PXG 0311 Black Ops drivers: Full reviews, robotic testing data and more
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PXG 0311 Black Ops Drivers
The breakthrough advantage the Black Ops drivers have over the previous generation comes down to one simple thing — advanced material science, specifically when it comes to the driver’s face. The stronger yet more flexible titanium used in the face allows for greater compliance (fun engineering term for flex) which helps to generate more ball speed and less spin.
To test what PXG calls Advanced Material Face (AMF for short), they used it in the Gen6 driver instead of the stock T-412 titanium usually used in the face. The result was .5 mph faster ball speeds and 200 less RPM from the same head. That was the sign they were onto something. When combined with the new geometry of the Black Ops and Black Ops Tour-1 head, the robotic face polishing for precision control of the non-uniform bulge and roll face design (not to mention COR), and finally the weight-saving carbon composite panels, you get two drivers that are faster, lower spinning, more forgiving and powerful sounding to boot.
The standard Black Ops offers a large front-to-back profile, and the largest heel-to-toe measurement allowed under the Rules of Golf to maximize MOI. With the larger shape, the crown is more aggressively angled to allow the face to be larger to boost up and down and side to side MOI, which gets very close to the 10K g-cm2 total MOI in the standard weight configuration. Add a few grams of weight to the rear weight port and the Black Ops easily surpasses the 10k g-cm2 number currently being touted by other OEMs.
As for the Black Ops Tour-1, its compact shape helps to create a more low and forward center of gravity to lower spin for faster players, but even with the smaller shape it maintains a large face profile equal to the standard model to help with forgiveness. Robot testing shows that the Tour-1 is the lowest-spinning driver PXG has ever created and spins on average close to 20 percent less than the standard Black Ops model, which when compared to the Gen6 models is already low spin.