While this site has taken up too much of my time over the last 6 or so years, it has also allowed me access to the vast amount of cue knowledge, so as I was trolling CL, I happened upon an obscure cue that I had read about, the Mohawk. To be honest, I had seen another one locally, but it was a plain jane and they wanted $75, I didn't think it was worth my time to possibly make $25.
It would seem as though a member here has the uncanny ability to resurrect 2 year old threads in the attempts of purchasing old Mohawk cues that probably sold, you guessed it, 2 years ago. Dizzy, if your reading this, it's probably 2015!!
The last month or so has been kind enough to bless me with some really cool sub $150 cues, so I figured it was worth the the hour round trip to check out the Mohawk. In an old Huebler case sat a pretty good looking cue, I was kinda surprised. It was rosewood on rosewood with maple and purpleheart trim rings, and if it had 6 points instead of 4, it would have been a close copy of a SouthWest. I had read that these cues where notorious for warping, some stating 80-90%, which I think may be a slight exaggeration. A quick site down the cue and it was obviously straight, so I figured it was going home with me. The seller and I chatted a few minutes, he was asking $75 and was losing his bartending gig, so I didn't have the heart to talk him down, much. I gave him $65, I did drive an hour roundtrip, and headed home.
OK, now to the cue. Even though it had a couple finish chips, it was in pretty damn good condition for an ex bar league cue. It has that old 80's finish that had a yellow tint to it, making the maple veneers look like a white wall from a bar that had been smoked in for 20 years. The finish had also shrunk with time, leaving cracks around the trim rings. To top it all off, there is a gold painted Mohawk logo under the finish that makes the cue look really cheap. All in all the finish just sucks and a refinish with today's products could make this cue look quite nice.
The cue has what I believe a Pau Ferro nose with four single maple veneered really nice rosewood points and butt sleeve, complimented with a short butt sleeve of purpleheart wood.
The purpleheart kinda stood out, but I then realized it was used in with the maple check rings too.
I gotta say, the woods are pretty top notch in my book. The points have a chatoyance to it, something I see more in the mahogany on nice acoustic guitars than I do in rosewood.
While inspecting the cue even closer, I notice that the butt cap and the joint collar are both made from the old black phenolic that I had on my Runde Schons and my Block letter Joss. With the cue in hand, it feels exceptionally balanced, so I pulled the ugly bumper off in order to remove and weigh the weight bolt. Much to my surprise, not only was there not a weight bolt to remove, one had never been drilled for either. To me, that's a big plus, really big plus. I had a Darren Hill, that was naturally perfectly balanced, that I foolishly traded off with another cue, only realizing that the Hill was one of the best playing cues I had ever had the experience to use, hats off to you Mr. Hill. So far the cue has great woods and phenolic, is balanced wonderfully, and now I find out has no weight bolt, well F*ck Yah! A cheap finish and and ugly bumper are the only cons so far, I think I can live with that.
Before I get to the shaft, I would like to say a quick thing about the pin. A Brass flat bottomed big pin has to be, one of if not, the best looking pin, thank you Mr. Kersenbrock. A big ol 3/8x10 flat bottomed brass pin is the only piece of metal that you can see on the cue, I'm assuming there is one at the A joint, which is another nice touch in a cue that I've become quite fond of.
Onto the shaft. First off, the shaft is 29" while the butt is 28 7/8". Nice piece of maple, ring count not too high, I counted 12-15, but they are nicely spaced and the spine is straight all the way down to the ferrule, which happens to be old LBM where you can see the linen, F*ck Yah, a favorite of mine. That shaft is tapered nicely, which I haven't measured, but I know it's not a straight taper. Really nice tap tone on the shaft too, on the high side, which happens to compliment the tap tone of the butt, which is on the medium side. Together the cue is super straight, and on top of all this, plays down right awesome. Only a few cues that I've played with have had this solid and evenly balanced feel to them. That mixed with a great taper, allows me to stroke through the ball much easier, placing the CB where I want it without working too hard. Some cues do the work, some make you work, others work with you. This cue works with you. The cue imparts confidence in my stroke, it is stiff but not overly, balls go down easily and its balance allows me to shoot left handed shoots with much more ease. I now understand why someone would attempt to purchase an extremely inexpensive cue from a two year old thread. This is where I thank you Dizzy for keeping a cheap unknown cue on the radar for me. I've played with SW's, Bluegrass, Black, Runde, Nitti, AE, Lebow, Rambo, Palmer, McWorter, Morris, Coker, Young(Fell in love with that one, thanks PoolRod), Hill and I'm sure some other great names. While I'm not directly comparing the Mohawk to these other cues, I guess I kinda am. This is a great playing cue, hands down. For me, better than my R series Schons, C and D McDermotts, any Joss, Pechauer, Jacoby whatever North American made production pool cue. Maybe I got lucky, maybe their cues are just ok and I found a great one, these things happen, I understand. Whatever the case may be, I am extremely happy to have found this cue, and my pocket book is to. I have plans for this cue, I think a refinish, rewrap in a color combo that compliments the woods, and a bumper that looks good will really make this cue shine. What I would like to do is have the Mohawk logo laser engraved into the bumper, since the Mohawk logo on the stick looks terrible.
It would seem as though a member here has the uncanny ability to resurrect 2 year old threads in the attempts of purchasing old Mohawk cues that probably sold, you guessed it, 2 years ago. Dizzy, if your reading this, it's probably 2015!!
The last month or so has been kind enough to bless me with some really cool sub $150 cues, so I figured it was worth the the hour round trip to check out the Mohawk. In an old Huebler case sat a pretty good looking cue, I was kinda surprised. It was rosewood on rosewood with maple and purpleheart trim rings, and if it had 6 points instead of 4, it would have been a close copy of a SouthWest. I had read that these cues where notorious for warping, some stating 80-90%, which I think may be a slight exaggeration. A quick site down the cue and it was obviously straight, so I figured it was going home with me. The seller and I chatted a few minutes, he was asking $75 and was losing his bartending gig, so I didn't have the heart to talk him down, much. I gave him $65, I did drive an hour roundtrip, and headed home.
OK, now to the cue. Even though it had a couple finish chips, it was in pretty damn good condition for an ex bar league cue. It has that old 80's finish that had a yellow tint to it, making the maple veneers look like a white wall from a bar that had been smoked in for 20 years. The finish had also shrunk with time, leaving cracks around the trim rings. To top it all off, there is a gold painted Mohawk logo under the finish that makes the cue look really cheap. All in all the finish just sucks and a refinish with today's products could make this cue look quite nice.
The cue has what I believe a Pau Ferro nose with four single maple veneered really nice rosewood points and butt sleeve, complimented with a short butt sleeve of purpleheart wood.
The purpleheart kinda stood out, but I then realized it was used in with the maple check rings too.
I gotta say, the woods are pretty top notch in my book. The points have a chatoyance to it, something I see more in the mahogany on nice acoustic guitars than I do in rosewood.
While inspecting the cue even closer, I notice that the butt cap and the joint collar are both made from the old black phenolic that I had on my Runde Schons and my Block letter Joss. With the cue in hand, it feels exceptionally balanced, so I pulled the ugly bumper off in order to remove and weigh the weight bolt. Much to my surprise, not only was there not a weight bolt to remove, one had never been drilled for either. To me, that's a big plus, really big plus. I had a Darren Hill, that was naturally perfectly balanced, that I foolishly traded off with another cue, only realizing that the Hill was one of the best playing cues I had ever had the experience to use, hats off to you Mr. Hill. So far the cue has great woods and phenolic, is balanced wonderfully, and now I find out has no weight bolt, well F*ck Yah! A cheap finish and and ugly bumper are the only cons so far, I think I can live with that.
Before I get to the shaft, I would like to say a quick thing about the pin. A Brass flat bottomed big pin has to be, one of if not, the best looking pin, thank you Mr. Kersenbrock. A big ol 3/8x10 flat bottomed brass pin is the only piece of metal that you can see on the cue, I'm assuming there is one at the A joint, which is another nice touch in a cue that I've become quite fond of.
Onto the shaft. First off, the shaft is 29" while the butt is 28 7/8". Nice piece of maple, ring count not too high, I counted 12-15, but they are nicely spaced and the spine is straight all the way down to the ferrule, which happens to be old LBM where you can see the linen, F*ck Yah, a favorite of mine. That shaft is tapered nicely, which I haven't measured, but I know it's not a straight taper. Really nice tap tone on the shaft too, on the high side, which happens to compliment the tap tone of the butt, which is on the medium side. Together the cue is super straight, and on top of all this, plays down right awesome. Only a few cues that I've played with have had this solid and evenly balanced feel to them. That mixed with a great taper, allows me to stroke through the ball much easier, placing the CB where I want it without working too hard. Some cues do the work, some make you work, others work with you. This cue works with you. The cue imparts confidence in my stroke, it is stiff but not overly, balls go down easily and its balance allows me to shoot left handed shoots with much more ease. I now understand why someone would attempt to purchase an extremely inexpensive cue from a two year old thread. This is where I thank you Dizzy for keeping a cheap unknown cue on the radar for me. I've played with SW's, Bluegrass, Black, Runde, Nitti, AE, Lebow, Rambo, Palmer, McWorter, Morris, Coker, Young(Fell in love with that one, thanks PoolRod), Hill and I'm sure some other great names. While I'm not directly comparing the Mohawk to these other cues, I guess I kinda am. This is a great playing cue, hands down. For me, better than my R series Schons, C and D McDermotts, any Joss, Pechauer, Jacoby whatever North American made production pool cue. Maybe I got lucky, maybe their cues are just ok and I found a great one, these things happen, I understand. Whatever the case may be, I am extremely happy to have found this cue, and my pocket book is to. I have plans for this cue, I think a refinish, rewrap in a color combo that compliments the woods, and a bumper that looks good will really make this cue shine. What I would like to do is have the Mohawk logo laser engraved into the bumper, since the Mohawk logo on the stick looks terrible.
