US 5,766,092 · Granted 1998-06-16
How TaylorMade Killed the Annoying Hollow Golf Club Rattle
Imagine hitting a golf ball with a hollow metal club head—it vibrates and makes a weird ringing sound that throws off your swing. This patent lines the inside with a special rubbery resin that absorbs those vibrations and dampens the noise, so you get a cleaner hit and better control.
The plain-English version
What it protects
The claim covers a hollow metal golf club head with an internal cavity lined on the impact wall (the face that strikes the ball) with a thin layer of viscoelastic resin. What's protected here is the specific design of coating only part of the cavity with this damping material, positioned to reduce vibrations that occur when the club face strikes the ball. Anyone manufacturing a hollow iron with this exact vibration-damping resin layer inside would infringe.
Why it matters
Hollow iron club heads were becoming popular in the 1990s because they distributed weight better and improved performance, but they suffered from unwanted vibrations and noise on impact. By patenting this internal damping solution, TaylorMade secured a technological advantage in making hollow irons feel and perform like solid ones—a meaningful edge in a competitive market where golfers care deeply about how clubs feel and sound at impact.
Real-world use
Every golfer who swung a TaylorMade hollow iron in the late 1990s and 2000s benefited from this patent—they heard a cleaner sound and felt less vibration in their hands compared to competing hollow club designs.
Original USPTO abstract
An iron-type golf club head comprising a hollow metal body (1) incorporating an internal cavity (2) delimited by a series of walls (10, 11, 12, 13) including an impact wall (10) connected peripherally at all points to other walls (11, 12, 13). The inner surface (100) of the impact wall (10) is coated with a thin layer (4) of a viscoelastic resin which has damping properties, and which fills only a portion of the internal cavity (2). The resin layer assures reduced interference vibrations peculiar to "hollow" irons, i.e., those incorporating an internal cavity for improved weight distribution.
Patent details
- Publication number
- US 5,766,092
- Filing date
- 1994-04-12
- Grant date
- 1998-06-16
- Assignee
- Taylor Made Golf Company
- Inventor(s)
- MIMEUR; NICOLAS, GUIBAUD; JEAN-MARC
- CPC class
- A63B53/04
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