How to Make a Wood Putter

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This summer I’ve been golfing a lot more, which gave me the idea to make a wooden putter. For this project, I chose a chunk of walnut that I’ve had laying around the shop for a while now. Using my joiner and planer, I milled the board down to 1″ thick and ripped it to 1″ wide on my table saw. As for the maple, I didn’t have a chunk of wood thick enough, so I had to glue up two boards that I planed down to a 1/2″ thick. This gave me a 1″ thick chunk of maple that is about 5.5″x5.5″. Using a forstner bit, I drilled a 2″ hole in the center of the maple at 1 7/8″ from the edge of one side. From there, I routed away a flat section on the 1 7/8″ side of the hole. Now I’m ready to glue the walnut and maple together. I beefed up the joint by using some dowels and wood glue. Once the glue cured, I cut a straight line to the edge of the circle on each side to remove the center section of maple. After trying multiple methods to cut a curved profile for the side of the putter head, I settle on just cutting a 75 degree angle on the back side of the putter. With the angles cut, I trimmed my putter down to 4″ in length. Using my cutting template, I cut my putter head to shape and drilled a 3/8″ hole on a 20 degree angle for the putter shaft to go. Next, I added a 1/4″ wide piece of inlay to the top of the maple (I’d recommend  cutting the inlay channel before gluing the walnut and maple together, but I forgot). After giving everything a nice and smooth sanding, I applied a few coats of spar urethane to help give the putter head a nice, water resistant finish. While I waited for the finish to cure, I cut the shaft of the golf club down to about 35″ long. Once the finish was fully cured, I added the grip to the putter shaft and epoxied the shaft to the head. Now my putter is all done and ready to hit the greens!