Unfortunately, to fulfil this stage of custom fitting and assembly it requires a relatively high outlay. The remainder of a decent, functional workshop can be kitted out for a few hundred pounds, but when it comes to clubhead bending machines, the serious club maker is looking at a cost of at least £500. This may seem expensive, especially in the current economic climate, but a ‘loft and lie' service that is implemented and advertised correctly can become a great source of income. Checking and adjusting a customer's clubs should be charged at around £30-40, so it wouldn't take long to recoup the cost of machinery, and after that every job is virtually pure profit.
Unlike a lot of other golf club specifications, loft and lie have an immediate and major influence on ball flight, and golfers are becoming more aware of its importance to shot accuracy, distance and trajectory.
Plane and simple
A properly fitted lie is crucial to the playability of a club as it has a major influence on accuracy. An incorrect lie can force the golfer into making swing alterations to compensate, which is obviously the antithesis of true custom fitting. A club that is too upright for a golfer normally results in shots that fly to the left of the intended target (for a right handed golfer), and the opposite applies to a club with a lie angle that is too flat.
It is a common misconception that it is the heel or the toe that digs in to the ground that causes the directional problems, when in fact it is the result of both lie angle and loft, or the ‘Face Plane Tilt'. If the toe is raised at impact the face points to the left, and vice versa if the toe is down at impact. It is the same principal that occurs when playing a shot from a side hill lie: the ball above the feet causes a pull and a ball below the feet flies to the right.
As the loft increases, the lie of the club becomes more influential to the angle of the face at impact, so it is more important to ensure correct lie in the shorter, scoring clubs than in the mid and long irons, and it is of almost no relevance in the woods.
The club length also has an influence on lie angle. If a golfer requires a club that is an inch longer, the new club will play two degrees more upright, so adjustments may be required. The golden rule is that half an inch in length is equal to one degree in lie angle.
Tape recording
When I started in club making many years ago, we all fitted the lie of a club using a static test by pushing a coin under the toe of the club until it touched the middle of the sole. Alas, this didn't take into account the change in posture and body position through impact, and nor did it allow for shaft drop, so in effect this method was a complete waste of time.
There is only one true way to fit for lie, and that is by using a hitting board and masking tape. By getting a golfer to hit half a dozen shots from a lie board with a piece of making tape on the sole of the club, the marks left on the tape will indicate the true lie required, regardless of the golfer's height, wrist-to-floor measurement or posture at address. Marks left on the toe side of centre require the club to be more upright, while marks on the heel side require a flatter lie. It is very unusual for a golfer to change swing mechanics to the extent that they vary the marks on the sole, so if the first mark is toe side, all the subsequent marks generally will be too.
Every club is an individual
Golf club manufacturers have traditionally made their sets of irons with one-degree increments between clubs, becoming more upright the shorter the clubs become. However, there are no standard lie angles in the industry and so one manufacturer's irons may vary by up to two degrees from a competitor's equivalent. One of the major companies deliberately makes its irons very upright, working on the principle that most golfers fade or slice the ball. By making the irons very upright this causes an initial pull, but with the golfer's natural fade bias the ball theoretically returns to the target line. This might not be a bad quick fix but it's not geared towards long-term improvement.
The best way to fit a complete set of irons is to test each club in turn and make the adjustments accordingly. Because the shafts get progressively stiffer as the club becomes shorter, there is no reason to assume there will be any pattern to the amount of shaft drop between clubs. In fact, when fitting the lie of each club individually, it may result in two or three clubs having exactly the same lie. Rarely will there be convenient, uniform increments throughout a set.
To fit club lies properly is a thorough and comprehensive service, which takes both time and expertise, which is why it should be charged for accordingly.
In the next issue I will look at loft of both irons and woods, the materials used in clubheads and the methods used to physically alter lofts and lies.
