What the desired size in a shaft ? what is your prefernce.

I've recently been playing with a 11.75mm pro taper solid maple shaft. Need more table time to judge if it works for me.

No more then 12.75

I'm good with 11.75 - 12.75. Perfect is 12.62 for me

Once a person reaches a certain level they should be able to play with any shaft within reason after an adjustment period.

I'm ok with any shaft between 13.5 mm and 11 mm.

I'm more interested in the taper of a shaft. Taper, size and length depen on one another.

Jeff

PoolFan101 said:

Hello ,

I was talking with a Cue maker who told me that you should never go below 12mm on a shaft , I personally like Meucci 11.65 and I have some that is 11.5 mm . But by preference for me I like a 12 mm on all of my shafts. 13mm just seems to big and 12 just suits me right . What size shaft do you like and what do you look for . Thanks

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My Meucci has a 12.5 Pro Shaft, and that feels about right to me. No reason to go smaller, IMHO.

another vote for 13mm plain maple shaft.

I have fat fingers and prefer a closed bridge 95% of my shots, so I prefer 11.75 up to 12.5mm. I believe every shaft I own now is between those #'s.

13mm seems just a hair big, easier for me to aim precisely with a slightly smaller tip for some reason. I have both solid maple and LD laminate Pechauer shafts in 12.75, may go to 12.5 but no smaller.

I have been shooting 11.5mm for the past 4-5 years, and before that it was 11.75 for another 4-ish years.

cubswin said:

12.75-13mm is what I like, but depends on the taper.

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Me too.

Ken

11.8mm right now, and the previous 3 shafts I've had (accounting for 10+ years of playing) have been within +-0.05mm of that. Anything else would probably feel entirely wrong to me at this point.

My 11.8mm is a Pechauer Rogue, which has a "modified straight taper", but searching around I can't figure out what that actually means. Anyone know?

Snooker Theory said:

I'll shoot with anything, 14mm down to 9.5mm, all bueno. I like 10-11mm conical tapers probably the most.

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Why is it that snooker plays seem to favor conical taper over pro-taper shafts??
Do snooker players even use anything other than conical tapers??

fastone371 said:

Why is it that snooker plays seem to favor conical taper over pro-taper shafts??
Do snooker players even use anything other than conical tapers??

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Theure using 8mm tips, conical tapers offer the proper stiffness, if they went american taper, the stick would be flimsy. 3 cushion cues are conical tapers as well, the ball is heavy,

The first cue I plunked down for was an Adams Rubber Duck with a 14+ mm tip. I got to hitting pretty good with it. It seems it's just easier to freewheel (bang actually) with a large diameter tip. Been through 11s, 12s, and settled on 13s because that's the prevalent size.

PoolFan101 said:

Hello ,

I was talking with a Cue maker who told me that you should never go below 12mm on a shaft , I personally like Meucci 11.65 and I have some that is 11.5 mm . But by preference for me I like a 12 mm on all of my shafts. 13mm just seems to big and 12 just suits me right . What size shaft do you like and what do you look for . Thanks

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I like around 12.3mm, with an extended Pro taper. Like a Meucci style Pro taper.

fastone371 said:

Why is it that snooker plays seem to favor conical taper over pro-taper shafts??
Do snooker players even use anything other than conical tapers??

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The reasons are mostly that the added stiffness provided by the conical taper allows for smaller tips. There are also reasons of tradition, how the cues are typically handmade (which makes it tough to make very complicated and super demanding tapers with the accuracy required). Also the big benefit of pro-tapers (the closed bridge thing) isn't really a factor in snooker. All but a handful of shots are shot with an open bridge. I don't know of any snooker player that plays with a pro-taper. It's just unheard of. It can be done of course, but there is really not an upside to doing it.

When you play with conical tapers for a while, pro tapers just feel flimsy. The conical taper IMO gives more controlled action on the ball, especially on centre-ish hits. I'm just never really surprised at the action with conical, while the pro taper sometimes gives me too much or too litte. It's a personal thing. I play with conical tapers only, since I'm a pool/snooker/blackball player. I'm learning carom as well, so it's easier to just stick with conical tapers. When you go to the outside of the cueball (side and top/bottom) the conical taper just feels a lot more solid, whereas the pro-taper can feel weak, like it's bouncing off the ball, rather than going through like the conical taper.

I think since dropping the elbow is minus 7, the conical taper helps keep the tip from dipping into the cloth.

My old friend who was a great player and pool room owner, Dickie Todd. He passed away a year ago, but he was only person I have met that played with a 14mm shaft. He played with a Joey Gold cue, and had shafts made to this incredible 14mm.

Can you even imagine?

Ken

I have smaller hands, so I like a thinner shafts between 12 and 12.5. I can't stand conical tapers. anything below 12 is too small for me, I am not accurate enough hitting the cue exactly where i want all the time, so the smaller shafts seem to magnify my errors.

surffisher2a said:

...the smaller shafts seem to magnify my errors.

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But they don't really. A smaller tip is just the inside part of a larger tip, so it acts identically. The tiny "missing" outside layer only comes into play with maximum spin.

pj
chgo