Designing your own driver is like running a race through a jungle that’s littered with booby traps. No matter how fast you are (or in this case, how good your idea is for a driver), you’ll need help navigating through the obstacles or you’ll never survive.

Myself and 18 contestants on Wilson Staff’s new TV show, which documents the driver design process in a competitive Shark Tank-esque format, found out just how many booby traps lay unseen in the jungle of driver design.

Golf Channel’s “Driver vs. Driver” reality show, sponsored by Wilson, airs October 4 at 10 p.m. EST and pits driver designs from novices against each other. Nearly 300 submissions were accepted from “bus drivers, engineers, college students who have never played golf… real people,” says Michael Vrska, Global Innovation Director at Wilson. The 18 contestants were a part of 11 different teams, and they worked with professional golf club designers from Wilson to refine their designs. The winner not only earns $500,000, but the distinction of having his or her driver brought to market for the golfing public to purchase.

Judging the driver designs on the show are former NFL linebacker Brian Urlacher, former USGA Technical Director Frank Thomas, Wilson Golf President Tim Clarke and PGA Tour player Kevin Streelman. The show host is Melanie Collins, who also co-hosts on Golf Channel’s Big Break.

As I learned — and I’m sure the contestants on the show did as well — the driver-design process has some serious and unexpected challenges. Personally, I needed major help along the way from Wilson’s design team to not only make an awesome driver, but make a legal driver. Below, I detail the process of my driver design from start to finish, including photos and real feedback from along the way.

GolfWRX Driver

My first challenge in designing a new driver was answering the question, “What hasn’t been done already?” Think about for a second. Not so easy, huh? And it’s especially difficult when you need to sketch something up, and send it to professional driver designers knowing the sketches will be on GolfWRX for the world to see.

No pressure.

Here’s what was going through my amateur-driver-designer brain during the design period.

The best-performing drivers have low CG and high MOI, right? So I’ll sketch up a driver that has extremely low and rearward CG. Duh.

So I slapped some carbon fiber on the crown to save some weight up top, and threw a rear extension low and back behind the club to drag weight all the back away from the face.

Looks good enough. And we need some adjustability, too. Hmm… I got it! Let’s put the gear from GolfWRX’s Gear Trials logo, make that dual-weighted — half aluminum and half tungsten — and spinning that gear will allow golfers to shift CG. There’s also some more room in the back of the sole. Might as well add some additional adjustability. And a speed channel behind the face, too, because… why not?

I figured the weights could be made of different materials of varying weights, and you’d interchange them depending on whether you wanted neutral, draw, fade, and could adjust head weight, too.

Brilliant! OK, about a year’s worth of R&D done in 15 minutes. A great-looking, and probably awesome-performing driver. Maybe this really is easier than it looks.

So I sent my very amateur sketches off to Wilson and got some lunch. I may or may not have been thinking I’d have a new career in designing drivers when I came back.

A few days passed and I received an email with feedback from Wilson. It was much like checking an exam grade that you thought you absolutely knocked out of the park.

And… I failed. Miserably.

Initial Design Feedback Summary

Little chance the carbon fiber inserts and face-to-skirt radii would pass durability.

Front-to-back length must be less than heel-to-toe length, so the driver is non-conforming under USGA rules.

Volume is 478cc, which is also non-conforming under USGA rules, which set 460cc as the mass limit.

The gear is too large, and is estimated to be too heavy.

The four weight inserts would likely add even more mass to the design, which already weighs too much.

I didn’t think about the USGA, nor did I consider mass, durability… and reality. The gear design and rear extension might work after all, though, even though the four weights probably wouldn’t. There just wasn’t enough weight to go around, especially when saving weight is the goal.

Here’s the second round of designs after a few back and forth conversations via email with the Wilson team.

Round 2 Feedback Summary

Club is now USGA conforming, with a shorter front-to-back dimension and 458cc volume.

CG is 0.130 inches toe-ward.

Overall head weight is still too high, and that’s before the hosel adaptor or interchangeable weights are added.

The lip structure for the carbon crown will also add additional weight.

It was still too heavy, and CG was toe-ward, which is less than ideal. But at least it was USGA conforming!

Wilson’s team asked for my thoughts on how to reduce size, weight and reposition CG. I was stumped. Luckily I was invited to Wilson’s headquarters in Chicago to play lead driver designer for a day, and sat over the shoulders of design experts, helping making final decisions on every aspect of the design.

Truth being told, however, I was just along for the ride. Wilson’s team took what was an obviously amateur — and frankly, a non-commonsensical driver design — and turned it into something that looked really cool, and might perform decently in the real world if it actually went to production.

A special thanks to Mark Spencer, Mark Kerscher, Kevin Mayoux, Rich Hulock and Michael Vrska for all of the time and assistance!

Final Design

Finals stats:

CG with gear weight max toe = 0.034 inches toe-ward

CG with gear weight max heel = 0.038 inches heel-ward

Total CG movement with gear weight = 0.072 inches

CAD MOI = Over 4100 for all gear weight positions

According to Wilson, MOI would probably be about 4300-4400 if it were actually to be produced. Also, with the amount of CG shift, the gear design would likely be enough to make a real impact on ball flight. Saving weight from various portions of the head made that possible.

Would it be the best driver on the market? Definitely not. But having the final product be USGA legal, and not a complete disaster was a success.

Final Thoughts

It would be a drastic understatement to say I have a newfound respect for driver design.

So much goes into designing a driver that it’s frankly overwhelming. Not only do you have to worry about conformity, durability, cost and production, but you need to highlight technologies in order to have a marketable driver, attract your intended consumers, and obviously, build something that performs better than not only your company’s predecessors, but other drivers on the current market. Oh yeah, and you only have about a year to do it.

As GolfWRX Senior Editor, I think it’s best I stick to reviewing the newest equipment rather than designing it.

Enjoy the gallery below featuring all of the sketches, CAD designs, FEA tests, etc., and don’t forget to vote in the poll below!

Poll

Would you want to test this GolfWRX/Wilson Staff driver? Yes.

No. View Results

Loading ... Loading ...

[wrx_retail_links productid=”112″]