Golf Club Head Texture Pattern for USGA Compliance
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Solution Overview
Problem
The challenge is to design a golf club head striking face that enhances spin while adhering to USGA regulations on surface roughness, which limits the average surface roughness (Ra) to 180 μin and maximum peak-to-trough value to 1,000 μin, and also addresses the dispersion issue in manufacturing to consistently hit target surface roughness characteristics.
Innovation Solution
A golf club head with a recurrent texture pattern defined by a plurality of depressions and scorelines, where the period of the texture pattern is between 0.20 and 0.35 inches, and the scorelines have a pitch that is greater than the period, combined with a manufacturing method involving multiple milling passes to achieve specific surface roughness parameters, ensuring compliance with USGA regulations.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Force
If the surface roughness of the striking face is increased to enhance spin, then the friction between club head and golf ball is improved, but the USGA compliance is violated due to exceeding Ra 180 μin and Rz 1000 μin limits
Solution Approach 1:
The striking face is segmented into multiple functional zones: scorelines (deep grooves for water channeling and visual alignment), recurrent texture pattern (moderate roughness for spin), and landing areas (smooth zones for consistent ball contact). This segmentation allows different regions to serve different purposes while collectively meeting USGA specifications.
Solution Approach 2:
Different surface roughness characteristics are applied to different locations on the striking face. The recurrent texture pattern provides localized roughness enhancement in specific areas while maintaining smoother regions elsewhere, allowing spin optimization without exceeding overall USGA limits for the entire striking face surface.
2Force
If the target surface roughness values are set closer to USGA limits to maximize spin, then the spin performance is improved, but the manufacturing dispersion causes more products to be nonconforming
Solution Approach 1:
The manufacturing process incorporates preliminary control measures by establishing a target Rz value (700-900 μin) that is deliberately set below the USGA limit (1000 μin). This preliminary action accounts for expected manufacturing dispersion, ensuring that even with normal process variation, the majority of products remain within compliance limits while still achieving optimal spin performance.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements feedback control in the manufacturing process by measuring actual surface roughness characteristics and adjusting milling parameters accordingly. This allows real-time correction of deviations from target values, reducing manufacturing dispersion and ensuring consistent compliance across production batches.
3Ease of manufacture
If a single milling pass is used to create the texture pattern, then the manufacturing process is simplified, but the surface roughness dispersion increases making it difficult to hit target characteristics
Solution Approach 1:
The texture pattern creation is segmented into multiple sequential milling passes, each contributing a specific component of the final surface structure. This multi-pass approach breaks down the complex surface generation into controllable stages, reducing the variability in each individual pass and improving overall consistency.
Solution Approach 2:
The manufacturing process uses periodic milling actions with specific pitch relationships (T/Ps > 1.0) to create the recurrent texture pattern. This periodic action with controlled parameters ensures repeatable results across multiple passes and parts, reducing dispersion while maintaining process feasibility.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution achieves enhanced ball spin characteristics while maintaining compliance with USGA surface roughness limits, reducing dispersion, and improving spin performance in both dry and wet conditions.
Implementation Method 1
milling on a striking face of a club head body
Implementation Method 2
The texture pattern increases the roughness of the striking face, and thus enhances the friction between the club head and the golf ball upon contact
Data Source
AI summary
Provided are a golf club head and a method for producing the golf club head. The golf club head comprises a striking face that in turn comprises a recurrent texture pattern that has a period T and that is defined by a plurality of depressions, each depression having an average depth no greater than 0.10 mm. The striking face also comprises a plurality of scorelines that at least partially intersect the recurrent texture pattern and that have a scoreline pitch Ps such that T/Ps is greater than 1.0, each scoreline having an average depth no less than 0.10 mm.