How-To "Backspin on chips"

Thanks Mox,

It has been an interesting debate and we seem to be at an impasse with it. I am happy to concede that we have differing opinions and will probably not agree on the subject.

I respect you for your opinions and wish you well my friend.

Best wishes

Brian

hi
its good we can all give our views and then try and support them in discussion even if we never agree on what is right but in a few posts we could be agreeing on a diffrent post.
it good to get diffrent points of views and it does make you think and that can only be a good thing.
cheers
bill

Bill,

You are a real diamond geezer in my estimation. We have never met but I hope that one day we may have the opportunity

thanks Brian
i have learned a lot in the 15 or so months i have been a member here and i have picked up a great deal from you and this site has made me think and revalue some of the things i believed and i have changed my views on some things. i hope one day we will meet and maybe have a game.
keep up your the good posts.
cheers
bill

eeeeh just having a bit of a mooch about and stumbled upon this thread!!

Now i'm not wishing to reignite things but for what it's worth i'm with Mox.

He's not saying the ball is hit squarely into the ground, like you would say, with a mallet and fence post.

In the pictures Brian posted you see (as we look at them) the ball being struck and the ball rotating anti clockwise.

How is this rotation possible without the initial movement of the ball being downwards??

It's not a squirt as in tiddly winks, as there is no pressure coming from directly above. But the initial movement of the back of the ball is down, which starts the rotation.

hi Bully
when the club face of any club from the driver to the wedge comes into the ball it always hits the ball below the equator. with a drive its just under the equator of the ball but with a wedge it more that half way below the equator due to the loft of the face of the club.
with the impact being below the center of the ball the ball has to spin back clock-wise. even a putter had a couple of degrees of loft.
the wedges and shot irons have bigger faces so the ball can slid up the face. with the less lofted clubs there is less backspin and less ball movement up the club face so the make the club face smaller.
you can still get dimples clubs and they apply just as much spin as the grooved type of clubs but there not as popular as the don't remove moisture and grass as well as the square grooved clubs faces of today.
cheers
bill

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Hi Bill, not that any of it really matters to anyone this side of a nobel prize for physics, but unless you make contact with the ball at the exact same time as you do the ground, I just don't see how the initial movement of the ball (however miniscule) is not downwards.

You said youself that , say a wedge, hits the ball first, a quarter of the way up. This initiates the backspin that accelerates as it moves up the clubface.

This initial backspin is imparted from a downward stroke and the backspin itself starts downwards to my mind.

Bully,

It happens like this:

1. In the first microsecond of impact, we have the irresistable force meeting the immovable object. The ball has to react somehow to the momentum of the clubhead, and the least-energy way it can react is by moving up the lofted clubface. Initially it slides up the clubface, because there isn't enough friction yet between clubface and ball. But all that is about to change very quickly.
2. The ball cannot acclerate to an upwards velocity in no time at all; that would require infinite acceleration, which requires infinite force. So it can't get completely out of the way of the clubhead just by sliding upwards. It begins to compress on the clubface, which creates a force between the clubface and the ball. If you don't think this is a large force, just try to compress a golf ball by 30% of its diameter using your fingers. Not even close! OK, use a vise; it's still very hard to apply that much compression force. Remember, this is a force that averages almost 2000 pounds during impact, and can easily peak around 3000 pounds. This force of compression does two important things:
   • It begins to accelerate the ball with a horizontal component, not just the vertical motion up the clubface.
   • It creates a lot of friction between ball and clubface. So, instead of sliding up the clubface, the ball begins to roll instead.
3. The ball continues accelerating upwards (due to the loft) and horizontally (due to the compressive force). The sliding has turned completely into roll, so the upwards acceleration increases the speed of roll. At some point, the momentum absorbed from the clubhead through acceleration has the ball moving faster than the clubhead. In other words, the elastic rebound of the ball's acceleration allows the ball to release from the clubhead. At this instant, its launch conditions are determined

__________________
Best Regards
Brian

________________________________
Funny o'l game!

Its probably no different than putting backspin on a ping-pong ball or a tennis ball. You strike down, but the paddle/racket face is slanted back to the degree that you want the shot to rise. I can see that AT THE NANO-MOMENT OF FIRST TOUCH, it might make some sense that the balls would be moved downward until the energy potential of the slanted, moving club/racket face and ball compression re-direct the ball to its upward flight. However, because the club is moving across as well as downward, and given the slant of the respective club face, I don't see how there is any real downward-directed potential at all.

Or do tennis balls hit with back-spin start downward and then miraculously change direction over the net?

And for those who can't separate the swing instruction from the actual results, it's AS IF you were swinging to trap the ball or hit the ball into the ground. AS IF, got it? Two separate topics in this thread I do believe.

Sorry for catching up late in this thread, but it is pretty interesting reading.

I can understand that thinking of trapping the ball into the turf is not such a bad thing but actually doing it is impossible. I have offered to eat my driver headcover if anyone can show me conclusively it happening.

That'll do for me mate!!

Seriously though it's not that important and after the couple of beers I've had, my shocking putting performance is taking presidence........

hi
if the ball does move down first then will that not mean the ball moved in two directions. anti-clockwise and down and forward a fraction and then clockwise and back and up the club face.
i can see the ball at impact reacting by climbing the angled face but not that the ball would move down as the resistance of the ball against the club face would always cause it to move up and not down even for a millisecond.
if you could meet the middle of the ball or the top half the i would think it would be possible but in golf you only ever hit below the equator and hitting below the middle will always result in the ball going up.
its like football you leg swings back and through and if you kick below the center of the ball the ball goes up the more below the middle the higher up the ball goes.
kick near to the middle and the ball stays low.
cheers
bill

__________________
ping zing2 metal driver
ping zing2 metal 3 wood
ping eye2 1 iron
ping zing2 3/9 irons
ping ist 47% wedge
ping zing2 52% s/wedge
ping mb 56% wedge
ping c10 G2I broom handled putter
top flight "T" golf balls
white ping bag

Lee Trevino is a legend! My fav player when I was a lad!

Hey Brian, one think I would point out is that in those 3 images the shaft of the club is vertical, isnt the grip supposed to be ahead of the clubhead (i.e. leaning forward)

Also, to the OP, you wont get much spin/stop on wet greens as the ball is not able to grip so it skids instead.

Cheers!

Hi,

The shaft will only lean forward if you de-loft it, it is really designed to be used upright and to get less or more loft you change the club for one with different loft.

It won't make any difference though, as the ball is contacted under it's equator it is impossible to compress the ball into the ground. try it, lay a ball on a table then take say a pitching wedge and try moving the shaft forward enough to make the loft push down on the ball, you will need to almost have the shaft horizontal.

My headcover still awaits my knife and fork

__________________
Best Regards
Brian

________________________________
Funny o'l game!