Maximize ES Tour Plus with an optimal setup

[Chuck]

I've been playing around trying to find the optimal setup for the Ernest Sports ES Tour Plus on E6 Connect for several weeks now. I've had several shots where spin wasn't recorded, several no-read shots like others have reported but I also saw some absolutely robust measurements on some swings where all the data points hit the mark. A lot of the issues are from simply being unfamiliar with the device and its idiosyncrasies and time on the practice area in E6 Connect can really help. Out of the sessions, I began to see a pattern in what swing types returned really good measurements and gave the best simulation results. All results where club data is reported in E6 proved to have the truest most lifelike flight and ball spins. They make for a better more enjoyable game. 1st rule is pretty much the word with these units, get a ball that has bold lettering in a straight line across the ball. Callaway's logo doesn't work, but Srixon does. Place the ball with the lettering facing the center of the ES16TP with the logo parallel to the ground. The rest is what I found that works for me. If you have your own system I would like to hear it. So I've attached a diagram of what I've found to be optimal ball placement for each club type. Irons-PW-SWs are placed closer to the unit than woods. For putting, I found that it helps to toe-out the unit about 2 degrees. The tee is placed exactly 8" from the units toe. In this diagram, I show the optical field as only covering half the area, when it actually covers both sides. The purpose is to maximize the overlap of radar and optical! In outdoor mode, the unit is radar only. In Indoor mode (used for Simulation) it Hybrid/Radar and Optical, with two modes of pure optical CHIP and PUTT. CHIP mode is where you may see missed reads either because the ball movement was too fast or the ball traveled in a trajectory the cameras missed. Always on tee off, be sure to read the Club selection as I've found the auto-caddy of E6 wrongly set the unit into CHIP mode.

When putting, be aware the window for ball motion is very small and a small imperfection in your putting surface will be compounded with distance to the hole. Your ball tee should be aligned to the center of your screen about 8ft-10ft away (I found 7ft works too but I can't attest to ball speed values).

But basically, if you can get optical and radar to overlap, you will get very consistent robust reads.

Now on to the acoustic trigger. For the most part, this works very well unless you're prone to digging in your club a little in front of your ball which I am. First, don't do that. You really don't want to do that anyway. But I thought I would test how sensitive it is. It does vary according to the type of clubs you use. Putting it's very very sensitive and just talking, popping open a can of beer will set it off. Other clubs like a driver require a really good bang to go off. What I couldn't understand was why my 3 wood would no read if I hit off-the-dirt a little too dirty. Well, I put an acoustic spectrum analyzer on my mat and if I just brushed the mat with my club, it looked almost like the sound pattern from a ball strike! This is from an Ultimat2 ("holds a tee") mat. Mats like mine are scratchy and noisy and a hit on them can mimic the signal of club impact. To my ears, it sounds completely different, but to a computer not much diff at all. So do what you should be doing and learn not to hit fat and just chalk this one up as a quirk of the device. If ES ever decides to take the ES2020 to the pricing realm of the hobbyist, its trigger is purely optical ball motion and has much faster cameras and should give everyone far fewer issues.

[nickfisher47]

After using it a lot more and following your guidelines, I'm finding driver placement to be the most finicky. I am not sure what I'm doing wrong, but it really is picky with my driver.

The most disappointing thing is that 8 out of 10 times my driver swing speed is 104-109 or so, but every 2 out of 10 I'm really flowing with the swing and know I pass 110 - and I can't get the reading. The guys at Ernest told me to position the ball logo instead of facing noon, facing 12:30, and I think that's helped, but I have never seen my device read 110 MPH on the digital screen, and I know I have swung faster than some of my 109's.

When i do hit that max speed (for me), it is a no-read. I am not expecting perfection, and the ES guys tell me it can read up to 140 mph so I'm not against the notion that it's me and my placement, but to your point, Chuck, I wish they'd produce a better documentation or video. My guess is, it's not an exact science...

[Chuck]

After using it a lot more and following your guidelines, I'm finding driver placement to be the most finicky. I am not sure what I'm doing wrong, but it really is picky with my driver.

The most disappointing thing is that 8 out of 10 times my driver swing speed is 104-109 or so, but every 2 out of 10 I'm really flowing with the swing and know I pass 110 - and I can't get the reading. The guys at Ernest told me to position the ball logo instead of facing noon, facing 12:30, and I think that's helped, but I have never seen my device read 110 MPH on the digital screen, and I know I have swung faster than some of my 109's.

When i do hit that max speed (for me), it is a no-read. I am not expecting perfection, and the ES guys tell me it can read up to 140 mph so I'm not against the notion that it's me and my placement, but to your point, Chuck, I wish they'd produce a better documentation or video. My guess is, it's not an exact science...

Try moving the tee to about 8" to 9" out for the LM foot. I found that gives me the best results with driver nearly 10 of 10. That and having a bold non-curvey logo facing the LM foot. But to your point, it is finicky in the Radar/Optical modes as it needs both to give a good sim result. But what do I know, I barely hit 95 mph on a good swing. What do you carry, 360 or something?

[nickfisher47]

If I get 110, and if I can get my smash factor above 1.4, it usually carries about 270 for me. Now, the tricky part is I have bravery and boldness in a sim but once I get on a course I"m so terrified of losing a ball for some reason that my swing is entirely different and I'm lucky to hit it 240 on a real course. I am not entirely sure the sim is good for my real life game.

But thanks for the great advice, I'll try 8" to 9" and see how it works!

[kjecu94]

I've been playing around trying to find the optimal setup for the Ernest Sports ES Tour Plus on E6 Connect for several weeks now. I've had several shots where spin wasn't recorded, several no-read shots like others have reported but I also saw some absolutely robust measurements on some swings where all the data points hit the mark. A lot of the issues are from simply being unfamiliar with the device and its idiosyncrasies and time on the practice area in E6 Connect can really help. Out of the sessions, I began to see a pattern in what swing types returned really good measurements and gave the best simulation results. All results where club data is reported in E6 proved to have the truest most lifelike flight and ball spins. They make for a better more enjoyable game. 1st rule is pretty much the word with these units, get a ball that has bold lettering in a straight line across the ball. Callaway's logo doesn't work, but Srixon does. Place the ball with the lettering facing the center of the ES16TP with the logo parallel to the ground. The rest is what I found that works for me. If you have your own system I would like to hear it. So I've attached a diagram of what I've found to be optimal ball placement for each club type. Irons-PW-SWs are placed closer to the unit than woods. For putting, I found that it helps to toe-out the unit about 2 degrees. The tee is placed exactly 8" from the units toe. In this diagram, I show the optical field as only covering half the area, when it actually covers both sides. The purpose is to maximize the overlap of radar and optical! In outdoor mode, the unit is radar only. In Indoor mode (used for Simulation) it Hybrid/Radar and Optical, with two modes of pure optical CHIP and PUTT. CHIP mode is where you may see missed reads either because the ball movement was too fast or the ball traveled in a trajectory the cameras missed. Always on tee off, be sure to read the Club selection as I've found the auto-caddy of E6 wrongly set the unit into CHIP mode.

When putting, be aware the window for ball motion is very small and a small imperfection in your putting surface will be compounded with distance to the hole. Your ball tee should be aligned to the center of your screen about 8ft-10ft away (I found 7ft works too but I can't attest to ball speed values).

But basically, if you can get optical and radar to overlap, you will get very consistent robust reads.

Now on to the acoustic trigger. For the most part, this works very well unless you're prone to digging in your club a little in front of your ball which I am. First, don't do that. You really don't want to do that anyway. But I thought I would test how sensitive it is. It does vary according to the type of clubs you use. Putting it's very very sensitive and just talking, popping open a can of beer will set it off. Other clubs like a driver require a really good bang to go off. What I couldn't understand was why my 3 wood would no read if I hit off-the-dirt a little too dirty. Well, I put an acoustic spectrum analyzer on my mat and if I just brushed the mat with my club, it looked almost like the sound pattern from a ball strike! This is from an Ultimat2 ("holds a tee") mat. Mats like mine are scratchy and noisy and a hit on them can mimic the signal of club impact. To my ears, it sounds completely different, but to a computer not much diff at all. So do what you should be doing and learn not to hit fat and just chalk this one up as a quirk of the device. If ES ever decides to take the ES2020 to the pricing realm of the hobbyist, its trigger is purely optical ball motion and has much faster cameras and should give everyone far fewer issues.

Is this still the optimal Set Up? I received my ES Tour Plus in April and have been trying to get it dialed in... Thank you. kj

[Chuck]

There was an update to the Firmware that kind of changed everything. With the latest firmware, the optimal tee up location is 10in from the club-side corner of the foot, and about 0.5in out from the corner of the club side foot. That tee location should be on the exact center of your projected screen image. The ES16TP should be lined up parallel to that line so it should be aimed 10in right of the screen center line for a right hander or 10in left for a lefty. If all is square and even, and you configure the projection properties in the sim software correctly correctly, you will be amazed at how well this unit works. I found that tee-to-screen only needs to be 71/2ft-8ft. This works both with E6 Connect and TGC 2019. GOOD LUCK AND ENJOY.

[oakleyj]

Chuck, thanks for posting these. Still putting the final touches on the sim bay. The CCE mat got here Sunday and the ES Tour Plus got here this afternoon. The screen and netting doesn't get here until Tuesday so I only got a few shots in before my canvas curtain material started crying uncle. Only misread out of about 20 was a seriously fat shot. The rest did what they should have except clubhead speed seemed to be on the high side even though ball speed was spot on when compared to recent Trackman numbers. And as long as those numbers are measured consistently I don't know that I care if they aren't exactly accurate. Direction was where I thought it should be on each shot as well.

I didn't have your measurements handy when I went out to play. Seems pretty clear that getting ball placement dialed in will be the key. Feels like they should give better directions on how to locate the ball. I wish there was a way to figure out which direction you were misplacing the ball, but that will be solved with a sharpie and 30 seconds once I get it sorted.

I feel like ES is their own worst enemy. They are essentially a modern technology company using 1998 marketing and online resources. When I call them tomorrow I might put in my application to take over their online presence because right now they are blowing it..

[Chuck]

Regarding clubhead speed, that indicates an error in your clubside radar. Look for metal objects or floresent lamps near by..
I agree with on the last part. It's a little too laid back and they should do a es tour plus v2 that replaces the audio trigger with a laser ball spotter or a more reliable impact detection system.

[Chuck]

I've learned so many things about this system now, and after a year or so of play on it; I feel I can comment on it as an expert. First, it is a good system. It's very well matched to TGC2019, and that would be the software I would use with this system. I did E6 for about a year with it, but just didn't like the translation of motion with chips or putting. The first thing to understand about this system is that it's mainly an optical system but it's dependent on its radar roots. Mainly it uses radar for club head speed (front radar) and ball speed (rear radar), and the radar is simply for speed measurements. It's pretty good with ball speed and club speed measurements. It triggers using an audio signal of a club striking a ball, so if you have a TV or radio in the background, it can interfere and will usually show up as a missed swing. (So no loud music during your game folks). On impact (and audio trigger) it tries to take a couple of IR images, strobing a bank of IR LED to build a picture of the ball launch. Using the ball logo, it tries to determine the ball's spin. I've found that while it does read spin, it can be wildly random if the ball's tee position is random. (So always align the logo straight up and down, square to the unit.). Lastly; For chipping and putting; the ES16TP will switch to an all-optical measured system. You can force an all-optical chip by setting the club to 'Lob-wedge CHIP' or 'CHP' mode. This actually works well for most all 40yr and under shots; but can even be good for 80yrd ones. For putting; I have to say it's pretty good in TGC2019. In E6, it's frustrating due to a glueball effect... just beware of that software issue in E6. For me; I always put it in CHP mode for any shot 40yrd or under.

From my experience; on a good drive, It can overestimate the side spin on the ball (or underestimate it if doesn't optically catch the ball spin, sometimes giving a 0 spin, perfect shot defaulting to radar for speed). With this unit, you can be sure of the smash factor and to minimize the side spin, align the ball as vertically as possible on the tee facing the lead front of the ES16TP. I find that a logo with straight lines that wrap around about 1/8 to 1/4 of the ball circumference seems to capture spin pretty well. If the logo isn't lined up, or at a random angle, it will affect spin, ball flight, and distances. If it can't measure a logo, it will default to ball speed only giving a perfect zero spin linear shot.

Also, Wilson makes a practice ball with a special marking on them; it's a yellow ball with 2 parallel 1" lines, with a dot in the middle. To achieve the best optical read, I put that logo face front to the face of the unit. Tee it up as needed and don't hit it fat on a lay or bunker (or anything for that matter). All in all, when the ES16TP is paired with TGC2019, it's not a bad LM at all.