A cue can't add anything to your stroke but it can certainly take something away from your stroke, the job of your cue is to transfer the energy from YOUR stroke to the cueball, ALL cues will lose some of that energy, it's Physics, but some a lot more than others, Becue cues are designed to transfer that energy as efficiently as possible, as my stroke has improved so has the transfer of power from my cue, follow and draw shots require far less effort to achieve the same results, In my experience the harder you hit the cueball the less control you have over it, so being able to stroke in a more controlled manner has made me more efficient in pocketing balls, I can now focus more on reading the table.

Bump

SeniorTom said:

Deflection is not a bad thing if you know how to use it?

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Deflection just makes the CB go in a slightly different direction than the stick is pointing - side spin shots would be more accurate, consistent and simple with a (theoretical) non-deflecting shaft that you simply point in the exact direction you want the CB to go, spin or no spin - no estimating squirt correction.

How could deflection make aiming anything but harder…?

pj
chgo

Patrick Johnson said:

Using a striped ball as your cue ball, with the stripe vertical and centered, can give you more detail about where you hit the cue ball, both by how the stripe wobbles with off center hits and by where the chalk mark is in relation to the stripe’s center.

pj
chgo

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Agreed, only problem is it gives you an indication of center ball, you must master that with the cueball

SSP said:

A truly humbling drill, I've only had a perfect results 2 times in thousands of attempts, the drill is difficult because if your tip strikes the cueball even a hair to the right or left you will fail and if your stroke is not straight you will fail

Click to expand...

Using a striped ball as your cue ball, with the stripe vertical and centered, can give you more detail about where you hit the cue ball, both by how the stripe wobbles with off center hits and by where the chalk mark is in relation to the stripe’s center.

pj
chgo

Recorded and replayed anywhere?

skor said:

Well it's obvious that you either don't aim right or you don't hit the point of aim, and this is usually a stroke issue.

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There's a triple articulated mechanism at work.
stick to ball
ball to ball
ball to pocket
Actually if you add self, that puts another magnitude of variables in the equation.

Hence CBL. The habit of teeing off dead straight is where it starts.

Everybody got limits.

Mensabum said:

So many choices in audio nowadays, it's often hard to choose. I have a ton of CDs and Vinyl. I'm not an aficionado of any of that nonsense. I know guys who swear vinyl sounds better. Idk. At the volumes I usually listen, trying to tell the difference would be impossible.

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Vinyl lacks the dynamic range of digital audio so a lot of it might be that. You get traditional mastering (hopefully) and sound, better calibrated to mr. and mrs. people.
Digital audio provides way more usable headroom - theoretically it's mostly a function of sampling rate - but is very unforgiving at the limits. I think this has opened the door to tin eared engineers and producers who can automate what they can't hear but probably not what audiophiles can. The goal seems to be 1 hour of loud and punchy; definitely out of the vinyl spec.

Edit:
dynamic range is a function of bit depth not sample rate which determines high frequency limit.

I’ve recently started collecting and researching older American cues, especially examples where the maker isn’t immediately obvious. This one came from an estate purchase in south Florida, and the construction reminded me enough of an earlier Rich-family cue that I own to ask for opinions from people with more firsthand knowledge. I intentionally left my own thoughts out of the original post because I wanted an unbiased assessment. I really appreciate everyone taking the time to share what they know.