I'm probably answering my own question, but.... I can hit them off the grass fine (they were OK during a round of golf and hitting off a grass driving range and also yesterday afternon at the park). I took the 7-9 irons to a range with mats - 8 and 9 were going straight (don't think I quite got the distance), but I had a bit of a hard time with the 7 iron. I have a pretty reliable clubfitter in the area. How much can DCI irons be bent?

In ref to all, the clubfitter/repair tech works at a "mom and pop" golf store. He's helped me zero in two sets of irons and my wedges. He also recently fitted my putter and my difficulty with short putts CEASED. Up until 2009, I didn't pay attention to lie angles. I pretty much used a standard set of golf clubs from 1972-2003 (between 1993-2003 I played very little and had two 3 year hiatuses). I also was able to hit long irons (I even teed off with a 1 iron during the 1980s). My short game was the pits. The other odd thing was that my height (which had been 5'11 3/4") increased to 6'1" in 2005. When I took up golf again in 2006, I developed a good short game but found out I could no longer hit irons above the 7 with any degree of consistency and woods/hybrids tended to pull. I got a tip from my Dad (who could have gone pro in the 1950s but heeded the call of Uncle Sam; he still is an 8 handicap at age 77) about standing more erect. That did the trick with the woods and hybrids but I started getting bouts of shankitis (more like a swing shutdown) that would pop up without warning. The temporary fix was use a 38 hybrid, a 36" 9 iron and lengthen the wedges by 1/2". I got into clubmaking early in 2009 and constructed a set of Snake Eye irons (Q3I 5-SW and 600W lob wedge). This is when the lightbulb hit! The sand wedge hit perfectly every time! I also learned about effect of grip weight on swingweight. What I did was set the 9 iron and the other wedges to match the length and lie angle of the sand wedge (64 degrees and 35.5"; the 9 iron had a 43 gram grip to compensate for swingweight loss). I slowly dialed in the 8 iron up to the 5 iron and got to the point of hitting the 7 pretty consistent and being half-arsed with the 5 iron and 6 iron (but don't use them because I hit a 5H and 34H - much less work). I also went to a more compact backswing with minimal weight shift going back (more spine tilt vs the "stack and tilt" and less rotational; sort of like the Don Trahan "in da mitt and tru da tree" swing). My ball striking is very good now. What I like about the DCI irons is the ability to hit a 6 iron solid. At this point I hit the 6-GW dead straight, although I have to use somewhat of a "Moe Norman" swing with the 6. How I hit off the lie board today with the 4 iron determines the spacing of the rest of the clubs (and the minimum I'll do today is do the lie board for the 4-6 irons). The worst case may be nudging the 8 iron 1/2 degree and best case is nudging the 6 iron 1/2 degree (latter being leaving the 7 iron alone and adjusting the 4 iron to 60 deg, which is +1 from standard; former would be 1 degree spacing between each iron from the 4 to the 9).

I did the lie board with the 4-6 irons and they all are slightly toward the toe. I went to the infamous Miramar Driving Range today (which has the most uneven lies of any range in SD County;ball above the feet and uphill at one end and ball below the feet and downhill at the other). I think the issue was getting used to the clubs. 4 iron needs a little work but I am hitting the 5 and 6 irons dead straight and solid. Iron shots the way I used to hit them. The only thing I may do is set the 4 iron at 61 deg since I do have a slight hook with it (just have to hit a few golf balls). I haven't hit player irons since 2008. I also haven't hit a 5 iron at all since 2006. Still intend to remain using the 5H since I would have to leave out the 3 wood if I put in the 4 and 5 irons. I do have to admit that I am a bit spoiled with the 5H.

Everything is dead on the money now. The 4 iron is @ 61 deg. The 5 iron is 62 deg with 1/2 degree between clubs through the wedges. I actually arbitrarily had the 4 iron flattened from 61.5 to 61 deg (which actually meets the specs at Titleist for just about every iron set) because I was having a very difficult time hitting it. This did the trick because I started hitting dead straight shots. The only difficulty was hitting from a thin mat. Everything else was good as set. Like I mentioned, the clubfitter that I am pretty happy with is Jesse at Fairway Golf (Convoy St in San Diego). I wrote the first review on Yelp. He has two that assist with fitting and club repair and they do a good job also.

Did pretty well with the irons on my last golf game. Setup is 6-GW. I use a 5H.

I don't believe in a standard for lies any more.  It's a good place to start but each club needs to be custom fit to your desired shot or to help prevent a prevailing miss.  So if there are issues in the set, let's adjust.

Different lie/loft machines may produce different readings as well so as long as you have one machine in use, roll with that machine and adjust to your desire!

RC

I brought my irons to a reliable fitter along with my "reference" 9 iron (a Lynx Black Cat with the lie angle at 64 deg; I have my wedges zeroed in at 64.5 for the SW and 65 for the lob and the X wedge). I can also get a small tweak for free if needed. I had a putter fitting a month ago from him and my putting (particularly for shorter putts) has improved quite a bit (I had 10 pars in 13 holes with 5 one putt greens - 1 thru 7 on the front 9 and 13-18 on the back; you pay for 9 but play 13). He also helped me zero in a set of irons I constructed and the Black Cats (my reference iron set). I hit the 9 iron on the lie board - sure as all get out, the scuff marks were toward the toe about halfway between the middle and the edge of the marks. I had the fitter bend it to the same lie angle as the Black Cat. Bingo - scuff mark pretty close to center (maybe a tick mark toward the toe). We bent the set about 2 degrees upright all the way through with separation of 1/2 degree between clubs. So the 4 iron is at 61.5, 5 at 62..... 9 iron at 64 and the wedges 64.5. The initial test at the driving range was the 9 iron and the wedges were dead on the money. I had to get the hang of hitting the 7 and 8 irons and the 4-6 were just about impossible to hit. This morning, I took the 6 iron to the park and found out I had to stand rather far from the ball with the arms extended to get it to hit properly (but I could swing away with it). So the truth was that my DCIs WERE a couple degrees off. Three different lie angle machines confirmed it. I'm still at a loss as to how I was able to hit clubs that were 2 degrees flat and hit them dead straight (or hit them at all, for that matter). I was actually hammering the 6 iron with a 60 degree lie angle. From the looks of things, I may end up having to flatten the 6 iron to 62 or 61.5 and then separate the 4 - 6 by a degree. What I definitely have to do is hit the 4-6 irons off the lie board individually at a minimum (the 8 iron might be too close to call but it is possible the 7 iron could be 1/2 to 1 deg too upright). It has been pretty consistent that the 7 iron is 63 deg, the 8 is 63.5, the 9 is 64 deg, PW and SW are 64.5 and the LW and XW are 65. I also sent my Pings back to be flattened from green dot to yellow dot (I could hit them fine but had to choke down to the middle of the grip; otherwise I would have a small hook and the hit would be a bit chunky).

Get fitted outdoors where you can observe the ball flight. And get it done by a good fitter who also is a good instructor.   Look at the marks on the sole - if the ball flight matches up with the sole marks then you're good regardless if they are 2* up, 1 1/2* flat.... who cares as long as the ball flight is good. Afterall that is what custom fitting is about - getting the ball flight correct. Not what some clerk in a store says the lie loft machine reads.

Steve Ball  ( ballgolf.com)
PGA Master Professional
Co-founder Titleist CF