Hello all!
It has been quite some time since I have last posted on the boards. I would like to say hi to all the familiar and not so familiar faces here. Feels good to be back
I have been very busy with school and such. Now that I am back and up to speed on everything etc, I will now be able to fill everyone in by answering questions, talk about new progress that is being made, what our plans are for future runs, etc.
I first want to start off by saying thanks to everyone thus far for all of the great comments, reviews, ideas, questions, and everything! All of this is very supporting and vital to us, which helps us tremendously. Please keep them coming!
I would like to talk a little bit more about the Ion.
There were a handful of key concepts that I wanted to implement into designing this disc.
Primarily, creating a putter that would have a strip of plastic made of different material, around the outermost diameter of the disc.
The route we have chosen to execute this was to use a two stage injection molding process. We have our mold and two sets of inserts that fit the mold. The first set of inserts produces what we call the 'core' part of the disc. The core from our first run, which we are currently selling, is the blue portion of the disc. Then, we interchange the first set of inserts with the second set. This second set of inserts encases the blue 'core'. With the core inside these inserts, we inject what we call the 'overmold' portion of the disc around the circumference. The 'overmold' is the soft and grippy red plastic on the outside of the disc.
Mad Scientist said:
I was just wondering if the edge of the core was smooth, or if there was some sort of channel for the rim plastic to form around.
I am not totally sure which edge you are referring to, but with our process, there are no channels/holes/etc that you have to worry about getting in the way of your fingers or anything. This is contrary to the stepped-up edge under the Quest Odyssey line of discs. We did not want any feature of the disc to have any inhabitance on comfort, allowing for a smooth accurate throw.
Why a different plastic along the circumference of the disc?
The number one reason for this, is that it would enable us to mold a VERY soft and grippy plastic along the leading edge of the disc to grab the chains. With the core in the middle of the disc, we can have any flexibility we choose without sacrificing the ability to grip the chains. This allows us to have a firm feeling putter, but will still have a tacky outer diameter to stop the disc on the chains. With two plastics being used, there are many creative combinations we are brewing up that may be seen in the future. There are a few other ideas that we have come up with that utilize this concept of an overmolded leading edge...but those are going to be a secret for now, until we make further progress on them
And of course, cool color combinations can and will be implemented!
Comfort. We wanted this disc to feel pristine in your hands. A putter needs to feel perfect in order to have a clean release, allowing for an accurate shot. The major factor that went into the design was the rounded edge on the inside of the rim meeting the flight plate. This can be seen from the cross section picture. Your fingers literally conform to the inside of the disc. You have to hold one to really understand how nice these feel. With the smooth rounded edge, you will have much cleaner releases from putting, approach shots, and even driving! We did not want to have any sharp corners or pressure points on this disc, just a putter that feels 'perfect'.
With our designed profile of the disc, we were shooting for a neutral or slightly under stable putter. I have only had the chance to throw a handful of drives, upshots, and putts with the disc. but I feel that the disc is a straight and neutral flyer. The rounded edge on the inside of the rim has made the disc very gyroscopic. Since there is more added weight along the outside of the disc, it keeps the disc spinning longer, making for a straighter flight. This is even true into a wind, with the gyroscopic forces, wind has less affect on changing the flight pattern.
Please keep your flight reviews coming! If you do not have an Ion to throw yet, please PM BCR-9er to buy our available first runs.
Currently, we are only using one type of plastic for the Ion. The plastic we are using is Polyurethane, which is widely known as an extremely durable plastic used for golf discs. This is comparable/same to Innova Champion, Discraft Z, etc. But, we have available to us, a vast variety of flexibilities of polyurethane. We have prototyped some cores that are very stiff, and some even flexible enough to literally roll up like a pancake. These were just a tiny batch of prototypes, but we plan to run a variety of these to suit all needs of different firmnesses. The one beautiful thing about the polyurethane we have available to us, is that it comes as straight polyurethane to our factory. All we have to do is just order what flexibility polyurethane and presto, we have our exact flexibility we want. There is no blending, no mixing, no guesswork, there is no variances between runs. CONSISTENT. We have yet to come up with a name for this plastic at this time. We will also create a flexibility scale that matches our exact orders of polyurethane so you will get your EXACT preferred flexibility to your likings EVERY time.
As for a baseline plastic. We have been very swamped rushing to finish the mold, prototyping different plastics, setting up sales, and getting everything tweaked perfectly, that we do not have time to test out a baseline plastic at this time. Could we work on a baseline plastic at a future time? Most definitely, but when is not something I can answer just yet.
So, as we stand right now. We have ran one large batch of these semi flexible light blue core with a red, grippy, overmold. All of which weigh approx 166 grams.
Future progress. Our next step and priority is running some max weight and close to max weight Ions. In addition to weight, we will be running a variety of flexibilities. We are working out how many different flexibilities we want to market, we just know that we can have them from super stiff to super floppy, and anywhere in between. But in the meantime, we need to sell some of our first runs before we can do a whole lot of progress at this time.
Please, if you have any questions, comments, reviews, thoughts, anything, feel free to post here and I will do my best, along with BCR-9er and PRES 10, to help out in any way we can.
Thank you very much,
Chad
