert, owner of Oban Golf shafts discusses the making and technology of the Airburst golf shafts in this video from my my YouTube Channel, Devoted Golfer, We shot this discussion at the January 2019 PGA show.

Lets take a look at the second Airburst golf shaft from Oban.

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Russ

Graphite Designs Tour AD HD Driver Shaft Review

Graphite Designs Tour AD HD Driver Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Highlands Performance Golf Center, Carrollton Texas 
Golf Digest Certified America’s 100 Best Club Fitter

The Graphite Design Tour AD HD released in September of 2020. It utilizes Torayca M40X prepreg in the mid to tip section and ultra-high Torayca T1100G in the tip section of the shaft. Like many Graphite Design designs, the changes from model to model are subtle.

This video is a round table discussion about Graphite Design golf shafts covering many of the recent designs.

Lets take a close look at the Tour AD HD.

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Russ

Project X IO Golf Shaft Review

Project X IO Golf Iron Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Highlands Performance Golf Center, Carrollton Texas 
Golf Digest Certified America’s 100 Best Club Fitter

The Project X IO was released in 2020 with the Project X LS and shares the new True Temper look of a matte brushed chrome finish. It is in the same weight range as the discontinued Project X PXi but has a different EI profile. It is lighter and has a low tip to butt stiffness ratio to promote a higher launch.

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Russ