The Easy Club is a new club head removal, epoxy break down device from Ultra Flex Power Technologies. It will also quick bond 24 hour epoxy. I really like the unit and the possibilities of using it in a workshop environment.

The Easy Club is an incredibly beefy unit that weighs 14.5 pounds and occupies less than a square foot of desk top. The unit itself appears to be constructed of a heavy duty steel box, several heavy duty cables, and a series of membrane switches with several settings. The unit can be ordered as 115v or 230v single phase power. The unit works via magnetic induction and included is what I call “The Power Wand” and a trigger footswitch.

In working this simple unit, you hold the “Power Wand” or PW against a golf club hosel for several seconds and the epoxy bond between shaft and club is broken via magnetic induction. Conversely, you can hold the unit against the hosel of a newly epoxied club and the 24 hour epoxy will bond in seconds. Both operations are fairly clean and very straight forward. I have not been able to work out all the kinks of the machine as of yet, but I am still trying and overall feel the unit can be further improved among various points to combat any of the negatives that cropped up; either through further experiments and testing on my part or a partial redesign of the unit.

The removing of a golf club head is very easy. Put your club in a club vise or have someone else hold it for you. Program your heat and time settings and either press start on the panel or engage the footswitch. You then just hold the PW against the surface of the club. The unit heats the hosel very quickly. At factory settings, bluing of the hosel was evident. I did some experimenting and gradually found out that for most clubs, a 70% power setting @ 30 seconds heated the hosel and shaft enough for removal by hand. This worked with either steel shafts or graphite shafts. Although the majority of hosels and clubs I worked on were straight steel and not painted. My settings on painted hosels was not good and would be the same as expected from running a propane torch at one spot on a painted head. (Don’t try this on anything important.) Although I have removed about 100 heads with the unit, I haven’t had the guts to keep testing the unit on painted clubs. I am sure the settings, much like a propane or butane torch, can be adjusted for quick removal without burning the paint or by using an alternative to protect the paint like an anti burn gel. One other feature is that the heated hosels seem to cool down very quickly, faster than if they were heated via propane. I believe the metal on the inside of the hosel is heated before heating the outside and there should be a way to apply the unit directly to painted hosels without burning them. I have tried alternate settings on the unit that are lower energy with longer times. During these trials, I have moved the PW around the hosel, much like heating a head with propane.

I additionally had further experience with the unit in removing bore through heads. Although the unit does heat the area completely, all of my instances of bore through heads utilized graphite shafts. I was afraid to twist the head off the shafts for fear of twisting the shaft tip from the body of the shaft. I instead put the club (after heating) into a head pulling unit. After tightening the shaft in my unit as usual, the head came right off the shaft. Again, I resorted to the head puller due to the fact that I wanted to save the shafts and I didn’t want to just twist off the shaft and leave part of it in the head or perhaps twist the shaft and compromise its integrity. Fortunately, there are a few graphite shafts in use for two months with no breakage (and these for a particularly hard hitter.)

My biggest complaints involve the PW and the footswitch. Although the Power Wand is very beefy at 2.8 pounds, there is a very specific area that you must hold to the hosel to start the unit either by footswitch or by hand. This area is slightly larger than one inch. Even if you have one of the longer hosels (like a traditional wedge,) the Power Wand will almost always not fit on the hosel (remember no paint can be there) without hitting the ferrule. The ferrule melts beautifully. After several tries, I began by heating the hosel for a short period while touching the ferrule (The unit will not start without the PW touching metal.) I then turn the unit off, knife off the ferrule, and return to heating the hosel. This is a method that I usually employ when removing a head via propane or butane, so there are no additional problems created in using the Easy Club. Unfortunately, part of the ferrule can melt on the PW and then it must be wiped off with paper towel as it will spread the melted part of the ferrule all over the hosel upon further heating. This does add an additional step that is unnecessary with traditional propane and butane removal. I must state, however, that in ninety-nine percent of the time in my own practice, that I remove the ferrule before removing the head from the shaft.

The footswitch is very cool and it allows single person operation. It is also beefy and seems to utilize some rugged wire to connect to the main unit. The cord should be about twice as long as the unit could be tucked on the back part of the work bench out of the way of normal operations but within easier reach of the footswitch. The power setting is manipulated via a membrane panel. Again, this unit is VERY beefy, much like something you would see on military style hardware.

The bonding claims of the unit are right in line. Before even thinking of conducting experiments, I contacted the firm that is involved in repackaging roughly 95% of all the club makers epoxy in the United States. The names this company handles are: Golfsmith, Golfworks, TWGT, Diamond Tour, and others. They sent me for further information to Royal Epoxy, who supplies all their epoxy. After a few days of phone tag, I was told by their tech that all of the epoxies they supply to the repackager will maintain roughly 2900 psi lap shear strength when heated above room temp. The products I am speaking of are all known as 24 hour epoxies. My own experiments were tried with Golfworks 24 hour and with the TWGT 24 hour epoxy. The product technician gave me several different temps and times in which the 24 hour epoxy would set up. It would not fully cure for several days afterward (just like all 24 hour epoxy generally doesn’t fully, 100% cure for at least a week after mixing.) However, I mean to say that the clubs are immediately playable after getting juiced by the PW.

Epoxy Gel Time
250F	65 seconds
300F	35 seconds
350F	30 seconds
400F	25 seconds

As per Manny at Royal Epoxy

I used the epoxy on a set of irons and on several other clubs; 20 are currently in play with no issues. I used the Easy Club to install shafts in heads and extensions in shafts. Overall, I have become very impressed with the unit. I am having a further meeting with a representative of the Ultra Flex this upcoming week in an effort to iron out some of the problems that I have detailed above. Complete emailed feedback has been provided to them. At the time of this article, prices for units are unavailable. I will try to get them nailed down at the meeting later this week. Overall, I would call the Easy Club a very nice unit that will help you maintain a set removal temperature for your shop.

Other uses could be in removing metal parts or bolts that have rusted in place or have been inserted with a locktite type material in general metal shop work or even for use on automobiles and other mechanical gadgets, being careful to not expose and wiring or magnetic elements to the Power Wand. My interest, in general, going in, was with getting a unit that would allow me to use 24 hour epoxy and get it bonded within a few seconds without having to pay for the expensive 5 minute solutions now available that sometimes doesn’t hold up as much as necessary for professional production of golf clubs. I think I have found it in Easy Club and it’s quite a happy find. Additionally, the Easy Club does a good job of removing heads from shafts as long as there is no paint involved (present limitations.) I will continue to use the Easy Club and hope to find solutions to my objections to the unit.