"Dead Straight" Are they all really??

[jetlau3]

I've only owned about 7 cues and only 3 have been customs, but EVERY single shaft I've ever owned has had at least a slight slight wobble.

My Buss has been kept inside, air conditioned, cared for very well, since the moment I got it from Jim. Both shafts, the one that has been played extensively, and the one that was until recently unchalked, have slight slight wobbles. They look dead straight and the wobble can not be detected by the naked eye, but when rolled on a perfectly flat surface, they do wobble a tiny bit. Can't tell when rolled fast but as the cue starts slowing down, it does indeed roll faster, then slower until it stops. Very slight wobble almost not noticeable to the eye.

Every for sale ad says "dead straight" and rolls straight together and apart.. is this true?? or do people just not mention it when the shaft only wobbles a tiny tiny bit when rolled??

 

[stouter2386]

im not sure wich company it is, either cutec or mucci but one of the state that their cue does have a "slight wobble" when rolled on a table but its perfectly normal

 

[qbilder]

There's no such thing as perfect if you go to extremes. Personally, I have never seen a shaft that was perfect to the eye. Does that mean they are all warped? Not in my opinion. I think it's gotta be noticably warped in order to consider it not straight. Everybody has their own feelings of what is straight & what is warped, but most generally are pretty close so everybody understands. Take a shaft that 99 people won't notice a wobble in, and the hundredth guy will be nit picky enough to point it out & swear it's not straight. So technically, there is no such thing as perfect or "dead straight". But on earth, with normal humans, if it rolls straight without flopping across the table, it's straight.

 

[butterflycues]

shafts

Some people don't look that close and some don't even care. But normally I think most people only look at how the cue rolls on the table. When I trade with someone for a used cue, I expect the shafts to have some roll in them. You are buying wood and it is used. I check the butt to make sure it is straight. Shafts are not that expensive. Shafts can be staight one day and have movement the next. Most players will not let it bother them as they know in a few weeks or months it will probably have some roll any way. JMO Butterflycues

 

[JohnPT]

When I get a new cue I check for straightness, once. After that I never bother to look again as I know wood moves and if there is even a slight wobble it's only gonna mess with my head.

 

[jetlau3]

just to clarify, most of the cues I say have small 'wobbles' can not be seen to "wobble" when rolled on a pool table. The felt has some thickness and cues roll rather slow on pool tables due to friction. These small wobbles are only apparent when placed on a hard flat surface such as a counter top or a hard wood desk where you can distinctly see the gap under neath the cue...

Good to hear that a small wobble is nothing to worry about though. I've often thought of collecting pool sticks for fun and the one thing that always sets me off is the fact that cues tend to warp, regardless of how well they are stored, and a warped cue is never worth nearly what it was worth straight..

 

[Tro]

I always check the butt. As stated by previous posters, it's very rare that you find a used cue that doesn't have some wobble to it. People sand em, taper em, clean em, store them poorly, etc. Shafts wear unevenly over time.

Now, if the thing wobbles like a banana during an earthquake, you have problems.

 

[Tramp Steamer]

Good shafts, from good cuemakers, almost never wobble.
Checking to see if a shaft is warped is somewhat difficult to do at the poolhall. The best way is by going to your friendly neighborhood cue repair person and have them spin it between centers on a cue lathe.
Checking the butt is easier, but what you are really looking for is a bent or poorly installed joint pin. Place the bumper end of the butt on the rail and the pin end on the table surface. Roll it back and forth and check the pin for up and down movement. If you're not satisfied with the results, the cue repairman can spin the butt also.

 

[ShootingArts]

three shafts

All three of my playing shafts warped a little over the summer. All three are dead straight rolling or to my naked eye right now. I'm betting all three will be less than straight next summer too.

Some sellers declare a slight wobble even when they can't detect any just to sidestep the folks that will claim it wobbles. Often the wobble comes from the test set-up. Sometimes it is only in people's minds, either way, "slight wobble" covers the seller's butt.

Even spinning in a lathe doesn't prove a shaft straight or crooked. Lathes themselves are never perfectly true and then however you choose to hold the shaft is less than perfect too. Spin too fast and there is a wobble from whipping. Somewhere along the line each person must decide for themselves what acceptable runout is. I can put the same shaft in my lathe five times and get five different runout readings measuring to less than .001".

Hu

 

[12310bch]

too perfect for me

Good shafts, from good cuemakers, almost never wobble.
Checking to see if a shaft is warped is somewhat difficult to do at the poolhall. The best way is by going to your friendly neighborhood cue repair person and have them spin it between centers on a cue lathe.
Checking the butt is easier, but what you are really looking for is a bent or poorly installed joint pin. Place the bumper end of the butt on the rail and the pin end on the table surface. Roll it back and forth and check the pin for up and down movement. If you're not satisfied with the results, the cue repairman can spin the butt also.

Tramp, if you gotta put it on a machine to find a wobble there's not
enough there to bother my C game. If it rolls straight on the felt of
a pool table, that's good enough for me.:grin:

 

[qbilder]

Even spinning in a lathe doesn't prove a shaft straight or crooked. Lathes themselves are never perfectly true and then however you choose to hold the shaft is less than perfect too. Spin too fast and there is a wobble from whipping. Somewhere along the line each person must decide for themselves what acceptable runout is. I can put the same shaft in my lathe five times and get five different runout readings measuring to less than .001".

Exactly. The straightest a shaft will ever be is the moment immediately after a cut. Once you do the joint work & flush it to the butt, it's no longer dead nuts. I don't care who the cuemaker is.

A guy showed me a trick of rolling the assembled cue on the table rail instead of the slate. The butt of the cue rolls on the slate with the joint & shaft hanging over the rail. This indicates very obviously if there's any wobble in the cue because you'll clearly see the tip end of the shaft roll out & wobble. However, I took an extremely warped shaft & faced it to centerline with the tip, and attached it to a butt & rolled it on the rail. It rolled perfect with no wobble as if it had no warp. Point being, even if the shaft is warped considerably, I was able to face the joint back to centerline & make the cue appear straight again. What does it all matter? Nothing. I personally have always thought people get too bent over minor warpage. Mountains out of ant hills.

 

[JoeyInCali]

Nothing. I personally have always thought people get too bent over minor warpage. Mountains out of ant hills.
The same guy who complains about .025 wobble in the middle of the shaft is the same guy who jumps on every shot.

 

[Tramp Steamer]

All three of my playing shafts warped a little over the summer. All three are dead straight rolling or to my naked eye right now. I'm betting all three will be less than straight next summer too.

Some sellers declare a slight wobble even when they can't detect any just to sidestep the folks that will claim it wobbles. Often the wobble comes from the test set-up. Sometimes it is only in people's minds, either way, "slight wobble" covers the seller's butt.

Even spinning in a lathe doesn't prove a shaft straight or crooked. Lathes themselves are never perfectly true and then however you choose to hold the shaft is less than perfect too. Spin too fast and there is a wobble from whipping. Somewhere along the line each person must decide for themselves what acceptable runout is. I can put the same shaft in my lathe five times and get five different runout readings measuring to less than .001".

Hu

It kind of depends on what you consider true. The runout on my 36 inch Jet was true to within 5 ten thousands.

 

[Siz]

I've only owned about 7 cues and only 3 have been customs, but EVERY single shaft I've ever owned has had at least a slight slight wobble.

If it looks straight when you sight along it, why does it matter if it has a wobble when you roll it on the table bed?

 

[Jason Robichaud]

If I can shoot the CB down table and come back to hit tip, stroking easy and hard, its straight.

 

[ShootingArts]

Over 28"??

It kind of depends on what you consider true. The runout on my 36 inch Jet was true to within 5 ten thousands.

I have owned a Jet and worked on a handful more. I have never seen one that was true to five ten-thousandths over the length of a shaft or butt. Another issue is that unless you have changed them and paid thousands for new bearing the bearings in a Jet aren't good enough to consistently hold five ten-thousandths for more than a few inches.

What chuck are you using and how are you holding a shaft or butt? The tooling has to be accurate to five ten-thousandths over the length of what you are measuring every time you put it together too. I've never seen any that is used in a cue shop that is.

How are you holding the tip end of a shaft? Any end pressure on a shaft can induce wobble.

Anytime you want to make a bet on your Jet holding to five ten-thousandths repeatable accuracy over a minimum of 27" the window is wide open from here.

Hu

 

[Jason Robichaud]

I have owned a Jet and worked on a handful more. I have never seen one that was true to five ten-thousandths over the length of a shaft or butt. Another issue is that unless you have changed them and paid thousands for new bearing the bearings in a Jet aren't good enough to consistently hold five ten-thousandths for more than a few inches.

What chuck are you using and how are you holding a shaft or butt? The tooling has to be accurate to five ten-thousandths over the length of what you are measuring every time you put it together too. I've never seen any that is used in a cue shop that is.

How are you holding the tip end of a shaft? Any end pressure on a shaft can induce wobble.

Anytime you want to make a bet on your Jet holding to five ten-thousandths repeatable accuracy over a minimum of 27" the window is wide open from here.

Hu

So, you are saying he used a BS gage to measure?

 

[Tramp Steamer]

Tramp, if you gotta put it on a machine to find a wobble there's not
enough there to bother my C game. If it rolls straight on the felt of
a pool table, that's good enough for me.:grin:

True enough 123, but you can look at it this way to. Would Efren, or Allison, use a shaft with even the slightest wobble in it?
I doubt it, so neither should you or I.

 

[ShootingArts]

No

So, you are saying he used a BS gage to measure?

Not at all. I am saying that half a thousandths runout on the end of a bare spindle or a chuck body has little relevance to measuring cue runout. I spent most of a day working on a faceplate and chuck to get runout to very close to zero, at the RPM I was turning and at that moment measured two inches in front of the chuck. Measure ten inches out and it was a different story. Run the lathe a week and test again or at fifteen degrees different temperature and it is a different story.

One of the major issues is how square the face is of the tool you are screwing the shaft onto is. Someone that is better than I am with geometry can tell us what .1 degree of angle off creates in offset 27" out. We can loosen and tighten the jaws on lathes over and over and get far more than .1 degree out of square.

I had an action trued to less than 1/10000" but that was only true as measured on the lathe it was cut on and only good for that one set up. My company lost fifteen thousand dollars one week simply because someone took a six inch long armature out of a lathe and put it back in the same lathe in the middle of a job. Tolerances on the project was .0005, five ten-thousandths or half a thousandth of an inch. I was overseeing the project but the company owner overruled what I wanted to do. Guess who got the "credit" for whizzing away fifteen thousand on machine work that week!

What I am trying to get across is that testing for trueness is only as accurate as the equipment and set up. If somebody tells me a shaft has .050" runout they may have a point or they may not. If they tell me it has .005" runout I'm going to ask how they tested. Odds are thin that they had the equipment and knowledge to accurately measure that amount of runout over 27" or more. If they tell me it has .0005" runout I'm going to ignore what they said unless they can produce far better equipment that I have ever seen outside a test lab.

Hu

 

[Tramp Steamer]

I have owned a Jet and worked on a handful more. I have never seen one that was true to five ten-thousandths over the length of a shaft or butt. Another issue is that unless you have changed them and paid thousands for new bearing the bearings in a Jet aren't good enough to consistently hold five ten-thousandths for more than a few inches.

What chuck are you using and how are you holding a shaft or butt? The tooling has to be accurate to five ten-thousandths over the length of what you are measuring every time you put it together too. I've never seen any that is used in a cue shop that is.

How are you holding the tip end of a shaft? Any end pressure on a shaft can induce wobble.

Anytime you want to make a bet on your Jet holding to five ten-thousandths repeatable accuracy over a minimum of 27" the window is wide open from here.

Hu

I think we're splitting hairs here, partner.
I did some checking. The "Tool and Manufactureing Engineers Handbook" SM3 Third addition, chapter 5-51 says that lathes from 12 to 18 inches (swing) should have a runout of 0.003 and I'm assuming that is a three jaw chuck. So my bad. I was off a zero. However, a four jaw chuck can have 0 runout because it can be adjusted out.