ivory ferrules
- Thread starter robertod
- Start date
You really need a reference point to start with. The reference point used to be fiber ferrules. So in past times I would say they play a good bit harder than fiber ferrules. Now I might compare to Melamine and I would say that they play a little harder and noisier than Melamine. The main advantages to Ivory is how easy it is to clean and how pretty it is on the cue. The draw backs are it is more likely to crack, is more sensitive to temperature changes and so forth.
Thanks for your response, I am looking for my first "players" cue and am wondering what materials I should be looking for. Realizing of course that playing with the different setups is the best way to see what I would like.
So it is more cosmetic than playability? Does it give a player any desirable features other than looks. Does "hard" equal less deflection?
As Chris mentioned the main advantage to ivory is cosmetic, though there are a lot of people who grew up playing with ivory ferrules and anything else feels "less than ivory". Frankly, if the modern plastics were available in the beginning, there would never been any ivory ferrules, balls or piano keys. That being said, I still use them on certain high end cues I make and of course on those made by some of the "dead masters". But in most player cues, unless otherwise requested, I'll use phenolic!
No, just the opposite, but I'm not of the "school of thought" that LD shafts are necessarily better!
No. Less mass equals less deflection. It has nothing to do with hardness.
Harder equals more deflection normally. The softer ferrules that compress with some spring action seem to shoot the cue ball closer to the aiming point. They also put more spin, draw and follow on the cue ball. That being said, the softer ferrules are less reliable in what they will do. You might get three foot of draw when you are trying for one foot. So one advantage to Ivory is it has a pretty flat hit that does not give the cue ball as much action. So it might actually be a little more reliable on what it will do. But it will not do as much as easily. For some that is what they want. I like something in between the high action softer ferrules and Ivory. Melamine seems to be closest to what I want.