dumping the break cue and feel liberated!!!

buckshotshoey said:
Ding ding! It's not that any playing cue cant be used to break with. It's how fast you want to flatten and mushroom your playing tip. Not as prevalent with a hard tip, but very relevant if you use a soft.

Anyone like breaking with a Kamui Soft? I didnt think so.
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That's my position. I'm also a bit reluctant to break with the more lightly constructed LD shafts, although now that I have CF that probably doesn't matter. Maybe I should put a Le Pro on my CF shaft and get myself free.
 
SlateMan said:
I use a Revo shaft at about 19 ounces with a white diamond tip. I can break with just my wrist and a bit of arm motion and make a 3 point compliant break. Although usually I try to use a whip effect of my arm and wrist to generate a bit more power with very little ooomph. I break from the side and draw the cue ball back through the middle of the table. Softer speed sometimes yields two balls into the back corner pocket with the head ball and two balls behind it on the right (opposite from break side) coming up table by the cue ball (at least two of these usually come up table).
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That cloth didn't look particularly fast. Are you generating more speed that it looks like with your compact stroke, is the cue converting that speed to cue ball speed, or are you hitting the rack just right. I suspect a bit of all three. Do you have a basic wood cue with a soft tip you can compare breaks with?
 
Chili Palmer said:
Something to consider is - does a heavier cue and a phenolic (or otherwise rock hard tip) allow for a softer arm speed to obtain the same break speed as a lighter cue with softer tip?

The result would be better control overall because you're not trying to whack the shit out of it?
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LOL... This is a GREAT question! I have a Lucasi BB 2 with a Phenolic tip. Does it make it easier to break with less power and still get a great spread? I have NO IDEA! I slam it as hard as I can every break because I can, and the tip is at least 10 years old and like new.

I WILL say this. I honestly know that I really break TOO hard. Balls massively scattered with multiple rails hit and it DOES lead to more balls on or near the rails. Maybe I need to lighten up a bit and try this theory! :-)
 
CanadianGuy said:
anybody else do this?

tried many break cues, never experienced more than a marginal improvement over a given standard cue

feels great to hit a rack and be ready to shoot immediately not to mention one less cue in the bag
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Recently spent a pant load on a Mezz PB-G and it's one of the few pool purchases I'm completely content with. Doesn't make me break any harder but the CF shaft and Sonic tip have allowed me to drop my speed and concentrate on accurate contact. For 10 or 8 ball, it's great.

That said, if I'm playing template 9ball I don't bother with the breaker, and will use my soft tipped 11.6mm playing shaft. Moderate pace at the most. No point burning the power when it's uncalled for.
 
tomatoshooter said:
That cloth didn't look particularly fast. Are you generating more speed that it looks like with your compact stroke, is the cue converting that speed to cue ball speed, or are you hitting the rack just right. I suspect a bit of all three. Do you have a basic wood cue with a soft tip you can compare breaks with?
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Now your getting scientific~! (Talk nerdy to me!)

All good questions!

I'll try to play around with different conditions etc in a week or so. The semester is almost over and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.
 
CanadianGuy said:
anybody else do this?

tried many break cues, never experienced more than a marginal improvement over a given standard cue

feels great to hit a rack and be ready to shoot immediately not to mention one less cue in the bag
Click to expand...
I have 20 playing cues, and they’re all way too expensive for me to be slamming balls on the break with. I use a very inexpensive 22oz McDermott Lucky with a Kamui hard tip, for breaking.
 
mrpiper said:
LOL... This is a GREAT question! I have a Lucasi BB 2 with a Phenolic tip. Does it make it easier to break with less power and still get a great spread? I have NO IDEA! I slam it as hard as I can every break because I can, and the tip is at least 10 years old and like new.

I WILL say this. I honestly know that I really break TOO hard. Balls massively scattered with multiple rails hit and it DOES lead to more balls on or near the rails. Maybe I need to lighten up a bit and try this theory! :)
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It is fun to smash a hard break shot. If you think about it, if it's a 9' table and the pockets are 4 1/2 inches, every time a ball goes to a rail there is a 9% chance that there is a pocket there. So more balls hitting rails equals more balls in holes! On the other hand, no ball can actually wind up more than about 8 feet from where it started so at some point the balls start to cluster back up. I think I've seen a couple of pros break and the balls all seemed to reassemble near the head spot.

What I am still figuring out is why I sometimes get a better scatter with a softer break. The balls seem to stick together like the extra force causes friction. Or possibly I'm just hitting the rack more accurately and actually delivering the energy where it counts.
 
I remember back in the70s or thereabouts, Billiards digest published something that stated the rack acts like a solid before diffusing. Must be something like stun shots on a bigger scale. Guessing, with a softer break the balls don't jam into each other with self cancelling impacts and roll away more comfortably.
 
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tomatoshooter said:
What I am still figuring out is why I sometimes get a better scatter with a softer break. The balls seem to stick together like the extra force causes friction. Or possibly I'm just hitting the rack more accurately and actually delivering the energy where it counts.
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(y)
 
tomatoshooter said:
It is fun to smash a hard break shot. If you think about it, if it's a 9' table and the pockets are 4 1/2 inches, every time a ball goes to a rail there is a 9% chance that there is a pocket there. So more balls hitting rails equals more balls in holes! On the other hand, no ball can actually wind up more than about 8 feet from where it started so at some point the balls start to cluster back up. I think I've seen a couple of pros break and the balls all seemed to reassemble near the head spot.

What I am still figuring out is why I sometimes get a better scatter with a softer break. The balls seem to stick together like the extra force causes friction. Or possibly I'm just hitting the rack more accurately and actually delivering the energy where it counts.
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I smash them pretty good and a while back I made 3 on the break and the other 6 were all inside the kitchen, CB was center of table. Bar box FWIW
 
CanadianGuy said:
anybody else do this?

tried many break cues, never experienced more than a marginal improvement over a given standard cue

feels great to hit a rack and be ready to shoot immediately not to mention one less cue in the bag
Click to expand...
I only play 14:1 so I do not have that problem.
 
straightline said:
I remember back in the70s or thereabouts, Billiards digest published something that stated the rack acts like a solid before diffusing. Must be something like stun shots on a bigger scale. Guessing, with a softer break the balls don't jam into each other with self cancelling impacts and roll away more comfortably.
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Maybe it's like ooblek.

 
Ooh blech...
Yeah like that except lower resolution. I think slamming the break is like shooting a (place advanced math here) ball combination where the shock wave is (place summo advanced math here) faster and greater than (some more math) object ball mass, reaction, reactive mass, by a factor of (last bit of math)...
 
I started using break cues to cut down on tip shaping/replacement. I've used several just trying to see if there was a difference and it breaks down like this for me;
breaking with playing cue = changing tip more often. good control on a bar box, less of a hit on a 9ft.
Predator break cue = Adequate. Works well on bar box, less so on a 9ft. Seems to be slightly better speed on break, but not "needed".
Jerico Stinger = Great. Too strong for bar box(to me) puts balls on rails. Perfect explosive hit on 9ft table. Lots of 8ball/9ball movement.
 
CanadianGuy said:
anybody else do this?

tried many break cues, never experienced more than a marginal improvement over a given standard cue

feels great to hit a rack and be ready to shoot immediately not to mention one less cue in the bag
Click to expand...
I agree, I've never been a strong breaker, and i use an inexpensive but effective Break Cue. I do this because my shooting stick is a Custom, made by Cal Hedden in '73, and is only one of about 5 cues ever created by the Mad Genius that still exist. It would crush me if i ever cracked the joint, or any part of the cue! But i agree, if i ever end up using another 'clothes rack' stick (Meucci, for example) I'll use it to break, shoot, and like you say, be Liberated! Good point.
 
Great question! I've have marginal success with a break cue. When I was young the thought was to use a different cue so as not to screw up your tip. There’s something about a break cue that makes me want to smash the rack 100 mph resulting in a off center crappy hit. Just last week I went back to my playing cue, hit it much softer, and got the same, if not better, results. Maybe this week I'll try a softer hit with a break cue and compare
 
Nope not happening. I can break with my players, but I have cracked lots of ferrules. I hope you like playing with a hard tip too because it's going to harden up pretty quick, that is unless you are breaking like Cory.
 
I use my older dufferin for a break cue,I just put a hard water buffalo tip on it, but am thinking about getting a lighter break cue as the dufferin is 21oz . I like a soft tip on my playing cue and like to break fairly hard so that is why I dont use my playing cue.
 
OP, you won't feel really liberated until you dump your shooting cue and just play with a house cue. ;)

The main reason I use a break cue is not so much that I get a better break (I actually do get a better break with a harder tip) but because I use a soft tip on my shooting cue and breaking with a soft tip, and even a medium tip, compresses the tip and hardens it, especially layered tips. I'm meticulous about the condition of my shooting tip and to use it for breaking racks would make it respond differently as it hardens and also require more frequent tip changes.
 
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