Golf Clubface Screw Pattern for Energy Transfer
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing golf club designs, particularly metal head clubs like drivers and hybrids, limit the distance of ball flight due to face deflection during impact, reducing the energy transferred to the ball and resulting in shorter shots, especially for amateur golfers who often miss the sweet spot.
Innovation Solution
A golf club head with a plurality of screws embedded in a geometric pattern on the clubface, which reduces deflection and expands the sweet spot, allowing for more energy transfer and longer distances, even on off-center hits.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Strength
If a solid metal clubface is used, then the clubhead structure is simple and strong, but the face deflects on impact absorbing energy and reducing ball distance
Solution Approach 1:
The clubface is segmented into multiple individual screw elements arranged in a geometric pattern. Each screw acts as an independent structural element that maintains face rigidity while allowing localized flexibility. This segmentation prevents the entire face from deflecting uniformly, reducing energy absorption while maintaining overall structural strength.
Solution Approach 2:
The clubface combines metal material with a pattern of screws creating a composite structure. This composite design provides both the strength of solid metal and the energy-returning properties of the screw configuration, reducing unwanted deflection while maintaining durability and structural integrity.
2Device complexity
If the sweet spot area is small, then the clubface design is simple, but off-center hits result in significant distance loss
Solution Approach 1:
The screw pattern creates zones of different stiffness across the clubface, with higher density around the sweet spot and varying density toward the edges. This local variation in structural quality expands the effective sweet spot area, providing more consistent performance on off-center hits while maintaining a relatively simple overall design.
3Reliability
If more screws are added to expand the sweet spot, then the effective hitting area increases, but the device complexity and manufacturing difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The screw pattern uses asymmetric geometric arrangements (such as triangular or diamond patterns) that are optimized for the specific stress distribution on the clubface. This asymmetric design achieves effective sweet spot expansion with a manageable number of screws, avoiding the complexity that would result from symmetric or uniformly distributed patterns.
Data Source
AI summary
An enhanced club head for a golf club that improves the distance achieved on a golf shot. ‘Metal head’ golf clubs, such as drivers, fairway metals, and hybrids have metallic sidewalls defining an interior cavity of the club head. A clubface of the metal head is enhanced by inserting a plurality of screws in a spaced apart relation to improve the sweet spot of clubface. It is believed that the plurality of screws in the clubface reduces the deflection of the clubface when the club strikes the golf ball, thereby imparting greater energy into the ball to obtain a greater distance.