*** update ***
Much to my amazement, my order from Seyberts arrived today. I ordered the cue & several misc items roughly around 1am Thursday morning, and was at my door Friday around 4pm. Way to go Seyberts on rapid shipment, you guys rock.:thumbup:
As for the cue, I have to say it's better than I had expected for an inexpensive jump/break cue. After a few coats of wax on the shaft and a quick tip scuff it was ready for a test drive.
First up, lets see if there is any merit in using a 14mm stiffer shaft and a phenolic tip over a leather Lepro on my standard, slightly less than 13mm cue shaft. Back in the mid 90s, I cut down an old butt and made a jump handle for my playing cue shaft to use as a jumper. It served its purpose, but took some humph and near perfect accuracy in all areas to be successful.
I noticed several things immediately. First was how little effort it took to jump a ball, I'd say less than 50% effort without the humph to produce an equal jump over my old setup. Second, was how much more control and better aim I had with so much less body movement during the jump stroke. Third, way, way more forgiving on those not so perfectly centered hits. Before, when struck even slightly off center, the spin would take the ball off the target line once returning to the playing surface, usually resulting in a miss or foul. My final thought of it as a jumper has already made it a worthy purchase as far as I'm concerned.
Now lets see how it functions as a break cue. I really had concerns with miscues, but that proved to not be an issue at all. After many breaks with it, I'd have to say I'm pleased with it so far. The tip has stayed on, so thats a big plus.
Using the BreakSpeed app, I noticed little to no increase in its speed reporting over using my standard playing cues to break with. Not that I expected it to increase, but I was curious if it would. I do like how the cue ball feels as if it is exploding off the tip though, and the racked balls appear to be more lively when struck. I know that is a debatable statement, seeing how the cue ball speed has not been increased much if at all. It's more of a perceived observation and could be that my brain is lying to me and that's what it wants me to believe.
On the topic of cue ball damage with the phenolic tip:
After only 3-5 hours of breaks and many practice jumps, I cleaned the ball off with just water on a micro fiber wash cloth to clear the chalk residue. Using a reading magnifying glass, I closely inspected the ball under the table light. So far, all I can see is some really small round dots that look more like scuff marks. Strikingly similar to when the cue ball popped off the table and bounced on the concrete floor prior to installing the Vinyl Plank flooring. Those marks would polish off in the ball polisher after a few cycles. However, the ball coming off the table was not near as frequent as the ball will now be struck with the phenolic tip.
With so little time using this tip on this cue ball, who knows what opinion I may have in the coming weeks. After just a single night of use though, I can't find any signs of bruising on the ball or below the balls surface. Just the surface scuffs that blemish the balls surface polish. In the morning I'll run the balls through the polisher and see if those scuff marks can still be seen, I imagine they will still be slightly visible as the scuffs from the concrete floor took a few cycles to fully vanish from the naked eye.
If your still here ready this, I'm amazed and owe you a cold one for hanging in there. I appreciate your time reading this and value any feedback you all have.
Dopc.
EDIT: Just to put my opinion on record, I still believe short jump cues should not be allowed. Jumping with a full cue should be legal, just not with a short cue. It makes it too simple. Again, just my opinion though. The reason for me using a short jumper currently is, because my opponents are using them against me in local tournaments. Keep up or get left behind.
Edit 2: Lol. not a single response about the George case or one like it currently available. I'll keep looking, I'm in no hurry and after all it's just a case right. Any decent one that fits the purpose should do after all.
