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So one of the hottest drivers of the year so far has been the very amazing Epon Monster Beetle or EMB as it's called in short form. This forged high MOI driver from Endo pushes the limits in distance and forgiveness with it's unique forged and laser welded body and shallow hybrid cup face. My testing was done with a 12* EMB and Regular Flex Grpahite Design Tour AD for EMB which as most owners of the EMB know, is an amazing and stable match with the Epon head.

Endo did a lot of research on creating a driver that would be long and straight without loosing much distance on mis-hits and would create optimal ball speads within the max COR limits. So how forgiving is the shallow and wide face of the EMB and where is the RED ZONE (a term taken from the now defunct Japanese Golf Gear Magazine which tested where the optimal impact point on a driver's face is). Read more to find out.

Testing was done at a local grass driving range in mid afternoon with a slight head wind. The 12* EMB with Tour AD is 46" long and uses a Epon standard grip. I find that teeing the EMB lower is a must as with the shallow face you can come under the ball asking for some serious skymarks. I tee it up with about a third of the ball above the crown. Ball used was the Callaway Hyper ERC. Distance markers are placed every 50 yards as well as flags every 25 yards or so.

This test is not scientific, nor do I have raw data. It's just my impressions from hitting the ball, marking the distance then checking the ball mark on the face of the driver. I'm 5'4" tall, weigh 125 pounds and swing an estimated 85mph.

I've worked hard over the winter at the driving range by my house in Japan to be more consistent with the driver so I proceeded first to test distance with the EMB where most people figure the sweet spot is on most drivers... a bit above center:

As you can imagine hitting it center produced the best feel and for me a pretty much straight drive resulting in a drive around 220 yards or so. Hitting the ball here consistently reproduced similar feel, sound (loud) and distance. I'd guess aound 195y carry with close to 20y roll.

Next I tried hitting the ball still center but lower on the face. The results were still straight, but did not feel as good or go as far. Also the trajectory was considerably lower:

The ball still went reasonably far because of the EMB's hybrid cup which wraps around the edges of the driver... the entire face you see in the pictures is part of the cup... all the way to the black body is where the laser welds are. Hitting in this spot carried aound 175 or so on a low trajectory and rolled a lot... maybe 25y. But still pretty straight.

Next was to try and hit the ball towards the heel:

A shot off the lower heel area of the face resulted in the most loss of distance and a slight push. A carry of around 170y or so and roll of maybe 15y. The push is what was not good as it went approximately 20y right of center. Hitting it a little higher up on the heel produced slightly better results.

Next was to hit it towards the toe:

I found that being slightly towards the toe off the sweetspot produced the longest drives of them all. This is a trait shared by several other EMB owners on the TSG forum. It seems like there is a hot spot just towards the toe where the ball really flies. Drives off this area carried 200-210y and rolled out another 20y or so consistently. So total distance 10-15y more than the center and the ball remained straight.

When I first got the EMB I teed it too high... especially since I was used to the deep faced Epon Forged 460. I hit several balls dangerously close to the crown. These resulted in very high trajectory shots which went straight and carried around 185 or so and then came right down and rolled maybe 5y. I proceeded to tee the ball much lower after that. (^_^).

Overall forgiveness on the driver is a plus epseically on hits center and towards the toe. The killer spot is low on the heel. Once again, I'm just an average recreational golfer who loves golf and gear so hopefully this gives people some idea on where to hit it on the Epon EMB for max forgiveness and performance.