growth rings on shafts

[twilight]

I'm assuming that the parabolic looking lines on cue shafts are the growth rings. I hear that the more growth rings, the better. Can the shaft taper make it look like there are more/less growth rings? Does the eveness of the rings matter. What about the shape, I have one shaft that has highly irregular lines, and another that has very nice parabolic looking ones. Should this question be posted on the ask the cuemaker?

 

[Donovan]

I'm assuming that the parabolic looking lines on cue shafts are the growth rings. I hear that the more growth rings, the better. Can the shaft taper make it look like there are more/less growth rings? Does the eveness of the rings matter. What about the shape, I have one shaft that has highly irregular lines, and another that has very nice parabolic looking ones. Should this question be posted on the ask the cuemaker?

Probably should be ask the cuemaker, but this is very interesting. I want to know the answers too!

 

[bruin70]

I'm assuming that the parabolic looking lines on cue shafts are the growth rings. I hear that the more growth rings, the better.

more growth rings = older wood, but doesn't necessarily mean better. maybe some people don't like older woods.

Can the shaft taper make it look like there are more/less growth rings?

yes...because a taper angles across all the growth rings.,,,like a street that angles across the other streets(think of the other streets as growth rings,,,think of the angling street as the tapered cut)

Does the eveness of the rings matter. What about the shape, I have one shaft that has highly irregular lines, and another that has very nice parabolic looking ones.

no. but OTOH, i have never seen rings with different spacing..

the shape you're talking about, i believe, is from viewing the shaft from the side. you know when you look at a veneered board at your local home furnishing dept., there are areas where the wood grain is very even and straight, and then they become kinda wild??,,,,that is kinda like your shaftwood laid out flat. if you make a 1/4 turn on your shaftwood you will see the rings as you SHOULD be judging them. now, you can see how tight they are, you can count them, you can tell if they're straight.

you can't tell anything about the quality of the wood from the angle you were originally looking at,,,the "parabolic" side

you should post at both forums(they'll give you a more detailed answer at cuemakers) because i'm sure not too many people go there.

 

[mjantti]

I dunno, I always count the growth rings near the joint, unless the joint is exceptionally thin/thick, I don't think taper will make a difference in growth rings. Usually counting a half circle near the joint will result something between 5-15 growth rings. Over 15 is a little bit more rare and can be found on those old growth shafts. I think the most I've seen is 21 growth rings. And don't try to count 'em on a Predator shaft

I've heard that more growth rings means more dense wood which usually means a stiffer and a heavier shaft.

Btw, one of my Scruggs shafts has only 6 or 7 growth rings but those rings go absolutely straight along the shaft from joint to ferrule. No curvature whatsoever. Look nice.

 

[bruin70]

I dunno, I always count the growth rings near the joint, unless the joint is exceptionally thin/thick, I don't think taper will make a difference in growth rings. .

the way i took his question to mean,,,is that if you're looking at the shaft from the angle he's looking at, which is NOT the side you look from when you count the rings, then the more the taper the more it angles across the grain and you can count more rings from that perspective.

anyway, that's how i interpreted his Q

 

[Andrew Manning]

no. but OTOH, i have never seen rings with different spacing.

I disagree, I think the spacing of the rings makes a difference. The closer together the growth rings, the denser and stiffer the wood, which is why people care about growth rings in the first place. If they are closer together on one side of the shaft than the other, the hit characteristics might change quite a bit depending on the orientation of the cue.

For instance, if you line up a shot with one tip of right english, you might get quite a bit more spin if you hold the cue with fewer rings toward the center of the cue ball, than if you orient the side with more rings toward the center of the ball, due to the way the wood density affects the shaft's flexing on contact. It might feel like a schon oriented the one way and a meucci oriented the other way, although I imagine that would take an extreme imbalance in ring density.

-Andrew

 

[bruin70]

I disagree, I think the spacing of the rings makes a difference. The closer together the growth rings, the denser and stiffer the wood, which is why people care about growth rings in the first place. If they are closer together on one side of the shaft than the other, the hit characteristics might change quite a bit depending on the orientation of the cue.

For instance, if you line up a shot with one tip of right english, you might get quite a bit more spin if you hold the cue with fewer rings toward the center of the cue ball, than if you orient the side with more rings toward the center of the ball, due to the way the wood density affects the shaft's flexing on contact. It might feel like a schon oriented the one way and a meucci oriented the other way, although I imagine that would take an extreme imbalance in ring density.

-Andrew

i don't disagree with you. andrew....but i took what the poster said literally. he asked "Does the eveness of the rings matter." i took this literally to mean whether or not it mattered if EACH ring was similiar in spacing....to which i answered that i've never seen rings that were spaced differently in one shaft.

 

[mjantti]

bruin70, I think we're all splitting a hair here. The question might have been a little bit vague...

 

[RSB-Refugee]

to which i answered that i've never seen rings that were spaced differently in one shaft.

By looking at growth rings, you can get a clue as to how the climate was year by year. You can look into the past and see if it was a dry summer or a wet one. You can see if winter came early or stayed longer. Tight rings, show short growing seasons. Wider rings show longer growing seasons.
The parabola mentioned earlier, is where you see the end grain, due to the taper. If you see an oval as opposed to a parabola, you are seeing both ends of that ring. If there is an oval, or parabola that points toward the joint, either the grain is not straight, or the shaft was not center drilled properly in relation to the grain.

Tracy

 

[mikepage]

[...]
For instance, if you line up a shot with one tip of right english, you might get quite a bit more spin if you hold the cue with fewer rings toward the center of the cue ball, than if you orient the side with more rings toward the center of the ball, due to the way the wood density affects the shaft's flexing on contact. It might feel like a schon oriented the one way and a meucci oriented the other way, although I imagine that would take an extreme imbalance in ring density.

-Andrew

I agree a shaft can in principle have a stiff direction and a whippy direction. But I don't agree that one direction produces more spin on the cueball than the other.

mike page
fargo

 

[JoeyInCali]

I'm assuming that the parabolic looking lines on cue shafts are the growth rings. I hear that the more growth rings, the better. Can the shaft taper make it look like there are more/less growth rings? Does the eveness of the rings matter. What about the shape, I have one shaft that has highly irregular lines, and another that has very nice parabolic looking ones. Should this question be posted on the ask the cuemaker?

In general, the more the growth rings the better. Not all the time.
You can have a shaft with 12 evenly spaced and straight growth rings compared to one with 20 but 10 are concentrated on one side; that side will be stiffer and might push the other side. Hence, will not stay as straight.

 

[Guru]

I disagree, I think the spacing of the rings makes a difference. The closer together the growth rings, the denser and stiffer the wood, which is why people care about growth rings in the first place. If they are closer together on one side of the shaft than the other, the hit characteristics might change quite a bit depending on the orientation of the cue.

For instance, if you line up a shot with one tip of right english, you might get quite a bit more spin if you hold the cue with fewer rings toward the center of the cue ball, than if you orient the side with more rings toward the center of the ball, due to the way the wood density affects the shaft's flexing on contact. It might feel like a schon oriented the one way and a meucci oriented the other way, although I imagine that would take an extreme imbalance in ring density.

-Andrew

I don't think it would work quite that way, the only way your theory would hold is if the shaft could compress lengthwise more on one side than the other due to the ring differences. If you're talking about the deflection (to the side), the same number of rings are being bent in either direction (all of them), they are just on different sides of the bend.

 

[RSB-Refugee]

If you're talking about the deflection (to the side), the same number of rings are being bent in either direction (all of them), they are just on different sides of the bend.

Try this, You need a weight to hang off the tip with a string and a ruler. Hang a weight be reasonable do no use enought to break the shaft. Check how far off center the shaft is bent. Then rotate the shaft 180 degrees and see if it is the offset is the same. When a shaft is bent, one side is stretched linearly, while the other side is compressed. Then comes the vibration, which is the compression and stretching, rapidly exchange sides. This is the theory that inspired the red dot Meuccis. Actually some players had been orienting the grain, with a mark, for many years, before the red dots.

Tracy

 

[Andrew Manning]

I don't think it would work quite that way, the only way your theory would hold is if the shaft could compress lengthwise more on one side than the other due to the ring differences. If you're talking about the deflection (to the side), the same number of rings are being bent in either direction (all of them), they are just on different sides of the bend.

I agree with you completely, but I do think the shaft can compress lengthwise more on one side than the other, since I believe the side with fewer growth-rings is less dense, and will thus compress more than the wood on the other side. I'm not a wood-worker, and I have no personal credentials to back up this opinion, but I think wood with tighter growth rings is less compressible.

So anything that's affected by shaft stiffness would be affected differently depending on which way you're holding the cue. I've read that non-laminated or flat-laminated wood shafts generally have reflective symmetry and not radial symmetry, meaning that there is a more flexible and less flexible direction to the shaft, and that Meucci puts the dot on the shaft to mark where the axis of this symmetry is. I've also read that if you have a sensitive enough feel to detect the variance in shaft flex, you should experiment with different orientations until you find one that seems symmetrical to you, and mark the shaft yourself so you can always shoot with this orientation, and theoretically get more consistent results. Unfortunately I don't remember the source where I read that.

-Andrew

 

[Andrew Manning]

Try this, You need a weight to hang off the tip with a string and a ruler. Hang a weight be reasonable do no use enought to break the shaft. Check how far off center the shaft is bent. Then rotate the shaft 180 degrees and see if it is the offset is the same. When a shaft is bent, one side is stretched linearly, while the other side is compressed. Then comes the vibration, which is the compression and stretching, rapidly exchange sides. This is the theory that inspired the red dot Meuccis. Actually some players had been orienting the grain, with a mark, for many years, before the red dots.

Tracy

Hey, now I have a source to quote about marking the grain. Ask and ye shall receive.

-Andrew

 

[JoeyInCali]

I agree with you completely, but I do think the shaft can compress lengthwise more on one side than the other,

That is true.
I've seen it tested with a golf shaft trueness/roundness tester.
Even the radial laminated ones.
The shaft rotated to it's softest side all the time when bent and being held by bearings.
So, NO wooden shaft out there will have equal stiffness on all sides.

 

[RSB-Refugee]

I agree with you completely, but I do think the shaft can compress lengthwise more on one side than the other,

I agree with you on this, Joey. I was trying to convey just that, but sometimes I don't express myself as well as I would like to.

Tracy

 

[12squared]

This is a very interesting topic and I want to fully understand what everyone is talking about. would someone please post a couple pictures with descriptions of what we're looking? This would help me, and maybe others, greatly.

Thanks, Dave

 

[rackem]

Ladders On a Predator?

The Predator shaft that I have has the ladder part of the dowel it was made from on 7 of the 10 pie shaped segments. What's the consensous here? Do more Ladders make for a better or worse Predator shaft? Or would it matter?

 

[RSB-Refugee]

The Predator shaft that I have has the ladder part of the dowel it was made from on 7 of the 10 pie shaped segments. What's the consensous here? Do more Ladders make for a better or worse Predator shaft? Or would it matter?

What do you mean by, ladder?

Tracy