KBS TCI Graphite Iron Shaft Review

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

Following the success of the KBS Carbon Fiber Hybrid shaft released in 2017, KBS has created light weight parallel iron shafts. Rather than me explaining the shaft, listen to Kim Braly at the PGA 2018 merchandise show discuss its development and pre release testing.

The shaft does not have a flex designation on its label. The number is the 6 iron swing speed which is your first cut and fitting the shafts. Lets take a look at the profile and data.

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Russ

Mitsubishi Diamana Thump Iron Shaft Review

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Mitsubishi Diamana Thump Iron Shaft Review

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

This is the second release of a Diamana Thump Iron Shaft. The first release, in 2010, was eventually discontinued. At $160 per shaft, or $1280 per set of shafts, there was little interest. I am surprised to see the shaft again being offered. Perhaps PXG’s success at selling uber expensive irons demonstrated there is a market for ultra premium irons.

What exactly do you get at $160 per shaft? Much like an exotic sports car you get light weight strength. I am seeing equivalent steel stiffness with 10 to 15 grams less weigh. I am not referring the the R,S,X denoted on shafts. Those letters are meaningless ways to compare shafts outside of their own particular model. I am referring to area under the EI curve, the only functional method I have seen to rate shaft stiffness. I have to get into the 125 gram range in steel to see a stiffness match to the 2018 Mitsubishi Chemical Thump 105 gram iron shafts. These are truly exotic iron shafts at a truly exotic price. Unless you are comfortable with the stiffness found in something like a 125 gram KBS tour this is not a shaft you can load. But if you are, you have to see what happens when your clubs weigh loses 15 grams. Let’s take a closer look at the numbers.

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Russ

UST Recoil Parallel Iron Shafts

UST Recoil Parallel Iron Golf Shaft Review

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

When the UST Recoil Iron shaft was first introduced I was enthralled by the concept of hoop deformation storing and then releasing energy. Hoop deformation was not part of the discussion in the club fitting organizations I belonged to. There was no publically documented procedure in the golf shaft business for measuring it. I was given some hints by another shaft company and set out on a long discovery process to measure it. Eventually it redefined how I calculated golf shaft EI by adding a correction for hoop deformation in the 3 point measuring process. This did not happen overnight. The journey lasted a little over a year, hoop deformation measurements are now an integral part of my understanding of the golf shaft. While I am forever grateful to UST Mamiya for bringing this to my attention, I did not find anything extraordinary about the hoop strength of the Recoil shafts. Generally it is a function of wall thickness, fiber orientation and layup strategy.

I recently obtained a limited range of UST Recoil shafts, including the Recoil 450, Recoil 460, Recoil 660, Recoil 670 and Recoil 680. Before we look at the numbers I realized in a conversation with a shaft company executive a few weeks ago that I was remiss in explaining my rating of shaft stiffness, EI Area. An article on the metric has been posted.. The concept was presented to me by Jeff Meyers who was the shaft guru at Titleist for about 20 years. By using area under the curve, each measurement of the shaft, from tip to butt is given equal weight in the stiffness rating. Jeff found it preferable over frequency to predict how golfers would report their impression of shaft stiffness. Frequency is heavily weighted toward the butt, overlooking the remainder of the shafts. As you read the charts on this site, your can compare overall stiffness of shafts by looking at the EI Area number in the tables.

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Russ

Paderson Kinetixx Iron Shaft Review

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Paderson Kinetixx Iron Shafts

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

When I asked Jason Horodezky for review samples I did not understand just how many shaft Paderson is making. Fortunately he did not send me one of each SKU as I requested, but he did send me the largest, heaviest box of samples I have ever received. At the speed I measure, it was at least 40 hours in the shop in between fitting, building and editing video from the PGA show. Iron shafts span 6 different profiles is various weights and flex’s. To see the range of shafts offer by Paderson, visit their website, Padersonshafts.com.

In addition to the catalog of shafts, there is an in depth discussion of their technology and manufacturing process which I am not going to repeat here with one exception. All but a few of Paderson’s shafts are filament wound. They are one of a very few companies that have this manufacturing technology. This video copied from their site illustrates the process.

Most carbon fiber shafts are made by rolling sheets of material over a mandrel. Paderson ‘spins’ a weave of carbon fiber ribbon over the mandrel. This gives them the unique ability to tension the fiber during the weaving process.

When you scroll through catalog of shafts on the Paderson site you will count 12 models in multiple flexes. I did not even put a dent in that array but measured enough to give you some insight into their designs.

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Russ

Overall I see high quality shafts with atypical set stiffness designs. I will revisit this when I get a chance to compare the shafts to my current gamers.

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Russ