Dry Swingweight is ALWAYS Heavier than Built Swingweight... Help Needed

[CKaneb]

Just as the title says. Whenever I am building a club I always take a dry swingweight (NO epoxy, YES grip, YES ferrule) to get a rough estimate of what the club is at so I know if I need to add any tip weights or not. However, when I go through this process and eventually build the club, it always swingweights out lighter than what the dry swingweight was. Can anyone tell me why this could possibly be the case? If anything it should be heavier because epoxy is now in the equation, right?

Edited July 18 by CKaneb

[Ger21]

Your title and description are at odds with one another.

[Howard_Jones]

35 minutes ago, CKaneb said:

Just as the title says. Whenever I am building a club I always take a dry swingweight (NO epoxy, YES grip, YES ferrule) to get a rough estimate of what the club is at so I know if I need to add any tip weights or not. However, when I go through this process and eventually build the club, it always swingweights out lighter than what the dry swingweight was. Can anyone tell me why this could possibly be the case? If anything it should be heavier because epoxy is now in the equation, right?

its most often the grip...
- Split grips is often not fully seated, so on the SW scale it adds play lenght where 1/8 = 0.75 SWP. Since 1/8" is right above 3 mm, we can say 1 mm off on PL = 0.25 SWP, 2 mm off = 0.5 SWP etc...

- The split grip might have a thicker grip cap than the grips installed, again like above, 1 to 2 mm off is enough
- Grip wgt on installed grips vs the split grip 
We say 5 grams with a BP at 4" from the butt = 1  SWP so 1 gram grip wgt becomes 0.20 SWP, 2 grams = 0.40 SWP etc..
- The blance point if grip models (split vs installed) is different.

Combined?...a mess we can and should avoid

SOLUTION
Tune up at least one club using the blind test (too little or too much without a clue about values),
When done, mesure values on that club, with and without grip, the latter so you get a dry fit target w/o grips to eliminate the grip cap/split grip error. its ALL about Play lenght vs head wgt, NOT whats going on grip side, and this is how we eliminate that.

GRIPS and TOLERANCES
- When the set is built, check specs BEFORE you add grips to make sure they came out right.
- Now start to put your grips on the gram scale one by one, mark each with its wgt.
- Now you measure Total wgt EX-grip for each iron.
- Ideal for SW matched clubs is 7 grams avarege with constant wgt shafts.
- Now you can use grip wgt variables to even out the total wgt slope.
(Heavy grips on light clubs and opposite so total weight progression becomes as good as possible with what you got at hand.)

Never mind what this clubs measure with grips on the SW scale, you have now matched HEAD and play lenght like it should, and even got TW progression as good as can be. we can NOT make it any better than that, since we can now change grips later without messing up a SW match job where clubs was matched to a "split grip", NOT vs play lenght and head wgt.

TAKE NOTES from start to end of ALL specs and mods for reference, also for later grip changes.

Edited July 17 by Howard_Jones

[CTgamer]

Just to confirm, your built swing weight is lighter than your dry fit swing weight? The title makes it seem like the opposite…

 

But to your point, yes, common wisdom says built swing weight tends to be heavier if anything because of epoxy. Most common reason for the other way around is length of the dry fit being a touch longer than built (if the shaft isn’t fully seated, etc). Have you measured length for both the dry fit and built clubs?
 

Lots of grip tape could change (really, “trick”) swing weight as well but it should be really minor

Edited July 17 by CTgamer

[Stuart_G]

19 hours ago, CKaneb said:

Just as the title says. Whenever I am building a club I always take a dry swingweight (NO epoxy, YES grip, YES ferrule) to get a rough estimate of what the club is at so I know if I need to add any tip weights or not. However, when I go through this process and eventually build the club, it always swingweights out lighter than what the dry swingweight was. Can anyone tell me why this could possibly be the case? If anything it should be heavier because epoxy is now in the equation, right?

 

Usually the epoxy is balanced out by the single layer of double sided tape - so no it's not usually heavier because of the epoxy.  At least not if you're only the amount of epoxy that's needed and not too much excess.

 

In addition to what others (especially Howard) has posted:

 

How much lighter?  and how consistent is it?

 

How exactly are you "adding" the grip during the dry check?

 

Are you installing additional layers of tape to build up your grip size?

 

For the dry weight check, is the ferrule (and therefore the hossel insertion depth and playing length) in the exact same place as when its' glued up?  If you push it down further during the epoxy, that will shorten the playing length - which will lower the swing weight.

 

Edited July 18 by Stuart_G

[GL3]

I’m just gonna guess here because it’s happened to me.

 

When you cut your shafts to length you are adding 3/8 for the butt cap, when it’s only 1/8 resulting in a 1/4 shorter golf club.  
 

[ignitewvu]

19 hours ago, CKaneb said:

Just as the title says. Whenever I am building a club I always take a dry swingweight (NO epoxy, YES grip, YES ferrule) to get a rough estimate of what the club is at so I know if I need to add any tip weights or not. However, when I go through this process and eventually build the club, it always swingweights out lighter than what the dry swingweight was. Can anyone tell me why this could possibly be the case? If anything it should be heavier because epoxy is now in the equation, right?

That is the grip end changing what the scale reads.
Each wrap of full grip tape or full build up tape is 1.5 grams = 3 grams of 1.5 SW points.

Maybe the split grip isn't fully seated

There is also the grip solvent to factor in while it sets.

A properly epoxied club really only adds .75-1 gram...it really isn't a fact unless you put WAY too much in.

 

I SW everything with 2 wraps of tape & a 52ish gram weight.  If i hit my desired SW there I just build the club.

Edited July 18 by ignitewvu

[Noodler]

This is why I never build clubs this way.  I used to, but long ago replaced this method with using a simple formula in a spreadsheet.  That formula is accurate to within 0.25 point usually (as long as the build goes well, especially the amount of epoxy used is controlled correctly).

[Golf Pig]

21 hours ago, Howard_Jones said:

SOLUTION
Tune up at least one club using the blind test (too little or too much without a clue about values),
When done, mesure values on that club, with and without grip, the latter so you get a dry fit target w/o grips to eliminate the grip cap/split grip error. its ALL about Play lenght vs head wgt, NOT whats going on grip side, and this is how we eliminate that.

GRIPS and TOLERANCES
- When the set is built, check specs BEFORE you add grips to make sure they came out right.
- Now start to put your grips on the gram scale one by one, mark each with its wgt.
- Now you measure Total wgt EX-grip for each iron.
- Ideal for SW matched clubs is 7 grams avarege with constant wgt shafts.
- Now you can use grip wgt variables to even out the total wgt slope.
(Heavy grips on light clubs and opposite so total weight progression becomes as good as possible with what you got at hand.)

Never mind what this clubs measure with grips on the SW scale, you have now matched HEAD and play lenght like it should, and even got TW progression as good as can be. we can NOT make it any better than that, since we can now change grips later without messing up a SW match job where clubs was matched to a "split grip", NOT vs play lenght and head wgt.

TAKE NOTES from start to end of ALL specs and mods for reference, also for later grip changes.

 

All you need to know about swing weight and total weight slope is right here. This post should be a sticky.

[CKaneb]

23 hours ago, Ger21 said:

Your title and description are at odds with one another.

good catch lol, it has been changed

[CKaneb]

20 hours ago, Stuart_G said:

 

Usually the epoxy is balanced out by the single layer of double sided tape - so no it's not usually heavier because of the epoxy.  At least not if you're only the amount of epoxy that's needed and not too much excess.

 

In addition to what others (especially Howard) has posted:

 

How much lighter?  and how consistent is it?

 

How exactly are you "adding" the grip during the dry check?

 

Are you installing additional layers of tape to build up your grip size?

 

For the dry weight check, is the ferrule (and therefore the hossel insertion depth and playing length) in the exact same place as when its' glued up?  If you push it down further during the epoxy, that will shorten the playing length - which will lower the swing weight.

 

1. It's usually 1-2 SW points lighter built than it is dry

2. I have a version of the same grip I play that is cut down the middle so I can put it on the shaft

3. Nope, just 1 layer of tape

4. Yes, ferrule is seated where it would be when glued up

[CKaneb]

3 hours ago, Noodler said:

This is why I never build clubs this way.  I used to, but long ago replaced this method with using a simple formula in a spreadsheet.  That formula is accurate to within 0.25 point usually (as long as the build goes well, especially the amount of epoxy used is controlled correctly).

Any chance you can make that spreadsheet available to the public? Sounds like an amazing resource

[Howard_Jones]

2 hours ago, Golf Pig said:

 

All you need to know about swing weight and total weight slope is right here. This post should be a sticky.

Naaahhh, then i should be "a-z" for how to...this is just a short input, but i might write a compleste guide, it seems like needed, even if i dit write a post about how to blueprint a set of irons to the      smallest tolerances possible.

...but that was only a "reply" too, but more detailed than the post above.