Mallet shaft weight comparison

Ever wonder which shaft is the lightest? Well since we recently received the some new poles in the mail we decided to go ahead and throw 'em on the scale.

The Fixcraft LT shaft is long, slender, and a lil' more than an ounce lighter than it's bigger brother, the "extra tuff" XT shaft. All our XT shafts were already built up so sadly they were left out of the comparison but we'll remedy that with the next order. Fixcraft makes excellent products and i've happily used them throughout 2011.

The Milwaukee shafts was the first on the market and is still the choice of many midwestern slayers. It's weight falls somewhere in the middle. Light enough but still extremely strong. And it comes in both orange and green... not my favorite shades but at least you have the option. I'm betting their next color will be something silly like purple.

...and the surprise winner- the Northern Standard "Gold".

Now to be fair the uncut Fixcraft shafts are pretty long and end up getting ~8 inches cut off for the finished mallet, but the uncut Northern Standard is still a good 5 inches longer than an uncut Milwaukee shaft and nevertheless whole ounce lighter!

Weight isn't the only consideration though, flexibility is important to how a mallet plays. The Fixcraft poles with their long and slender taper end up having the most flex, while Northern Standard poles are extremely stiff and the Milwaukee poles fall somewhere in the middle. Much like golf clubs different people like different amounts of flex depending on it's use (flexible shafts from long distance drivers and firm shafts for short irons and wedges). Polo mallets are no different, though since we tend to use the same mallet all match long it really comes down to preference. I like all three shafts and all three companies and all are better options than used ski poles. Hell, i'm just happy that going into 2012 we have this many options!

Of course Travis and I also have some high tech swiss space mallets coming in the mail, so i'll make sure to update this post and keep the comparisons comin'!

Thanks nick crow for taking the pics.

-W.