can you make a cue hit stiffer?

S

sluggerknuckles

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Hello and once again thank you in advance for your comments. I always appreciate the cue makers taking their time to answer these forums.

Can you make a cue hit stiffer with a new shaft?

I recently purchased a Jim Pierce cue and love the hit. The ball pops off of the cue. After playing for a while with the pierce, I went back to my ned morris and my whisler to compare.

The Morris and Whisler hit "Flatter"....not as sharp maybe. I do not know how to describe the hit since my experience in playing with different cues is limited.

They both hit well in my opinion and when I have more expereinced players use them, they say they hit really well.

Anyway, can I take the cue to a cue maker and have him make me a new shaft for my other cues that can hit more like the pierce? How would I even explain this to a cuemaker?
 
sluggerknuckles said:
Hello and once again thank you in advance for your comments. I always appreciate the cue makers taking their time to answer these forums.

Can you make a cue hit stiffer with a new shaft?

I recently purchased a Jim Pierce cue and love the hit. The ball pops off of the cue. After playing for a while with the pierce, I went back to my ned morris and my whisler to compare.

The Morris and Whisler hit "Flatter"....not as sharp maybe. I do not know how to describe the hit since my experience in playing with different cues is limited.

They both hit well in my opinion and when I have more expereinced players use them, they say they hit really well.

Anyway, can I take the cue to a cue maker and have him make me a new shaft for my other cues that can hit more like the pierce? How would I even explain this to a cuemaker?
Click to expand...



There are a couple of ways to stiffen up the hit of cue. First if it doesn't have one and the pin is a 3/8-10 have a phenolic insert put into the cues shaft. This will give you a tighter connection than pin to wood. Next you could also have the ferrule replaced depending upon what the shaft currently has. I find that a Macarta ferrule with a hard tip will also stiffen up a cues hit.

Oh and by the way this is only my opinion others may or may not agree with it.

Hope this helps
 
In my opinion you just need to keep playing with your Pierce until the day you are well-advanced enough in your game that you can tell why you like that one better.
 
manwon said:
There are a couple of ways to stiffen up the hit of cue. First if it doesn't have one and the pin is a 3/8-10 have a phenolic insert put into the cues shaft. This will give you a tighter connection than pin to wood. Next you could also have the ferrule replaced depending upon what the shaft currently has. I find that a Macarta ferrule with a hard tip will also stiffen up a cues hit.

Oh and by the way this is only my opinion others may or may not agree with it.

Hope this helps
Click to expand...

Not to be captain of the semantics police, but, IMHO - the changes you
suggested wouldmake the cue hit HARDER. but not stiffer.

Dale
 
"Can you make a cue hit stiffer with a new shaft?"

To the OP;
Generally speaking, YES, a new shaft CAN stiffen the hit of a cue.
If there's any stiffening to be gained, that's where it would happen; the shaft.
To help illustrate this, I'll give you a mental image based on the extremes.
Imagine you're playing with a Meucci-like 'noodle' shaft.
Now swap-out that shaft for a 13.2mm shaft or a Purpleheart shaft.
You will definitely stiffen the hit of the cue.
Start at the extremes and work your way to the center until you find your happy-place.

To Capt. Semantics, Lol
I respect what you are saying, I really do. You've pointed to the distinction btwn hard & stiff.
I also suspect that you are a purist. In my world, that's a good thing.
What Manwon is suggesting in his point of replacing the tip and/or ferrule, WILL make the cue hit harder
but it won't stiffen the hit.
His other suggestion of a phenolic insert used in conjunction with the BIG pin will, IMO, stiffen the hit to a noticeable degree.
Here is why I feel this to be true.
The big pin normally doesn't need an insert to perform it's function of securing the shaft to the handle.
It's been performing this function admirably for at least 50 yrs.
OK, here's the down-side; it threads into wood.
Wood will flex and it will move. In extreme cases it can strip out. It's certainly not the tightest connection that can be achieved.
That's precisely where the shaft is losing it's rightful stiffness, at that threaded connection.
The shaft is not being secured to the handle as tightly as it could be. The phenolic insert remedies this.
Phenolic threads don't move nor will they flex in this application.
An additional benefit is that phenolic threads aren't subject to the consequences of changing humidity.
I remember reading somewhere that wood is subject.
Thanx Dale, good post. Sometimes you've got to do more than just scratch the surface.

All in all, it's pretty tough to get two shafts to hit exactly the same. First off, they're two different pcs.
of wood. Even if everything else about the shafts is the same, they're still two different pcs. of wood.
Compound this search for the holy-grail of sameness with the fact that you won't know until the shaft is built.
Potentially, you could build 20 shafts before you find one that's even close.

Keep thinking. It's part of what cue-building is all about.
KJ
 
KJ is right, I had an older Mike Stacy that was incredibly soft in the forearm area. It played terrible, so i had a Purple Heart shaft made for it and it helped. I still never got used to the thin flimsy forearm but like I said it did make a difference
 
I too like a good solid stiff hitting cue and what I did was get some laminated blanks from Atlas and have Bill McDaniel make me some shafts for my McDaniel cue. He made these with his normal construction (taper and ferrules) and I like the hit better than regular shafts.
 
KJ Cues said:
... The shaft is not being secured to the handle as tightly as it could be. The phenolic insert remedies this.
Phenolic threads don't move nor will they flex in this application. ...
Click to expand...


Is it possible that some of the flex that you are trying to eliminate is just transferred to the interface in the shaft between the phenolic and wood?
 
Short answer, no.
The flex that we're discussing has, for all intents and purpose, been eliminated.
If it were merely transferred to an adjacent area, it would still exist and nothing would be gained relative
to stiffening the hit.
The phen. insert, which is harder/stronger than wood, is installed with epoxy (which is also harder/stronger
than wood), into the base of the shaft and literally becomes one with the shaft.
Some of the phen. inserts I've used have a small threaded area on their outside which allows them to be threaded
into the shaft even though they are epoxied as well. This may be overkill but I don't see it hurting anything.

HTHs, KJ
 
Have a builder build you a new shaft like the pierce you like so much with the same taper, ferrule, tip combo, or better yet, have Jim make you some.
Problem solved:thumbup: The vast majority of a shafts stiffness is in the taper, not wether or not it has a phenolic insert. Hueblers had a fairly stiff hit, especially for a small pin, and soft implex insert so............
 
Have you ever noticed that when you get a cue with 2 shafts you will pick one over the other, few to none of the players I have ever seen just reach in for either.

I think there may be a handful of cue makers that will take the time to match weight, grain and color to the 95% mark and don't believe you could hit 100%.

The negativity reached by the shaft not feeling right to you could be equal to getting down shooting a ball thinking you could miss it and miss you will.
 
The best way to make a cue hit stiffer is to grind up some Viagra and rub it in to the shaft.
 
I'm guessing you really want a firmer hit. The cheapest and easiest way to give the hit a firmer feel is to change to a harder tip. If that doesn't do it, a ferrule change in combination to a harder tip should do the trick. Micarta is expensive, but it will firm up the hit considerably.
 
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