I cannot clearly understand your experiment. Do you have a small flexible piece of string of finite length (eg. 3") between the nut and the peripheral end of the dowels stick? If yes - then I can imagine the string following the plane of clubshaft movement with the hex nut dragging behind in the same plane. However, what happens if you attach the hex nut to the peripheral end of the dowel stick with a piece of rigid metal about 3" in length and then move the dowel stick in a rounded arc - as if you were swinging it like a golf club across the front of the body?
I have no problem seeing the clubshaft hosel rotate around the sweetspot in your example - where the grip end (fulcrum point) remains stationary and the clubshaft hangs vertically, and the sweetspot remains in the same spot in space while the club is being twirled.
However, the clubshaft's grip end is moving continuously in space along a rounded arc of motion during the golf swing, and while it is moving the clubshaft's grip end is also rotating in direct proportion to the degree of rotation of the flat left wrist/hand. While this is happening, I cannot see the clubshaft hosel rotating around the sweetspot. Can you?
I have no problem seeing the clubshaft hosel rotate around the sweetspot in your example - where the grip end (fulcrum point) remains stationary and the clubshaft hangs vertically, and the sweetspot remains in the same spot in space while the club is being twirled.
However, the clubshaft's grip end is moving continuously in space along a rounded arc of motion during the golf swing, and while it is moving the clubshaft's grip end is also rotating in direct proportion to the degree of rotation of the flat left wrist/hand. While this is happening, I cannot see the clubshaft hosel rotating around the sweetspot. Can you?
Jeff.
I cannot see the fingers of the pianist playing Mozart that misses a key, but I can hear it. Must everything been seen to know?
if you took a strip of sheet metal say 1 inch wide by 6 inch long and wrapped it around the end of the dowel and attached it to a weight, it's stiffness would prevent it from "releasing" in the plane of the golfswing while still allowing to rotate out of the plane of the swing (provided it doesn't bind up) if indeed it were subjected to a force that caused it to want to rotate out of the plane of the swing. I submit there is no force that causes it to want to rotate out of the plane of the swing.
Generally speaking..
Any object (a shaft for instance) will naturally want to rotate about an axis defined by its angular momentum vector. But all real objects are constrained to rotate about random axis which due to manufacturing tolerances is never aligned with the angular momentum. This unavoidable misalignment between angular momentum vector and axis of rotation causes imbalance forces. (Lathe imbalance for instance). But this has nothing to do with the face of a golf club opening and closing.
What we have with a golf club is the CG of each element of its contruction (head and shaft) wanting to find their way ONTO the plane of rotation (not off of) the plane of rotation. But... the club head being attached to the hossel is forced to rotate off plane (against its natural inclination) as the golfer's hands cause the shaft to rotate about its longitudinal axis.
Originally Posted by Jeff
nm golfer
I cannot clearly understand your experiment. Do you have a small flexible piece of string of finite length (eg. 3") between the nut and the peripheral end of the dowels stick? If yes - then I can imagine the string following the plane of clubshaft movement with the hex nut dragging behind in the same plane. However, what happens if you attach the hex nut to the peripheral end of the dowel stick with a piece of rigid metal about 3" in length and then move the dowel stick in a rounded arc - as if you were swinging it like a golf club across the front of the body?
You wrote-: "f you took a strip of sheet metal say 1 inch wide by 6 inch long and wrapped it around the end of the dowel and attached it to a weight, it's stiffness would prevent it from "releasing" in the plane of the golfswing while still allowing to rotate out of the plane of the swing (provided it doesn't bind up) if indeed it were subjected to a force that caused it to want to rotate out of the plane of the swing. I submit there is no force that causes it to want to rotate out of the plane of the swing."
You state that there is no force that would cause the clubhead to rotate out of the plane of the swing. That would be true if the hands propelling the dowel stick didn't rotate the dowel stick about its own axis while the dowel stick is being moved in a rounded arc. However, the left hand holding the dowelstick may swivel counterclockwise while the left hand is moving the dowel stick in a rounded arc. Wouldn't that cause the clubhead to change its position relative to the clubshaft, and wouldn't that change in position of the COG of the clubhead cause it to rotate even more - because the COG of the clubhead has shifted in space relative to the overall orbit of the dowel stick's hosel?
I am thinking of a similar argument to your argument about the release phenomenon - where the club acquires angular velocity because the hand directional pull is not in-line with the COG of the club.