a tale of Schmelke’s kindness

soyale

soyale

Well-known member
many years back i decided to get my girlfriend a cue. not wanting to spend much, i got ahold of David Schmelke through email to see what was available. I got a cheap rosewood plain jane with a nice checkered collar and matching collar on a maple shaft. I also ordered a PTO pro shaft, which at the time was Schmelke’s low deflection option. It was a laminated pie shaft similar to the OB design.

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She hit a few balls with it and it got packed up into the closet for five years or so. pity, as it is a beautiful cue

I was pleased with the cue, so i had David build me a jump cue. I wanted bocote to match my playing cue and even though it’s not an option on the website he was happy to do it. Love the way it came out. hops like a frog.

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now, down the road i decide to experiment a bit with my equipment, so i busted out her old rosewood to give it a try. Different balance point, different joint, different weight. Much to my chagrin, it only took a few strokes shots before the sound and feel of a delaminated shaft became ever more apparent.

as i had two previous excellent transactions with david, i decided to reach out once more. I told him what i’ve told you. He told me to send the shaft back and offered me the option of a new SKS Schmelke Kielwood Shaft, or $200 store credit.

i started drawing sketches and picking out woods. I added a hoppe ring. And in the end, i got this beauty of a cue shipped to me 2day air for the grand sum of like $54.
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Even though the shaft was over 5 years old, david did not hesitate to stand by his product. He could have easily told me to kick rocks and i would have understood, but now i have a hell of a player in my case instead of an unused broken shaft in my closet.

this is a testimonial to the benefits of ordering from a man who builds cues instead of a factory in china.

long live Schmelke

SchmelkeCue - Custom Pool Cues | Pool & Billiard Supply Store

Schmelke family has been in business of making custom pool & billiard cues for over 50 years in Northwest Wisconsin. Schmelke Cue sells both one and two-piece billiard cues, cases and accessories throughout the United States, Europe & Canada.
schmelkecue.com schmelkecue.com

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what a nice piece of curly. macasar aint too bad either!
 
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Had occasion this week to hit a few with a Schmelke that a guy picked up recently. It is old. I can’t remember which decade he said it was from. Anyway, it is an old one, ‘50’-70’s era- sorry for not remembering exactly what he told me. Had the old Schmelke joint, full splice, a little butt heavy by today’s preferences. That is a solid cue that has stood the test of time.
 
Bavafongoul said:
My friend has two Schmelke Kielwood shafts and absolutely endorses the quality and performance.

I have a Schmelke SP cue that plays great. Schmelke is largely overlooked by most pool players.

If I were going to get my 1st pool cue, it would be a Schmelke SP with a Schmelke Kielwood shaft.
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If only their website would work anymore. I've used 4 different browsers and every combination of clearing my cache, going in incognito mode etc. Their web site just plain will not work. I did have luck for it to briefly work on Brave browser but only in incognito mode. I reloaded the page and it no longer worked. I really adore Schmelke and would like to actually order a kielwood shaft from them but their website just plain doesn't work for me.

Maybe someone who is also enamored with them or appreciates them could get in contact with them and see if they can fix their website? It has to be effecting orders. I know I'm in the market and can't order from them or even get on their website long enough to get contact information. This has been going on for a year, there is no excuse for that.
 
boogieman said:
If only their website would work anymore. I've used 4 different browsers and every combination of clearing my cache, going in incognito mode etc. Their web site just plain will not work. I did have luck for it to briefly work on Brave browser but only in incognito mode. I reloaded the page and it no longer worked. I really adore Schmelke and would like to actually order a kielwood shaft from them but their website just plain doesn't work for me.

Maybe someone who is also enamored with them or appreciates them could get in contact with them and see if they can fix their website? It has to be effecting orders. I know I'm in the market and can't order from them or even get on their website long enough to get contact information. This has been going on for a year, there is no excuse for that.
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Details? What browser? I genuinely can't get on and haven't for around a year. Supposedly back then a site certificate or something expired and it's not worked since.
 
boogieman said:
If only their website would work anymore. I've used 4 different browsers and every combination of clearing my cache, going in incognito mode etc. Their web site just plain will not work. I did have luck for it to briefly work on Brave browser but only in incognito mode. I reloaded the page and it no longer worked. I really adore Schmelke and would like to actually order a kielwood shaft from them but their website just plain doesn't work for me.

Maybe someone who is also enamored with them or appreciates them could get in contact with them and see if they can fix their website? It has to be effecting orders. I know I'm in the market and can't order from them or even get on their website long enough to get contact information. This has been going on for a year, there is no excuse for that.
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the website does not work well. I emailed him a link to this thread, so maybe he will look into it. Perhaps someone here with experience in that area could help the guy out…. Perhaps in trade….

best bet is to call the guy. he isnt a technology expert by any means
 
soyale said:
many years back i decided to get my girlfriend a cue. not wanting to spend much, i got ahold of David Schmelke through email to see what was available. I got a cheap rosewood plain jane with a nice checkered collar and matching collar on a maple shaft. I also ordered a PTO pro shaft, which at the time was Schmelke’s low deflection option. It was a laminated pie shaft similar to the OB design.

View attachment 838631

She hit a few balls with it and it got packed up into the closet for five years or so. pity, as it is a beautiful cue

I was pleased with the cue, so i had David build me a jump cue. I wanted bocote to match my playing cue and even though it’s not an option on the website he was happy to do it. Love the way it came out. hops like a frog.

View attachment 838632
now, down the road i decide to experiment a bit with my equipment, so i busted out her old rosewood to give it a try. Different balance point, different joint, different weight. Much to my chagrin, it only took a few strokes shots before the sound and feel of a delaminated shaft became ever more apparent.

as i had two previous excellent transactions with david, i decided to reach out once more. I told him what i’ve told you. He told me to send the shaft back and offered me the option of a new SKS Schmelke Kielwood Shaft, or $200 store credit.

i started drawing sketches and picking out woods. I added a hoppe ring. And in the end, i got this beauty of a cue shipped to me 2day air for the grand sum of like $54.
View attachment 838633
Even though the shaft was over 5 years old, david did not hesitate to stand by his product. He could have easily told me to kick rocks and i would have understood, but now i have a hell of a player in my case instead of an unused broken shaft in my closet.

this is a testimonial to the benefits of ordering from a man who builds cues instead of a factory in china.

long live Schmelke

SchmelkeCue - Custom Pool Cues | Pool & Billiard Supply Store

Schmelke family has been in business of making custom pool & billiard cues for over 50 years in Northwest Wisconsin. Schmelke Cue sells both one and two-piece billiard cues, cases and accessories throughout the United States, Europe & Canada.
schmelkecue.com schmelkecue.com

Log into Facebook

Log into Facebook to start sharing and connecting with your friends, family, and people you know.
www.facebook.com www.facebook.com
schmelkecue@gmail.com

View attachment 838630View attachment 838631View attachment 838632View attachment 838633View attachment 838634View attachment 838635View attachment 838638View attachment 838640View attachment 838641

what a nice piece of curly. macasar aint too bad either!
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Great story. I asked David to make me a SP with a UniLoc joint. He said they don't build with UniLoc...
 
I've been playing nothing but Schmelke cues for 20 years. I had some ideas for what I wanted in a cue and David helped get exactly what I wanted through several prototypes then the final version. I've had sticks made for my kids and some friends and teammates too. Can't say enough good about that company.
 
Interesting. I have ordered two cues from them this year. The last one was just a month ago and their website, although antiquated worked fine. David will also answer the phone and is great at responding on email.
 
Happy to say that I've been a satisfied and loyal customer for decades. They've treated me very well the few times I've needed to contact them.
 
ky4some said:
Great to hear things like this! Oddly enough, I had a local cue maker build me a break cue butt that was inspired by your girlfriends cue. Get a break shaft for that butt and you'd have an awesome breaker.
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I don’t quite get your meaning. Inspired by hers how? You mean you just ordered it after seeing this photo?

I’ve done a lot of work on that thing, actually. It plays amazing. Its been sort of my guinea pig for beginning to work on cues.

quoting myself to collapse the text, because i wrote a novel about it just now.
soyale said:
I have a few tools but dont have the space or money for the lathe shop of my dreams. Right now im working on converting a drill for spinning shafts.

The rosewood came in with an 18 pin flat faced phenolic joint at 19oz on the nose with a 3.9oz shaft, with an 18” balance point. This was part of why i decided to experiment with it. The cue i had been using for 15 years had a steel joint with a 14 pin, with closer to a 20” balance point (forward weighted).

when i sent the PTO shaft back, i actually had a kielwood made for her cue by AZBs own @GBCues. It plays! I also had him plug and tap the rosewood for an extension bumper. Good, affordable work. Recommend.

David gave me a 5 week lead time so i used the keil/rosewood combo in the meantime:
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Results of the experiment: I did not like the rear weight. I did not like the rear balance. The kielwood shoots straight as an arrow but juiced the rock significantly less than my ob1+.

i decided to fiddle. i took every drill bit extension in my house and hodge podged them together. after pulling the weight bolt i used a spade bit and slowly started turning by hand to get a feel for the wood. rosewood is hard. once i had the bit set i slowly spun it on the drill about half the length of the weight bolt and then tapped threads in my new hole. I put the weight bolt back in, and measured the balance point. Unchanged. i had removed enough material to lighten up the weight but what i moved forward was not enough to offset the loss in terms of balance.

I did this back and forth for a day or so, scared to go too far. by the the time the cue hit my desired 19” balance point i had basically hollowed out half of the cue. I settled on 18.4oz, figuring half an oz wont matter much and that the change would be good for me in terms of my experimentation.

I loved it. The kielwood already resonates so nicely but when attached to a hollow piece of rosewood it rang like a bell.

You can kind of hear it in this video:


but there is no way to show yall the feeling. i am a fan of haptic feedback, and dislike stiff unresponsive cf. this felt like the opposite of that, yet insanely low squirt.

fast forward five weeks and my cue butt arrives. now i need to get the kiel to fit. some azb searches and discussions with friends led me to believe i could do it. as the rosewood used an 18 pin, i was able to use standard hardware; a bolt in the insert and two jam nuts up against it. i crumpled up foil to use as a heat shield. i used the schmelke maple shaft as practice, first, but did it to both.

I layed out the shaft and propped up my torch. couple minutes and it spun right out:
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i happened to have a 5/16-14 schmelke insert with a 7/16-14 install thread that i bought at the same time as the rosewood. i retapped the threads to clean them and then spun the insert right in. i decided to forgo the epoxy until the insert twists itself out… but it aint goin anywhere anytime soon.

the kielwood was more difficult. everything came out fine. I made a much bigger diameter on my aluminum foil heat shield this time.

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this is where things get REALLY dumb. I only had a 7/16-20 install thread self aligning insert on hand.

heres a photo of what i had next to what came out of the kiel:
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For the sake of experimenting, i decided to file and tap the insert to a fully threaded 7/16-14. I smashed the ever-loving hell out of the insert in the process. I took an old extension bumper and filed two sides flat so I could put it in my bench vice. I put a pin in the bumper and the insert on the pin.

Once secured, with a moderate amount of unsavory language and time, i was able to transform the insert into a usable one

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Some sanding and polishing and smashing got the insert back to where it looked good enough for me.

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plays like an absolute dream. the weight, balance, hit, and deflection are ALL the best of any cue i’ve ever held (which truthfully is not many), let alone a cue i own.

however now my beautiful rosewood had no shaft…. So im currently in the process of swapping the pin from a flat faced 5/16-18 to a piloted 5/16-14.

getting the pin out was easy. as per some of azbs instruction i used modeling clay to fashion a sleeve for the joint collar and then stuck it in the freezer, as well as a tshirt for good measure. Once cold, i slipped the clay over the collar and wrapped the cold shirt around the forearm and repeated my process, and it twisted right out with a pair of channel locks. I checked the collar afterward and it felt maybe slightly warmer than if left in a hot car. retapped the threads (with a 5/16-14 pin that i dremel’d cuts into to make a tap) to clean them and my new pin screws right in. epoxy recommendations are welcome.

now the scary part. best i had to pilot the hole was a bench vise and a drill press stand. not a drill press. a stand that you put a drill in. I used a 29/64ths bit and spent a good hour making adjustments until i had it as center as possible. i failed to deliver a perfectly center hole, but i intend to clean it up by hand. thats the last straw for that stand, though. ive been checking FB marketplace for a drill press.

as it sits currently:
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anyway. that’s what i’ve been up to.
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TLDR: Im tryna work on cues without real tools lol
 

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boogieman said:
If only their website would work anymore. I've used 4 different browsers and every combination of clearing my cache, going in incognito mode etc. Their web site just plain will not work. I did have luck for it to briefly work on Brave browser but only in incognito mode. I reloaded the page and it no longer worked. I really adore Schmelke and would like to actually order a kielwood shaft from them but their website just plain doesn't work for me.

Maybe someone who is also enamored with them or appreciates them could get in contact with them and see if they can fix their website? It has to be effecting orders. I know I'm in the market and can't order from them or even get on their website long enough to get contact information. This has been going on for a year, there is no excuse for that.
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Agree they need to fix the issue. I could not get on at all. Three different computers etc. the problem I think is the provider not browser. I cannot get on with my PC. Can’t with my phone either but if I turn off my WiFi, I can get through to them from my phone.
 
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