Royal Collection New SFD Black First Impressions

A huge box arrived today from Royal Collection containing their all new SFD Black demo clubs for me to try out. The new SFD Black just launched on the weekend here in Japan and is considered their new average golfer offering replacing the 2 year old SFD III line.　While RC’s BBD’s line caters to the athlete and better golfer, SFD models are typically known for their ease of use and high launch distance performance characteristics which make them very attractive for the average to improving golfer.  RC compared to most brands is a very small company with only 20 or so employees dedicated to designing and producing golf clubs that look great and perform great. The SFD Black looks to live up to that commitment of performance and quality.

I’m going to be hitting each club and reviewing them individually but as always its exciting to get a bunch of demos at once so I thought I would provide some first impressions. The clubs look great with a Black IP and Silver finish. Black finishes are certainly a big fad now with golf clubs and not all black finishes are created equal. I’m glad to say as you can see in the pictures the finish of the RC clubs is very pretty and while not jet black, the IP finish is more of a smoked black reflective finish. It’s pretty classy looking. One thing I did notice about the new SFD Black line which may catch people’s attention is that while parts of the clubs are made in Japan, RC is saving costs by assembling the clubs in Taiwan (it says Assembled in Taiwan on the stickers). Because of this, the SFD Black is priced lower than usual compared to other JDM brands ie the driver has a Japanese MSRP of  620.00 which is on the low side for Japan.

I received the driver, fairway wood, utility and forged iron. All the clubs are on the larger side and all the woods feature slightly closed faces. They are all high launch designs that are meant to minimize slices and maximize distance. The iron looks uncannily similar to Royal Collections older FD Forged and original SFI forged iron from about 5 years ago. All four clubs are shafted with Fubuki shafts specially made for Royal Collection by Mitsubishi Rayon. I’ll start tomorrow by testing out the woods at the range and recording some impact videos (RC typically always sounds good which is reflective of their feel). Stay tuned for the reviews!