How to Make Wooden Golf Tees

Crafting your own wooden golf tees is a deeply rewarding project that connects you more intimately with the game you love. It allows for complete customization over a seemingly small but significant piece of your equipment. This guide will walk you through everything you need to know, from selecting the right wood and tools to the step-by-step process for making professional-quality tees, with or without a lathe.

Why Make Your Own Golf Tees?

As a golf coach, I always preach the importance of controlling the controllables. Your setup, your alignment, your pre-shot routine - and yes, even your tee height. While grabbing a handful of plastic or generic wooden tees from the pro shop is easy, making your own offers some unique advantages. First, there's the sheer satisfaction. Holding a tee you've shaped with your own hands and then launching a drive off it is a special feeling. It’s a quiet act of dedication to your game.

Second is customization. You can control the exact length, the shape of the cup that holds the ball, and the material. Maybe you've found a specific tee height that works perfectly for your new oversized driver head. You can make an entire batch of tees to that exact specification. You can also paint them with marking lines to guarantee you tee the ball up to that repeatable height every single time - a fantastic way to build consistency off the tee box. Finally, what could be a better gift for your regular foursome than a set of personalized, handmade tees?

Gathering Your Materials and Tools

Before you start shaping wood, you need to gather the right supplies. The quality of your materials directly influences the quality of your finished tees.

Wood Selection

The ideal wood for golf tees is strong, relatively hard, and has a straight grain to prevent it from snapping easily on impact. You don't want to choose a soft wood like pine, which will break almost every time. Here are the best options:

• Birch: This is the industry standard for commercially produced wooden tees. It’s strong, affordable, and readily available in the form of dowels. It has a fine, straight grain that makes for a smooth finish.
• Maple: Even harder and more durable than birch, maple is a premium choice. It's a bit tougher to work with but will create very resilient tees. Sugar maple is particularly strong.
• Hickory: Known for its use in axe handles and baseball bats, hickory is incredibly tough and shock-resistant. It's a fantastic, albeit more expensive, option if you want to make tees that can potentially last for multiple rounds.
• Bamboo: While technically a grass, bamboo is a popular material for "wooden" tees due to its strength and sustainability. Sourcing bamboo dowels is easy and they provide excellent durability.

For ease of use, I recommend starting with birch or maple dowels. A standard golf tee diameter is about 4.3mm (or 11/64 inches), but a 3/16-inch or 1/4-inch dowel is a great place to start, especially for your first batch. They are dimensionally stable and save you the step of milling down larger boards.

Essential Tools

The tools you’ll need will depend on which method you choose. Here’s a breakdown for both approaches.

For the Lathe Method:

• Wood Lathe: A mini or midi lathe is perfect for a project of this scale.
• Lathe Chisels: You will need a small spindle gouge for shaping, a parting tool for creating grooves and separating the tee, and a skew chisel for fine details.
• Jacobs Chuck or Pin Chuck: This mounts in the tailstock and is used to securely hold the small-diameter dowel.
• Calipers: For precise measurements of length and diameter.
• Sandpaper: Various grits from 120 up to 400 for a super-smooth finish.
• Safety Equipment: Safety glasses or a face shield are non-negotiable when working on a lathe.

For the No-Lathe Method:

• Hand Drill or Drill Press: Used to spin the dowel for sanding and to shape the cup.
• Bench Vise: To securely hold your drill or the dowel.
• Cutting Tool: A fine-toothed hand saw or miter saw for cutting dowels to length.
• Carving Knife or Block Plane: A sharp utility knife or whittling knife will work for shaping the point.
• Rotary Tool (Dremel) or Sanding Bit for drill: A small spherical grinding bit or burr bit for creating the cup.
• Sandpaper: Various grits.
• Safety Equipment: Safety glasses and potentially gloves when using a cutting tool.

Method 1: The Wood Lathe Technique (The Pro's Method)

Using a wood lathe is the most efficient way to produce uniform, professional-looking tees. The rotation of the lathe does most of the heavy lifting, allowing you to focus on shaping.

1. Prepare the Blank: Start with a dowel that is long enough to make several tees. A 12-inch dowel will yield three or four standard 2.75-inch or 3.25-inch tees. Secure one end of the dowel into your lathe's headstock chuck. Support the other end with a live center in the tailstock to begin.
2. Rough Shaping: With the lathe spinning at a medium speed (around 1500 RPM), use your spindle gouge to turn the dowel so it's perfectly round and smooth. Take very light passes.
3. Mark Your Tees: Use a pencil to mark the desired lengths of your tees along the dowel. Account for the small amount of wood you'll lose from the parting tool. Let’s say you’re making 3.25-inch tees, make your marks at 3.25 inches, then 6.5 inches, and so on.
4. Shape the Cups: Move your tool rest close to the first mark. Use the long point of a skew chisel or a very small gouge to carefully hollow out the cup at the end of the dowel where the tailstock was. Create a smooth, bowl-like indent. Don’t go too deep, or you might weaken the neck of the tee.
5. Turn the Body and Point: Now, working from the cup back toward the first pencil mark, use your spindle gouge to shape the body. Create a gentle taper from the wider neck down to the pointed end. The motion should be smooth and controlled. For the final sharp point, you can use either the gouge or a skew chisel.
6. Sand and Finish: While the tee is still spinning on the lathe, start sanding. Begin with a lower grit like 150 to smooth out any tool marks, then progress through 220 and finish with 400 for a glass-like feel. Be gentle - these are delicate.
7. Part Off: Use your parting tool at the pencil mark to cut the finished tee from the dowel. Catch it as it comes free. Now you have a section of fresh dowel ready, and you can repeat the process to create the next tee’s cup and body.

Method 2: The No-Lathe Method (The Determined Golfer's Way)

No lathe? No problem. It requires a bit more patience and hands-on work, but you can absolutely make great tees with more common workshop tools. The key is to spin the workpiece with a drill.

1. Cut Dowels to Length: First, use your miter saw or hand saw to cut your dowels into individual tee lengths. Add about half an inch to your desired final length to give you some material to clamp into the drill. So for a 3.25-inch tee, cut a 3.75-inch piece.
2. Create the Cup: This is the trickiest part without a lathe. One good method is to use a drill press. Secure a dowel section vertically in a vise or clamp on the drill press table. Install a small, spherical grinding bit or a concave burr bit into the drill press chuck. Carefully lower the spinning bit into the center of the dowel's top to hollow out the cup. Another option is to clamp the dowel in a bench vise and carefully use a handheld rotary tool (like a Dremel) for the same effect.
3. Shape the Body and Point: Clamp your hand drill into your bench vise horizontally. Secure the non-cupped end of the a tee section into the drill chuck. Turn the drill on at a low, consistent speed. Now, you have a makeshift mini-lathe! You can use a sanding block or a sheet of sandpaper to shape the rotating dowel. Start with a coarse grit to quickly taper the wood into a point, then switch to finer grits to smooth the entire body. You could also use a sharp whittling knife to carefully shave the point into shape before sanding. This requires extreme care, always cut away from your body and wear protective gloves.
4. Final Sanding: Give the entire tee a final hand-sanding to soften any sharp edges and blend the cup, a neck, and point together seamlessly.

This method takes more time per tee, but the hands-on approach is incredibly gratifying. Your first few might look a little rustic, but you’ll quickly develop a feel for the process and start turning out consistent results.

Finishing and Personalizing Your Tees

Once your tees are shaped and sanded, it's time for the final touches. This is where you can turn a functional object into something truly your own.

• Sealing: Applying a light coat of Tung oil, boiled linseed oil, or a wipe-on polyurethane will protect the wood from moisture and give it a slight sheen. This also makes the wood feel better in your hand.
• Painting: This is the fun part. You can leave them natural or paint them any color you like. Use a quality spray paint for an even coat. Sticking a batch of finished tees into a piece of styrofoam is a great way to hold them upright while you paint and let them dry.
• The Coach's Tip - Adding Height Lines: Before you seal them, use a fine-tipped permanent marker or a small brush and paint to add depth markings. Measure from the tip and add lines like you see on some high-end plastic tees. This enables you to tee your ball up at the exact same height for your driver or 3-wood every single time, removing one more variable from your tee shot. This small piece of customization can have a real impact on your consistency.

Final Thoughts

Making your own wooden golf tees is a fantastic project that bridges the gap between craftsmanship and love for the game. Whether you use a lathe for precision or a drill and sandpaper for a more hands-on approach, the result is a set of tees that are uniquely yours - a small but proud representation of your dedication to golf.

Once you’ve crafted your perfect tees, the challenge shifts to using them with a smart strategy on the course. Dialing in your equipment is one thing, but knowing the right play for each hole is another. That’s where I find Caddie AI to be invaluable. You can describe any tee shot on any course and get instant, pro-level advice on target lines and club selection, helping you make smarter, more confident swings every time.