Ivory joint

[Terry Aeschliman]

A question for cuemakers with experience with Ivory joints. Are there any advantages to a full capped joint as opposed to a sleeved one. I am thinking a fully capped, .125 cap and .070-.080 wall thickness would be more sturdy and afford more "Ivory hit" than one that was sleeved.

 

[rhinobywilhite]

Capping would probably give you a better ivory type hit.

Some cuemakers take and mount a solid "round" of ivory and the glue at the base of the ivory and the glue where the joint pin goes through the block and into the wood are what holds the block in place.

I personally prefer to bore a .625 hole into the block for a depth of .250. The rest of the block is solid and the joint pin goes through the block and into the wood. The length of the ivory joint would be 1.00". I have seen some joints that were shorter than that but I like that length for ivory.

Some cuemakers freebore the pin through the block of ivory. Their concern is that slight pin flex could break the ivory joint. I have not had that occur on ivory joint cues that I have built but that is only my personal experience.

 

[Terry Aeschliman]

ivory joint

Thank you for your time and reply

 

[cubswin]

As a bit of a cue nerd, I've never really felt that joint material was all that important outside of how it effects balance. I've had ivory sleeved and capped ivory joint cues that were great hitting cues, also had some that just sucked.

Of course I'm not a cuemaker, as you know, just a bad player that loves trying out cues.