Hand Inlays

TATE said:
I thought you guys might like to see how Palmer did theirs. This is the part of the job the Balner's enjoyed the most.

http://www.palmercollector.com/InlayPage.html

Chris
Click to expand...

Almost all hand cut inlays, other than dots which a drill can make the perfect size pocket, are or were put into dark woods, as your examples show. Dark woods and dark glues mask larger glue lines.
Dick
 
Nice pics Chris, I do like those old palmers, they bring back alot of memories of people I first learned to shoot from. I still know a few people now that have them/had them back in the day , and/or wish they had some like you have, altough, they're probably alittle out of some of their price ranges these days. ofcoarse I have some others with the plain jane models from the 80's to present that think they have something. I have a hard time finding the heart to tell them they are not on the same level when they ask Me. They are good player cues, and these guys do well with them, I would still buy and sell them at the right prices, but when I think palmer, I'm thinking way farther back then that, and those are the ones drying up now days. The days of getting deals on those are long gone. Thinking back, I really underestimated these cues value in the future, and it hurts to think what all I passed on when I had the chance.

The dot inlays really are probably the simplist of inlays to do, I aggree that a drill bit the correct size is plenty enough for them. Just try different bits around that size on a scrap piece until you find one that drills a hole the dot fits in snug. It's really easy to do, and could even be marked out and hand drilled if nessesary, altough I would prefer to index them, I have done them both ways. I would use a small center drill first if marking them out and drilling By hand, and not using an index, so the bit does'nt rolloff. I also can do them on the panto, by using one of the dots to cut a female pocket to use as My template, or simply do them on a lathe with a drill mounted in the crosssilde. It could also be done with a mill or drill press. It's probably the most versatile inlay to do.

I aggree By far the darker colors are also the easiest to blend. With some lighter colored woods, your inlays can look like a perfect fit, but still show tiny gluelines, and are alot harder to hide. Black is By far the most user friendly to inlay into. With black you can hide almost any size gaps perfectly, making It alot easier to inlay with hand tools. You can tell before finishing alittle, but after the finish is applied they usually look perfect. This is probably why you see alot of black borders seperating lighter colors, and ebony butt sleaves with complicated inlays in them.

If I was just drilling, and then practically hand knifing the whole pocket out back in those days, I know I would had an apprietiation for the dark colors. I did find the part about the stamp/dia to inset the outline, and to ease the knifing part on that page interesting. That's something that's crossed My mind before, but never knew if anyone did that or not. Very informative, thanks for sharing.

Greg
 
rhncue said:
Almost all hand cut inlays, other than dots which a drill can make the perfect size pocket, are or were put into dark woods, as your examples show. Dark woods and dark glues mask larger glue lines.
Dick
Click to expand...

Dick,

The pearl doesn't show up in light colored woods anyway. The best I could find were some inlays in a lighter rosewood and they looked good too. I think what was amazing was the amount of hand inlaying they did. They made a lot of cues and those cues had a lot of inlays. After Gene Balner passed away in 1971, Ilona continued to do the inlays until the mid 1980's on custom ordered "old line" cues.

Greg, as you noted Palmer transitoned from being a custom cue shop to being a distributor and manufacturer in the late 1970's. I did a history of the company you might like to read. The PB and PM line cues you are referring to were made by Adam to Palmer's designs and specs. They do have a loyal player following and if you get one to look at (I've seen a couple) they are high quality production cues.

Here's the Palmer history link:


http://www.palmercollector.com/Palmerhistory.html

Chris
 
TATE said:
I thought you guys might like to see how Palmer did theirs. This is the part of the job the Balner's enjoyed the most.
http://www.palmercollector.com/InlayPage.html
Chris
Click to expand...

Nice.
Thanks for sharing that, Chris.
Looking at vintage cues is always a pleasure that puts a smile on my face every time. :D

The second most favorite part is pondering how they did some of their designs.
It has been explained how they did most of their dots and diamonds but I wonder how they did the wavey veneers shown in some of those cues.
I cant recall ever seeing a cue design like that before.
 
chokenstroke said:
Nice.
Thanks for sharing that, Chris.
Looking at vintage cues is always a pleasure that puts a smile on my face every time. :D

The second most favorite part is pondering how they did some of their designs.
It has been explained how they did most of their dots and diamonds but I wonder how they did the wavey veneers shown in some of those cues.
I cant recall ever seeing a cue design like that before.
Click to expand...

I would think that would be easier than cutting a pocket for a diamond. With the use of either a pin router or an engraver with a pattern to follow you would mearly cut the pockett to the width of the three veneers glued together and then just glue the veneers in.
Dick
 
Chris, Thanks for posting the Palmer information. I enjoy learning about their craft and history. It's amazing that they were able to turn out so many hand inlayed cues cues during their peak period.

Martin



TATE said:
I thought you guys might like to see how Palmer did theirs. This is the part of the job the Balner's enjoyed the most.

http://www.palmercollector.com/InlayPage.html

Chris
Click to expand...
 
rhncue said:
I would think that would be easier than cutting a pocket for a diamond. With the use of either a pin router or an engraver with a pattern to follow you would mearly cut the pockett to the width of the three veneers glued together and then just glue the veneers in.
Dick
Click to expand...

Sorry, I didn't see the question. The question is, how were the wavy lines made on the model "M" cue?

I am going to cover that in the "In the Shop section" but since it was brought up, here's what they did.

On the "M" cue, Gene Balner and only Gene Balner made every one himself. Remember this was 1968 and they didn't have any routers or panto in the shop. Ebony is a hard wood. They used no machine routing or engraving whatsoever. In fact, they had very little tooling compared to even a moderately equipped shop today. They primarily used bandsaw, lathe, table saw, and drill press to build their cues.

To build the "M" what Gene did was take the ebony block and lay out the curved lines. Each side had one line. Holding the block freehand, he would bandsaw it into the shape on one side. He would then sandwich an ebony veneer between two natural veneers and glue it up. He wet or steamed the veneers to make them pliable. When that was set, he then bandsawed the other side. After it was set he then, of course, turned it on a lathe. The block was long enough to include the butt pieces. Properly assembled, the butt pieces should continue the lines of the forearm.

I think it's remarkable that this is the one famous cue in history that nobody has seemed to copy. It's also remarkable that his thumbs were still attached to his hands after all those M cues.

Here's a pic of one:

MVeneers.jpg


Chris
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top