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From Breaking Heads to Making Heads:
Sam Feller Creates his Own Lacrosse Head
November 2003

Sam Feller has accomplished something that almost no college player has done before. He has designed and fabricated his own goalie head.

Sam gained interest in his quest for the perfect stick through his own experiences in the cage, in continually breaking heads. His cracked heads served as the impetus in conducting research of materials and attributes of goalie heads. This drove him to test the stiffness and weight of available sticks on the market. Not entirely satisfied with the results, he took it a step further and attempted to design his own head!

Sam used the computer program AUTOCAD to design his prototype goalie head. He included full images in his article describing the specific measurements.

Sam constructed the prototype using a foam core and fiber raps. Once construction was complete, he conducted a pressure/deflection test on several of the most popular goalie heads currently available. The flex, weight and strength of a stick are some of the most important characteristics mentioned in Sam’s article. Strikingly, Sam found that his prototype head was the stiffest among the group tested (Warrior Abyss, Brine Extreme, STX Goalmaster, STX Eclipse and the DeBeers Web). It displaced 20lbs of pressure with relative ease, whereas the DeBeers Web was the weakest amongst the group. The next test was comparative weight. The prototype head was heaviest weighing in at 518grams and the Extreme was lightest tipping the scales at 300grams.

In support of Sam’s information, he does note the limitations of his testing and fabrication. Suggesting that further research and modifications must be done to provide conclusive results, demonstrates Sam’s understanding of the difficulties concerning stick design. Goalie Nation applauds Sam and his innovation and ambition. Sam has ultimately raised the bar for college players across the country by taking measures into his own hands. For a goalie there is nothing more frustrating than following the ball into your stick and having your stick flex, allowing the ball to pass into the cage. Sam is an educated consumer; he has compared the advantages as well as limitations of certain available sticks. Coupled with this, he has made an effort to improve his game by any means necessary. Because Sam has shown his love of the game and stressed the importance of the goalie position, he is our Spotlight columnist this month.

Interview

Goalie Nation: How did you first become interested in lacrosse?

Sam Feller: In eighth grade, my friend started playing lacrosse, and he kept on telling me how much fun it was to play, so I went to a summer camp and started playing seriously my freshman year in high school.

GN: What is your experience? How did you being playing goalie?

SF: I played in high school for four years. I had played hockey before and had been a goalie, so when I started playing lacrosse I decided I wanted to be a goalie too.

GN: It seems you have a bit of expertise working with these types of materials, how did this come about?

SF: I took a class my junior year called "Nature of Materials." It was like a very specialized shop class. We learned about metals, plastics, ceramics, and their strengths and weaknesses. One of the units in the class was about composite materials, and we spent time learning how to use them to make miniature boat hulls, tiny bridges, and other forms. Everything else was good advice from my teacher, Mr. Buxton, and Warwick Goalie Masks.

GN: What triggered your interest in researching/developing goalie sticks?

SF: Lacrosse players working in the Prototyping Lab in previous years had made lacrosse shafts for their projects, so that’s where I got the idea. Instead of making a shaft though, which had been done before, I decided I wanted to try making a head. I considered making a plastic stick, and keeping it simple, like the Shotgun, without the open sidewalls, but the whole process of milling a mold for injection molding would still be too difficult for me. Instead, I realized that using composite materials would be an option, and I ended up making a goalie stick instead of a regular head because the larger size of the stick would be physically easier for me to build.

GN: You have interesting insight on what makes a well designed goalie stick, could you enlighten us on what you feel makes the perfect stick? After completing this research and design, what have you found to be the most important components of a well designed goalie stick?

SF: The most important aspect of a goalie stick is its weight. Lighter weight will give a slight edge in making the save, but when throwing, the leverage of the shaft multiplies the weight of the stick, giving a distinctly different feel to sticks of slightly different weights.

Some people might look at stopping area next, but I think that’s the least important. All goalie sticks reach the NCAA limits for size across the widest part of the stick, so any differences in stopping area come near the neck. In my experience, changes in the size of that area hardly make a difference in saving or missing the ball.

Stiffness I would choose next, because a stiffer stick will give you slightly more control over rebounds and a touch more power when throwing.

Shape, whether the plastic can be gripped at the neck, hole placement, and so on, are all matters of personal preference.

GN: It looks as though you have consulted some important sources in the lacrosse goalie world, what made you contact them?

SF: I already had formed some of my own opinions about what a goalie stick should be like, but its important to talk to other people, especially those with more experience, because that might know something that you don’t, or think of something that you haven’t. I asked Bill Daye from Brine and Goalie Nation a number of questions about how the shape of the Brine X-Treme would effect the shape of the pocket, for example.

GN: How helpful was their information in the design of your prototype?

SF: The best advice I got was from Chris Heim from STX, and Mr. Warwick from Warwick Goalie Masks. Like I said before, Chris Heim told me to form the stick around the pocket, not the other way around. Warwick Goalie Masks, which specializes in custom hockey goalie masks, gave me lots of advice on working with composite materials.

GN: What do you plan to do with the information your have found from your research and design?

SF: A lot of companies donated products to me for free, so I sent them copies of my report. Other than that, the information will be available at school in case any future students are interested in working on a related project.

GN: Is there a stick coming from Sam Feller in the near future?

SF: Probably not. The carbon fiber composite stick I made would be extraordinarily expensive, and is very time consuming to make.

GN: Any other comments or information you wish to share with the Goalie Nation audience?

SF: While I was weighing different sticks for my report, I found that the stringing kit weighs close to a third of the weight of an unstrung head. I thought that lacrosse companies should look in to using high performance fibers, like Spectra, that weigh less than nylon, are more durable, and bead water instead of absorbing it to make the mesh.

GN: Thanks for your comments Sam; we appreciate your input and information.

For more information about Sam's project, read his report, "The Design, Construction, and Testing of a Lighter and Stiffer Lacrosse Goalie Stick" (PDF).

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