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“You can’t call yourself a designer until you have paid a tribute to the classics. I hope the Bimini Classic Blade does the Wilson 8802 justice.”
Guerin Rife
Designer
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THE BEGINNING!
The Story
Doing a Collectors Series has been a dream of mine ever since I started designing putters in 1994. Rife is a Tour driven putter company. I have always taken my designs and technology to the PGA and Champions Tours to let the best golfers in the world tell me what I'm doing wrong or right. These putters are made in small quantities and perfected with little or no concern for cost.
The Collectors Series are these very same putters. Each will be CNC milled right here in the U.S.A. and be produced in a limited edition of 500 individually numbered custom putters. I will be doing four designs in the coming year. And hopefully you will be one of the 500 passionate golfers to collect and enjoy this line of limited edition hand crafted putters.
My first Collectors Series putter is based on the classic 8802 originally designed by Arnold Palmer and Wilson Sporting Goods back in 1955. Why not something cutting edge and contemporary? It just didn't feel right. I've never trusted any designer that didn't study the classics first. You have to pay your dues. To me one of the true classic putter designs of all time is the Wilson 8802. It still evokes a sense of tradition and legend to virtually every golfer. The Bimini is not a show case for my design talent, but my tribute to a true classic. If I were to make one statement about this simple, elegant putter, I would say, "less is more."
The Process
If you take a moment and review the steps above you will glean that the Bimini is no ordinary blade putter. Most every 8802 style blade on the market is cast, not milled. The main reason for this is the hosel. It is virtually impossible to machine this round, double bend, complex angle. By friction welding the hosel I was able to not only accomplish the elegant hosel shape but introduce the merging of two complimentary stainless steels to enhance feel and performance. After all, blade putters are all about feel.
The Bimini Classic Blade is a combination of precision engineering, innovation and hand crafting. If you are a feel putter I hope you will agree that the Bimini is the best feeling, best performing, blade putter ever made.
The Design
When I was first considering what putter design would be right to launch my Collectors Series, I was doodling on napkins at Starbucks. I had a real nice stack going, with new and exotic head shapes and hosel designs. About that same time my partner in Rife Putters, Jim Barfield was bugging me to do an 8802 so he could show it to Ben Crenshaw. Jim was out there making us #1 on the Champions Tour.
But how can you improve on something as simple as an 8802? The last thing I wanted to do is copy someone else's design and call it mine. So I did some more doodling and realized that this is where the Collectors needs to start.
I started to think, "what could I do to make it better?" The sweet spot on a 8802 is too close to the heel, so I biased weight to the toe by adding meat to the top edge and rear flange to move the sweet spot more to the center (but not quite). RollGrooves naturally create a softer feel because less metal touches the ball at impact, so I added the idea of combining a noisier 303 head with a quieter 304 hosel. And if you have ever putted with a Rife, you know that RollGrooves produce the purest and fastest roll of any other putter brand. Virtually every blade putter falls closed or open at address, so I added two degrees of sole draft to counter balance the forward pull of the hosel. These putters sit like a stone.
Specifications
I've set the lie angle at 70 degrees. But you can tell us what you want. The loft is at 1.5 degrees to let the face grooves do their magic. But if you forward press and deloft the face you will need more loft. Let us know. Head weight is 325 grams to 330 grams. Swing weight is at D9 at 35". We measure length on the shaft angle. That means that we follow the shaft to the ground and allow for the thickness of the butt cap at the top of the grip.
The Package
This is my first shot at doing a small run, numbered series of putters, that are ridiculously expensive to produce. As a mainstream putter brand we have to be conscious of our cost in order to give our customers high quality products at the lowest price. Not so with the Collector's Series, we are doing it right. If you took the time to read The Process you know that I have not been overly concerned with how much it costs to make the Bimini Classic Blade. These are the very same quality of putter I design and make for the best players in the world. Because of all the hand work, these putters are basically "one offs." The end result is worth the effort, I hope you agree.
