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ES 240 project: Stress and Vibration Analysis of a Golf Driver
In this project, I will attempt to analyze the stresses and vibrations produced by a stroke of a golfer on the club in order to determine the drivers “sweet spot.” The sweet spot is the spot on the clubface, which causes the lease amount of vibration and force transfer to the golfers hand thus giving the golfer the best energy transfer, feel and therefore, the best drive. (Cross, The Sweet Spot of a baseball bat) Anyone who plays golf can quickly approximate the location of the sweet spot so I will attempt to verify its location through finite element analysis.
There are few golf studies of stress and vibration analysis (in the English language) so I will also use studies based on baseball bat impacts/vibrations.
Using ABAQUS, I will model a finite element structure of a basic golf driver, paying special attention to the geometric and material properties given to the shaft and to the driver head. FEA will allow me to analyze the distribution of stress and the harmonics experienced through the club. I will apply the impulse to different locations on the club face and determine the frequency of each impulse. After choosing a small number of points, I hope to be able to determine the average “sweet spot” of the club. If time permits, I will attempt to model other golf head geometries and compare.
Attached are 3 papers, which give a related study on what I am attempting.
| Attachment | Size |
|---|---|
 The Sweet Spot of a Baseball Bat.pdf | 110.25 KB |
| Numerical Analysis of Golf Club Head.pdf | 747.36 KB |
| Modal Properties of Golf Club Wood Driver in Differ….pdf | 382.99 KB |
 golf project.ppt | 1.64 MB |
| golf_paper_APodpirka.pdf | 8.2 MB |
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ES240 Project Critique
This project proposal is very impressive in many ways. The author chose the right object, a golf clubface, to model in FEM. Due to its structural complexity, modeling of golf clubs requires a numerical method, rather than an analytical model, for more accurate results. The author has a clear idea about the procedures to accomplish the goal based on his well prepared literature search. According to my brief search on the literature archive, most numerical work on golf clubs were on shaft design, and a club head was often modeled just as a rigid mass [1, 2]. It is great that the author is eager to tackle a problem that has not been worked on much. Many golfers will surely be interested in the project results.
I observed the following difficulties in this project. First, boundary conditions and loading conditions need to be set properly. Since the load will be applied dynamically, and clubs are held by humans, these conditions would vary depending on cases. Second, due to the limited time, a set of loading points and loading conditions should be smartly chosen to promptly obtain optimal results. However, both difficulties can be positively worked on with the help of the previous work done by others, as suggested by the author.
Although the author already has more than enough to work on, another interesting follow-up result would be how much difference the “sweet spot” can make in the ball flight length [3]. I would be also interested in the effect of the golf head structure (shape, material, rigid/hollow) to their vibration modes.
[1] Cheong, S.K. , Kang, K.W., and Jeong, S.K., “Evaluation of the mechanical performance of golf shafts,” Engineering Failure Analysis, v 13, n 3 SPEC. ISS., April, 2006, p 464-473
[2] Knight, C.E., Wicks, A.L., and Braunwart, P. “Modeled dynamic response of a golf club during the swing,” Proceedings of the International Modal Analysis Conference - IMAC, v 1, 2000, p 550-554
[3] Mase, T., “Simple design methodology for golf ball impact and flight,” Society of Mechanical Engineers, Pressure Vessels and Piping Division (Publication) PVP, v 396, 1999, p 183-186