True Temper steel shafts lighter than ever

• By Global Golf Post
• Jun 18, 2012 1:08 PM ET

True Temper has been using Variable Wall Technology (VWT) for some time now to improve feel in its steel shafts, as well as to enhance accuracy, distance and control. More recently, though, the company has employed that process to make those products lighter than ever before without compromising the consistency golfers have come to expect from shafts made of that material.

Consider the new Project X PXi, which Jason Dufner has been using in his irons with great success in a year that has so far included two PGA Tour wins.

“PXi is a lightweight version of the Project X,” says Chad Hall, director of product marketing and global tour operations at True Temper. “Project X weighs in at 130 grams, while the PXi that Jason uses is only 112 grams. It still provides tour-caliber spin control and tip stability at that weight. But it also enhances distance and feel by being lighter.”

VWT is why True Temper is able to produce PXi. It enables the company to create a reinforced tip section in the manufacturing process that maintains that coveted steel shaft stability and control as it also “thins out” the wall of the shaft, moving up toward the grip. According to Hall, that’s how True Temper can reduce shaft weight without inhibiting performance.

The technology has also allowed the company to offer steel shafts – whose heavier weights when compared to graphite products have long limited their use to better, stronger players – to a much wider range of golfers.

For example, True Temper uses VWT in the manufacture of its GS steel shafts, which go as low as 75 grams. And it continues to employ it in the company’s popular Dynamic Gold shafts, which tip the scales at 130 grams. It also uses it in its Dynamic Gold SL, which is designed to play just like Dynamic Gold but weighs only 20 percent less and also in Dynalite Gold (115 grams).