I love this video. He makes it real clear that it comes down to 'your equipment, your stroke'. No one size-fits all deal. Regardless of whatever 'WonderCue' you play with you still have to figure out the squirt/swerve aspects of it. Looks like 'HAMB' is still alive and well.
Sane advice/Heresy ala Neils.........................
- Thread starter garczar
- Start date
dendweller
Well-known member
if they ever create a cue that doesn't cause deflection or swerve, I'm in. Since that would seem impossible, I think you need to pick your poison and get used to it.
I suppose it might be possible to make a cue that doesn't cause deflection (squirt), but swerve is caused by the stroke angle, not the cue.
pj
chgo
dendweller
Well-known member
that would be why I said impossible
dendweller
Well-known member
Here's a question, do you agree that lowering the weight of the front of the shaft decreases deflection because it allows the shaft to deflect instead of the ball?
that's what happens, a 'lo-def'(CB) shaft deflects more allowing CB to squirt less.
It’s not possible as long as Newton’s 3rd Law of Motion is in effect. Off-center action on the CB -> equal and opposite reaction by the CB.
Deflection could be further reduced if we find a lighter weight material for shafts than carbon fiber, that is still stiff and strong enough (unlikely - but titanium could be a candidate), but it will never be zero. And it’s not even close to zero with CF. Currently the deflection scale for shafts is approximately this:
0 - - - - - - - - - - - - ULD-LD-SD
I'm recalling a weird cue idea I saw diagrammed here years ago: the tip and ferrule were on a sliding mount so they could move sideways without moving the shaft sideways. The amount of "end mass" being pushed sideways could be small enough to not matter.
pj
chgo
Did justnum invent that little gem by chance??
Interesting. Aren’t there equipment rules against that? Even so, there’s still going to be a non-zero amount of CB deflection from the off-center force applied.
If you hit a CB off-center with a feather, it won’t deflect. But it also won’t move. A certain amount of shaft end mass is necessary to propel the CB.
It's an imperfect example that suggests anti-squirt technology may still have some tricks up its sleeve.
I suggest not using a feather.
pj
chgo
dendweller
Well-known member
So then the stiffness should contribute some one way or another?
It's more directly caused by the shaft's end mass, but I think stiffness can affect how much of the shaft's end mass is "counted" (something about the speed of transverse "shock" waves along the shaft's length).
pj
chgo
Dr.Dave covered this. Stiffness is part of the equation but end-mass is far more important. My Rhino cf shaft is quite stiff but still pretty lo-defl due to its low-mass/weight. Math heavy but at the end he gets to the point: https://billiards.colostate.edu/technical_proofs/new/TP_B-19.pdf More: https://billiards.colostate.edu/faq/squirt/endmass/
Shaft stiffness has little to do with deflection. From Dr. Dave:
However, typical pool cue shafts are very flexible in the lateral direction (i.e., they don’t require much force to flex), and the shaft does not flex very much during the incredibly brief tip contact time anyway, so stiffness does not have a significant direct effect on squirt. Per the what causes squirt resource page, it is endmass (not shaft stiffness) that is almost entirely responsible for squirt.
That 'incredibly brief contact time' is still probably longer than my current attention span.
The appeal of carbon fiber shafts (super-low deflection) is that there is less aiming compensation needed for using side spin. This compensation is pretty much guesswork for most players. That's why so many start playing better soon after they switch to carbon fiber.
Reducing guesswork on spin shots, and in some cases eliminating it, makes a huge difference for players that tend to miss every time they have to apply a lot of spin.
Reducing guesswork on spin shots, and in some cases eliminating it, makes a huge difference for players that tend to miss every time they have to apply a lot of spin.
dendweller
Well-known member
To me, the guess work was just different, with side spin high or low, I was seeing swerve I wasn't used to.
Just side was pretty nice though.
Yeah, I mentioned to Dr. Dave once that without flexibility the end mass wouldn't be such a large factor either. I mean, if the end mass was super light but the shaft material didn't allow it to flex out of the way, you'd have maximum squirt.
His response was that there is no shaft like that. Still, my point stands, that you can't say flexibility has no significant impact unless you've actually tested the lateral flexibility of different shafts that have equal end masses.
An example would be comparing two identical shafts with equal end mass, and one shaft is used where the wood grain works against lateral deflection, while the other is used with the wood grain working in favor of the deflection. Test both shafts first to see how much force is needed to bend the shaft laterally X amount of distance. If the force is the same, then of course the cb squirt will be the same. But I wonder how much of a difference there'd be in cb squirt if the shaft deflection forces were not the same.
Not that any of this makes a difference in playing pool, because the bridge hand isn't so fixed and rigid that it won't allow lateral cue shaft movement. If it were, if our bridge hand allowed zero lateral movement of the cue, then it would be obvious that shaft deflection would play a major role in cb quirt, much more than end mass. So I'm sure that's why Dr Dave says shaft deflection is not a significant factor, because the bridge gives so much that any shaft deflection is rendered meaningless.