Patent ID: 7056225

Claim:
A method of fitting a golfer with a set of golf clubs all having shafts of substantially the same stiffness matched to the particular golfer; (a) empirically determining the proper club shaft stiffness for a particular golfer by: (i) providing a trained observer to observe the ball path and flight of the golf ball struck by the golfer; (ii) having the observer watch the golfer strike a number of golf balls using a first group of test clubs in which the clubs in the group have varying lofts and all have substantially the same first shaft stiffness with the golfer progressing through the first group of clubs having the same shaft stiffness before testing subsequent club groups; (iii) having the observer continuing to watch the golfer strike golf balls using one or more subsequent groups of test clubs in which the clubs in the group have varying lofts and all have substantially the same stiffness which stiffness is different than said first stiffness; and (iv) determining a selected stiffness for the particular golfer based on the observations of ball flight and path as the golfer strikes balls using the test clubs; (b) fabricating a set of golf clubs all having substantially the selected stiffness by measuring the vibration frequency of a plurality of shaft blanks in a frequency analyzer by positioning the butt end of a shaft blank in a clamp and deflecting the tip end to achieve a generally planar vibration path to determine shaft frequency and to locate the shaft spine; (c) incrementally trimming the blanks at an end as necessary to produce a set of shafts each having the desired length and all having substantially the same selected stiffness; and (d) securing a club head to each shaft with the spine location opposite the club head striking face.