did you ever wonder.,,

ericdraven

ericdraven

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
why windows and barbells and propellers are so popular on cues ? i mean going way back to even
now they are are used so much . i dont hate them i just see to many of them . i think windows are
the top perecnt getter .

like i said they are fine but wouldnt be a top choice for me unless it just had a special look . im weird
anyway . propeller cues would have to a great deal to buy one . i have nightmares of a pos houseboat
when i was a kid that was worked on more then in the water . maybe child hood flshbacks of being stranded on a lake lol
 
All those things come pre made , many cue makers are just assembling pieces and parts. My question is ....if you buy a spliced butt off a guy that sells spliced butts and you buy the rings and inserts and etc from a dealer . At what point are you just an assembler and not a builder.
 
book collector said:
All those things come pre made , many cue makers are just assembling pieces and parts. My question is ....if you buy a spliced butt off a guy that sells spliced butts and you buy the rings and inserts and etc from a dealer . At what point are you just an assembler and not a builder.
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That is a old argument, used to come up all the time. Just my opinion, but if you are tapering, adding rings, changing balance points, building a shaft etc then the individual parts coming together makes you a builder. Same as most things in the world, where the whole is more than the individual parts.

Now if you are simply making a design and having someone else build it and selling it as your own then I start to have issues. That has happened more than once.
 
middleofnowhere said:
That's not really true. Anybody making cues make all that stuff themselves, It's easy. One of the reasons you see windows, dots, barbells and so on is because they are easy to do without much equipment. You assemble pieces that create an illusion. Stitch rings at the joint look like an inlay but are just stacked rings and so on. Years ago cue makers like Rambow used a lot of dots because you just had to drill a hole.
I don't do cues anymore but here is a picture of some stuff I have laying around that I made up at some point. It takes no time to make up parts. There is no reason to buy them. Perfectly even points are actually easy to make if you know what you are doing. Of course most today are just CNC and actually inlays and not splices.


picture 2 is an example of what I am talking about. It looks intricate but is actually a simple assembly. I had a Ginscue with the cloverleaves. A close look you could see they are over lapping dots.
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Either my written communication skills are suffering, or your reading comprehension skills are lacking.
 
Anybody making cues usually make all their own stuff themselves, excluding maybe inserts and screws. It's easy. One of the reasons you see windows, dots, barbells and so on is because they are easy to do without much equipment. You assemble pieces that create an illusion. Stitch rings at the joint look like an inlay but are just stacked rings and so on. Years ago cue makers like Rambow used a lot of dots because you just had to drill a hole.

I don't do cues anymore but here is a picture of some stuff I have laying around that I made up at some point. It takes no time to make up parts. There is no reason to buy them. Perfectly even points are actually easy to make if you know what you are doing. Of course many today are just CNC and actually inlays and not splices.

Building a good cue that plays with integrity is not that hard. The materials are available and the knowledge to do so is readily available. There are a number of cue makers with equipment they got from Chris building great cues. One thing that sets a cue apart is the design, execution and finish work. I was once at the BCA show and was looking over a cue when the cue maker pulled it out of my hands. I had taken out my loupe. The cue maker (very well known) said "No cue is to be examined closer then arms length". From that quote some will know who I am talking about as he has said it before. What I was looking for was black epoxy often used to install inlays that are not perfectly fit.

Dennis Searings name often comes up on this forum. His cues CAN be examined that close. That is one of the things that sets him apart. His cues are works of art that in the future will always be of higher value then other cues. Do they play better then other cues, that is subjective. What they are though, is the highest example of the cue making art.

picture 1 is an example of what I am talking about. It looks intricate but is actually a simple assembly. I had a Ginscue with the cloverleaves. A close look you could see they simply over lapping dots.
 

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book collector said:
Either my written communication skills are suffering, or your reading comprehension skills are lacking.
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I deleted the post and re posted it generically. It was not meant to be attached to your post as a reply. When responding to posts, often if you have read the thread you find yourself making reference to other posts but they are not really the subject you were addressing.
 
middleofnowhere said:
I deleted the post and re posted it generically. It was not meant to be attached to your post as a reply. When responding to posts, often if you have read the thread you find yourself making reference to other posts but they are not really the subject you were addressing.
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I agree with your point that it's cheaper for anyone with even mediocre equipment to make their own inlays and rings than to purchase from a dealer (even on a pantograph in the days before CNC). I think the repetition in these design elements is because cue builders often copy each other (like in any art form) and customers want what they have seen already.
 
ericdraven said:
why windows and barbells and propellers are so popular on cues ? i mean going way back to even
now they are are used so much . i dont hate them i just see to many of them . i think windows are
the top perecnt getter .

like i said they are fine but wouldnt be a top choice for me unless it just had a special look . im weird
anyway . propeller cues would have to a great deal to buy one . i have nightmares of a pos houseboat
when i was a kid that was worked on more then in the water . maybe child hood flshbacks of being stranded on a lake lol
Click to expand...
IDK. Have you ever wondered why some people need to post a thread using GIANT BOLD BLACK letters?? ;)
 
garczar said:
IDK. Have you ever wondered why some people need to post a thread using GIANT BOLD BLACK letters?? ;)
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I can answer that one. You can be legally blind, but still able to see. 2 people i work with send all their communication that way due to poor eyesight.
 
book collector said:
All those things come pre made , many cue makers are just assembling pieces and parts. My question is ....if you buy a spliced butt off a guy that sells spliced butts and you buy the rings and inserts and etc from a dealer . At what point are you just an assembler and not a builder.
Click to expand...
Car companies assemble cars today, they dont make one single thing themselves.
Back in the very early days of car building most every thing was made in house because there were no parts suppliers at that time.
Same go's for cue makers of the past, they had to make stuff or find things not made for pool cues and adapt them such as Balabuska did.
Today with all the pre made parts one can be a cue assembler for the most part.
But even a cue assembler has to have a high degree of skill to build a good cue.
 
measureman said:
Car companies assemble cars today, they dont make one single thing themselves.
Back in the very early days of car building most every thing was made in house because there were no parts suppliers at that time.
Same go's for cue makers of the past, they had to make stuff or find things not made for pool cues and adapt them such as Balabuska did.
Today with all the pre made parts one can be a cue assembler for the most part.
But even a cue assembler has to have a high degree of skill to build a good cue.
Click to expand...
In Balabushkas day he would have utilized parts that were originally designed for another use. Inserts may have been something originally used in assembling tables or something. Palmer and Joss in the beginning just used the 5/16-18 off the shelf screw rod.

Brass inserts are common in a lot of assembly work. Butt screws and weight screws are just off the shelf items as we're pretty much all the plastics used.
 
Back when inlays were done with a pantograph. It took a lot to make new patterns. Once one design became popular. They were used over and over. Now I think it’s just traditional on traditional cues.

Larry
 
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