choosing a break cue

berlowmj

berlowmj

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Your assistance on technique has made my breaking practice extremely efficient. Now there is the question of a break cue. I had a phenolic tip mounted on my extra Players shaft. It explodes the balls nicely, but I miscue if I do not hit the center of the CB precisely & English to avoid a scratch is out of the question. I spend a great deal of time chalking it.

Today I used a 22 oz Valley cue with a thicker shaft (on sale at the pool hall) & I got equal explosion with greater forgiveness on the center CB hit & was able to experiment with English without miscueing. Where do I go from here?

I do not want to abuse my Universal shaft which serves me well on my other shots.
 
I just had Kevin Varney do a break cue for me. Should be shipping first of next week. Looking very forward to it! :D
Chuck
 
Break cues--weight versus speed!

berlowmj said:
Today I used a 22 oz Valley cue with a thicker shaft (on sale at the pool hall) & I got equal explosion with greater forgiveness on the center CB hit & was able to experiment with English without miscueing. Where do I go from here?

I do not want to abuse my Universal shaft which serves me well on my other shots.
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22 ounces? Now obviously, your preference will carry the day regarding what type and weight of break cue you will buy, and I don't know what weight cue you play with, but I suggest that unless you are a huge person, you may do better with a lighter break cue. When I was growing up I believed, like many, that a heavier break cue, having more mass, would translate to higher speeds on my break. However, scientific studies by people like Bob Byrne and Bob Jewett awakened the pool world to the fact that for most people, this just isn't so!

As you may remember from high school physics, momentum equals speed times mass. Therefore if two cues are traveling at the same speed, the heavier one will transfer more energy to the cue ball. The problem is that most of us cannot generate enough stick speed with a 21 or 22 oz. cue to create this additional momentum. For most people, the higher speed generated with an 18 or 19 oz. cue actually creates greater momentum (thus more cue ball speed) than can be generated with a heavier cue. For this reason, the break cue carried by most pros and top players are the same weight or lighter than their playing cues. Try it out and let me know how it goes!
 
Not to detract from Kevin's ability to build an awesome break cue, but the X-Breaker is certainly one amazing break cue!! The tip holds chalk very well, the cue feels very solid and controls the CB on the break...usually winding up mid-table. This cue has actually improved my break overall, even when not using it! Worth every penny, IMHO.

Lisa
 
have you tried breaking with a lower weighted cue? speed is more important than mass when it comes to breaking. ive used the new break cues, tried the xbreaker a few times and honestly i prefer my 18.5 scruggs SP with a hard triangle tip over any break cue i've used.

the most important part of breaking is hitting flush on the one ball, using stop or center on the cueball, and making sure you're using a full stroke to hit it. a smooth followthrough with less strength can break the balls a hell of a lot better then just trying to smash the rack every chance you get.

a good break is when you have a decent spread and the cueball somewhere near the middle of the table. for you to accomplish that, all you really need to do is hit the rack hard enough to spread the balls out. if you hit the rack with unnessesary hardness it just inreases your chances of losing the cueball, having the cueball fly off the table or scratch.

i just wanna elaborate a little bit more on using a full stroke on the break. you NEED to follow through on the break. a lot of people have this weird stop stroke when they break, and they never move thier body. you want to use your body as part of the momentum when you break, so after you initially hit the cueball (always making sure to aim at dead center of the ball you're breaking into) make sure you are following through.
 
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berlowmj said:
Your assistance on technique has made my breaking practice extremely efficient. Now there is the question of a break cue. I had a phenolic tip mounted on my extra Players shaft. It explodes the balls nicely, but I miscue if I do not hit the center of the CB precisely & English to avoid a scratch is out of the question. I spend a great deal of time chalking it.

Today I used a 22 oz Valley cue with a thicker shaft (on sale at the pool hall) & I got equal explosion with greater forgiveness on the center CB hit & was able to experiment with English without miscueing. Where do I go from here?
.
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Well... judging from everything you actually wrote, and the results you've seen, might I suggest to tear that phenolic tip off and put on a hard leather tip? I don't think you need to buy a new break cue.

Fred
 
ioCross said:
or just start playing one pocket, so you dont need to spend any money on a break cue :)
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I love 1- pocket... i have run out 10 times ever it....its so hard to do. I have been playing it for a couple months now. Makes you really appreciate 9 ball
 
RiverCity said:
I just had Kevin Varney do a break cue for me. Should be shipping first of next week. Looking very forward to it! :D
Chuck
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Me too... Mine is in the works as we speak. Will most likely be selling my Stinger shortly after my Varney arrives.

Craig
 
playablue said:
I love 1- pocket... i have run out 10 times ever it....its so hard to do. I have been playing it for a couple months now. Makes you really appreciate 9 ball
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an 8 and out in one hole is a wonderful thing to behold.
 
ioCross said:
an 8 and out in one hole is a wonderful thing to behold.
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I've played all of three one-pocket tournaments in my life. Two Derby City, and one very informal. My two shutout 8-and-outs came in these tournaments. I can't imagine what would happen if I actually had a clue how to play the game.

Fred <~~~ thinks the original poster should love his hijacked thread
 
berlowmj said:
Which hard leather tip would you suggest?
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Personally, I think any. But, that being said, the hard leather tip I had on my Gilbert chipped. So, I put on a hard Talisman WB. I think Mike Webb just told me this weekend he breaks with a Hercules tip.

I'm on the fence with phenolic tips in general. For jumping, they're the bomb. But for breaking, I'm just not sure if there's a real advantage. The hard breakers are still breaking hard. The weak breakers are still breaking weakly. The controlled breakers are still breaking with control. And the non-control breakers are still breaking all over the place.

Fred
 
Cornerman said:
Personally, I think any. But, that being said, the hard leather tip I had on my Gilbert chipped. So, I put on a hard Talisman WB. I think Mike Webb just told me this weekend he breaks with a Hercules tip.

I'm on the fence with phenolic tips in general. For jumping, they're the bomb. But for breaking, I'm just not sure if there's a real advantage. The hard breakers are still breaking hard. The weak breakers are still breaking weakly. The controlled breakers are still breaking with control. And the non-control breakers are still breaking all over the place.

Fred
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Back to pivot points....
I break with a BK-2 and thru my own testing have found the PP for the break shot to be right around 13.5" as Predator's site says - do to the throw effect at the one-ball about 1.5" needs to be added to the actual PP. A Sledgehammer for example, then would be around 10.5" according to Platinum's #'s.

A neat thing about this on the break is if the player bridges at the "break-shot" PP, aligns perfectly, and keeps the bridge perfectly still thru the hit, then the CB should "stun" at the one-ball even if the cue is rotated and the CB struck to the left or right of center.

Another interesting factoid about a steady bridge - if the effective PP is at 12.5" and the player bridges there and aligns correctly, but during the stroke the bridge moves say to the right just 1/8", the error compounds x4 and the miss at the one-ball is about 1/2" to the left of center.

I like the Phenolic tip because I believe it is faster and it holds it's shape.

Steve
 
The Mace by Rick Howard. One of my league teammates has one, and every time I break with it, I wish I could justify spending the money to upgrade to one. However since I already have a sledgehammer j/b which I really like, I just can't see how buying a better break cue is an effective use of my hard-earned dollars.

-Andrew
 
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