Project X HZRDUS Black Gen4 Driver Shaft Review

TrueTemper Project X HZRDUS Black Gen4 Driver 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 True Temper HZRDUS Black Gen4 features a new Dual Torsional Design throughout the shaft. It is the fourth HZRDUS Black model so the name Gen4 is appropriate. First was the Black. Next, the Smoke Black. That was followed by the third generation Smoke Black RDX. I see the last three generations as variations on a shaft I had a great respect for, the Project X Loading Zone

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Russ

Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro Orange Golf Shaft Review

Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro Orange Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Golf Center at the Highlands, Carrollton Texas

MRC-TEN-CK PRO OrangeAt this moment, all eyes are on this shaft as it is in the bags of Tiger and Rory at the Masters. Mitsubishi is sold out in the US until around May 1. The Pro Orange is the third shaft in the Tensei product line. As noted on the Mitsubishi Chemical website “this is the first of it’s kind bend profile for MCA GOLF.”  Many of Mitsubishi’s designs are variations of previous themes. The Tensei Pro Orange is unique. I keep inserting the word Pro in my description of this shaft. The Tensei Orange, a shaft sold to the club companies is not the same. The difference between the two can be seen on the Mitsubishi website. The torque and the bend profiles are quite different.

The Tensei Pro Blue and The Tensei Pro White have been reviewed earlier. The three shafts are an evolution in multi material construction from Mitsubishi. Most interesting is the Carbon Fiber Dupont Kevlar “CK” material woven into the butt section of the shaft. You can plainly see it’s effect on hoop strength in the following chart.

I just listened to a PodCast where a tour fitter described the main advantage of this shaft as it being counterweighted. I never cease to be amazed at some of this banter. The tip structure of this shaft is far more likely to make it a good fit for hard swinging tour pros than counterweighting. I can counterweight with a bit of lead tape under the grip if what I am after is a swing weight change. But an elementary lesson taught when I first started club building many years ago was this is not the proper way to build. Tricking a swing weigh instrument with butt weight is not how one should achieve club balance. Counterweighting does deliver benefits for some players, but in drivers that it typically accomplished with a 20g or 30g plug in the butt of the shaft. If the small balance change created by counterweighting a shaft works, they why not just use a heavier grip.

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Russ

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ

Matrix DEUS Driver Shaft Review

Matrix DEUS, DEUS Tour and DEUS Tour B Driver Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Golf Center at the Highlands, Carrollton Texas

Shaft DEUSMatrix DEUS

Shaft DEUS Tour

Matrix DEUS Tour

Shaft DEUS Tour B

Matrix DEUS Tour B

The Matrix DEUS line is new in 2017. It joins a large array of shafts available from Matrix. In this review I cover the DEUS, DEUS Tour and DEUS Tour B. The Matrix website does not give much information about these shafts other than spin ratings. It was discussed with Tom Deshill at the 2017 PGA merchandise show. He did mention the DEUS line was targeted at a lower price range than most previous Matrix shafts.


Lets take a close look at the specs. 

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Russ

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ

Graphite Design Tour AD IZ Golf Shaft Review

Graphite Design Tour AD IZ Driver Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Golf Center at the Highlands, Carrollton Texas

Shaft ADIZ

The Graphite Designs Tour AD IZ released in late 2017. This video was shot in January 2018 at the PGA Merchandise show. Bill McPherson and I discuss the IZ and other 2018 shafts from Graphite Designs.

T1100-G-Side-ImageTour AD IZ, like the Tour AD TP, utilizes TORAYCA ® T1100G carbon-fiber pre-preg with NANOALLOY ® technology in the tip section of the shaft. Also like the TP, it is made with 50 ton ultra-premium, high modulus, aerospace quality carbon fiber materials..

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ

Mitsubishi C6 Driver Shaft Review

Mitsubishi Chemical C6 Driver Shaft Review

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Golf Center at the Highlands, Carrollton Texas

C6Image

The C6 Blue is available only to customer builders, distributed exclusively through SwingScience. This is not unlike the shafts made exclusively for the head companies. To the best of my knowledge this is a new distribution channel for Mitsubishi Chemical. The many Club Builders that get their shafts and heads through SwingScience now have access to a unique shaft with premium specs at a price that will not elicit a gag reflex from their customers. The emphasis in here is on “unique”, there was not a good match to be found in my knowledge base. Lets take a look at the EI profiles. 

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Russ

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ

Project X Rifle Tapered Iron Shaft Review

Project X Rifle Tapered Iron Shaft

By Russ Ryden, Fit2Score, A Dallas Fort Worth Club Fitter & Club Maker
The Golf Center at the Highlands, Carrollton Texas

The Project X Rifle Golf Shaft was one of the first shafts I studied when I took up club making. I attended a weekend course on its history and how to build matched sets of iron with the parallel shaft. Much of that history is explained in my earlier article about the Project X Rifle Shaft. Parallel shafts have a tip diameter of .370 inches. A set is made by incrementally cutting the shaft tips. Today however, the majority of the iron heads have .355 tapered hosels. That means the club maker must secure the club head and ream the hosel to .370. With forged heads it does not take much effort providing you have a good drill press and a hosel clamp fixture. With cast heads it is much more difficult. The hardness of the cast hosel requires a mill with horse power and in many cases a cooling system to keep from burning the ream. In other words, if you tried this once on a hard casting you probably will refuse to do it again.

True Temper provides a solution. Tapered Project X Rifle shafts with precut tip. The Rifle shaft system gave the club maker the ability to fine tune stiffness by altering the length of the tip cut as he pleased. That can not be done with taper tip shafts. To remedy that problem, the taper Rifle shafts are offered in 10 different lengths for each stiffness. The club maker can hit mid flex targets by selecting shafts from that array of pre trimmed tips. 

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ

To continue reading this section of the review, you must be registered at a higher level membership.
Russ