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Last year I built a spine finder and have been using it on all my graphite shafts ever since with great results. But last week I pulled all the TT steel shaft from my # 2 set of irons, and I'm having all kinds of trouble using the spine finder on the steel shafts. I have tried two different sets of brand new steel shafts, one TT and one Rifle, with the same problem. When I use a graphite shaft, I can find 2 places where the shaft wants to be stable, (NP) and two places where the shaft wants to "move away from that place". That's what should happen. With the steel shafts, all I can find is one place where the shaft want to be stable, not 2. It acts like the shaft is bent, and it only wants to go to a place so that the bend is downward. Rotate the shaft 180 degrees, it should act the same way, but it doesn't. Have any of you that use spine finders on your shafts, have the same problem? Or am I just missing something? Thanks in advance for your assistance with this.

Graphite shafts generally have more then one spine. This is due to construction techniques, i.e. the graphite shafts are made by wrapping layers of material around the shaft. Steel shafts generally have only one pronounced spine because they are made by an extrusion process. Hope this helps.

That's all you're going to find is one spine/ nuetral bend point, as Forged said, it's just the way steel shafts are put together, this is normal. at least one good aspect, it's not hard to find the spine.

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Originally Posted by mikey300 That's all you're going to find is one spine/ nuetral bend point, as Forged said, it's just the way steel shafts are put together, this is normal. at least one good aspect, it's not hard to find the spine.

Mikey; NO you don't, you find TWO spine/nuetral bend points. With a graphite shaft, after I find a NP, I can rotate the shaft 180 degrees, and I find a second one. Same thing with the spine point, 180 degrees rotation, and thiere's a second one. But with steel shafts, I'm not finding this 180 degreee rotation situation. After I find what feels like a NP, I can rotate the shaft 180 degrees, and it feels more like a spine, than a NP. It's totally different with all the steel shafts I've tested compared to all the graphite shafts I've tested. It's weird and driving me nuts, which I admit, isn't a very long drive, more like a short walk. Is there any one out there that has been using a spine finder for a long time that can tell me what the secret is? Thanks.

OnePutt... check out the following link which deals with golf spines.

http://www.clubmaker-online.com/spines.html

Steel shafts fall into a category which only have one spine (which others have mentioned). This is due to the manufacturing process where a small billet is heated, bent to a ring and then welded prior to extruding. The weld is then transferred down the shaft from butt to tip, resulting in the shaft's spine.

Maybe you already knew all this, but hopefully the website will help you out some.

YES, I already know all this, and I've read that article before. What no one hiere is understanding, is that once you find a spine on a shaft, you can rotate the shaft 180 degrees, and you find it again, in the same place. It doesn't matter if the spine is at 12 O'clock, or at 6 O'clock, the shaft will exhibit the same feel, and it will flex the same way. That's exactly what happens with all the graphite shafts I've tested, but not with any of the steel shafts tested. This is the problem I'm having with steel shaft. Maybe this is what all clubmakers are finding with steel shafts, and that's what I'm trying to find out. Exactly how do I use a spine finder on a steel shaft, and how am I supposed to install the shaft afterwards? That's my question.

Sorry...

OnePutt, PLEASE listen to what these people are telling you. I've Spined thousands of steel shafts. You will find ONLY 1 spine. You'll find the S1 (spine), but VERY, VERY RARELY will you find the NBP. This is 100% what you should find due to the characteristics of the steel shaft. Graphite shafts have been found to have up to 4 spines!! Steel shaft spines are extremely easy to find a 6 year old can do it. You're over complicating things. Pay less attention to SOME of the articles you read, and even SOME of the explanations of some of the manufactures of both the shaft and the spine finders. LISTEN to the clubfitter/builder! Steel=1 spine. NOW what you want to do is after you find that spine, and the shaft is bent DOWN in your finder, mark the top of the shaft with a sharpie. That is your spine and you should align that mark toward your target, 9:00 if you're a righty and 3:00 if lefty. Simple as that. Now if only graphite shafts were that easy to spine, the world would be a better place. Good luck.

If you mark the top of your shaft with it bent down in the spine finder, thats not the spine. The spine is generally 180* from this position. Its true, steel shafts have only one spine. What you have found is the NBP of the steel shaft. I say generally because spine finders can lie.. you may actually be finding the residual bend in the shaft and not the NBP. In either case, it is the weak plane of the shaft as it will tend to spin away from the one true spine in a spine finder.

How you align the shaft in the clubhead is personal preference. The important thing in an iron set is to be consistent. Many clubmakers prefer to align NBP to target and others will align the spine (180* from the NBP) to target. Again, its important to be consistent. It is generally accepted that aligning NBP to target will result in softer feel. I have seen shafts differ as much as 1 full flex depending how you orientate it in the freq. meter.

Okay; Now I'm starting to get this figured out. My main problem was in thinking of steel shafts as I do graphite shafts. With a graphite shaft, the spine is 90 degrees away from the NBP. With a steel shaft the spine and NBP are 180 degrees away. That's where I was getting in trouble. NOW, by only problem is that govikesgo, and a GoodWalk are telling me the exact opposite as to where the spine is. Will one of you let me know which one of you is correct? I"m going to set up my spine finder again and try again with the new information you two have given me and see how I do this time. Thanks for you help. I'm starting to see the light now. Let me ask one last question. After I find the spine, how do I align the shaft so that it will play as soft as possible? The reason I ask is that I have a set of X stiff TT shafts, and I'd like to have them play more on like a Stiff flex, or at least as soft as I can get them to play. Thanks again guys.

For the irons to play as soft as possible, you would want to align the NBP to target. The spine is the most rigid and will play the stiffest. If you follow this logic and apply it to the spinefinder, it makes sense that applying a downward force to the shaft, the shaft will spin to where its most comfortable in a bending conformation. It does not want to bend at the spine! In fact, it will do all it can to spin away as quickly as possible from this orientation and bend in its softest plane. That is why when you mark the top of the shaft in a bearing-base spinefinder, it is generally the shaft's NBP.

you'll notice that the spine is generally opposite of the NBP in steel shafts, at least the one i just checked. as GWSA said, the NBP go towards the target.

OnePutt, a good walk is correct, and Although I was correct, I typed the wrong thing. I meant that with the shaft down, it's NBP, not spine. Given that, I always, for my customers put the NBP towards the target. You can position it either at 9:00 (toward the target for a righty) or 3:00 ( away from the target. Like good walk stated though and IMO when the shaft want s to jump that hard, why would you want to point it anywhere but straight at your target? Either way, just be consistant.

Thanks guys. I just got finished using my spine finder on all the shafts that I pulled out of my old set of irons. I've got a set of TT TriGold shafts in them, X stiff flex. Using the information you posted, I understood my mistake, and now I know that graphite shafts and steel shaft will react differently in the spine finder. What I did today, was find the one spot where the shaft really wants to twist away, and I marked that spot as the spine. Now I can re-install the shafts and point that mark away from the target. I sure hope it will be worth all this trouble when I'm finished. If I can see or feel a noticeable difference in how the set plays after all this work, I'll pull all the shafts from my current set of irons and do it all again. At least this time, I'll know what I'm doing.
As a side note, one thing I noticed with steel shafts. I had to use more weight on the end of the shaft to bend it. With graphite shafts, I can get good results with 3 pounds of weight, with steel shafts, I needed 5 pounds of weight to get a good feel for the shaft wanting to twist away. Now that I feel better checking steel shafts, I think I'll check 3 more sets of shafts I have in stock. Thanks again for all you help and I'm sorry to be "a little thick headed" before. Type at you later.

Couple things. You may have gotten it wrong based on your explanation. When in the spine finder and you put a load on the shaft, It should react by bending down, as if you had a fishing rod and had a fish on. In fact this technique has been used for over 50 years to find the spine on fishing rods. Anyway in that position with the shaft bend down, mark the top of that shaft and that is the NBP, not spine. THAT MARK NOW SHOULD BE POSITIONED TO THE TARGET or 9:00 O'clock. You seem to have put it the other way, but I may be wrong, but that's what your explanations looks like. Secondly, I don't know what kind of spine finder you have, but you shouldn't have to put any weight on the end of the shaft to get it to bend. What you need to do is go to Home Depot and buy a sealed bearing, about the size of a quarter, with a center hole large enough to fit over the tip. Now just pull down on the bearing and the shaft will jump to NBP with no effort at all. You can then twist the shaft around in the spine finder to get repeated jumps to the NBP. Hope this helps. Check out this link for a visual image of the jb spine finder in action. As you see the shaft bending down, the top is NPB http://usera.imagecave.com/govikesgo/vise_holder3.jpg