manwon said:
I agree John, however, those same products will not stand - up long term, I mean the quality is just not there. The plastics used instead of Phenolic, the finishes that are applied to thin of chip, crack and peel when expansion and contraction occurs. The chemically stabilized and treated wood that warps as the chemicals evaporate with time, I could go on and on.
However, I do agree John that hit and feel are subjective, but when the substandard adhesives begin to break down from use or temperature change this will change.
John, why do they not build cues that they would want to put life time guaranty on. I know that they can do it, but until this happens, while I will sell them, I will not sing the praises of Asian cues. I am also a little surprised that you continue to make these comparisons between import cues and custom cues. You of all people do know the difference, so please John why do you do it?
You are right, I do know the differences. I also am keenly aware of the similarities. I have seen the evolution of Asian - and let's just narrow that down to Taiwan/China - cues from little more than bare facsimilies of pool cues to real cues that are getting to the point that they are indistinguishable from cues made anywhere else.
Now, the largest and best of the Chinese production cuemakers use the same glues, the same materials, CNC workflows, the same methods of full splicing, the same types of recut method for points. The make lines using any material the customer desires that is legal. IvorineIII ferrrules, Tiger tips, Moori Tips, leather wraps, genuine (from Ireland) Irish Linen, use Delrin, G10, Double Linen, Phenolic, Carbon Fiber, etc.....
The thread all parts or use sleeves depending on the customer's requirements and the price point of the cues.
They have five year stockpiles of wood that is cut and stored and treated many times before being used in a cue. The wood is graded and sorted for use on various levels of cues.
They use the same stain and finish methods used by American craftsmen.
I would challenge anyone to come here and pick any ten random cues from our line and to do the same for any other production cuemaker anywhere else ad give all the cues to an independent lab with no stake in the outcome for evaluation. I know that the results of such a test would silence many current critics who rely on quality samples from a decade ago and who use fear mongering to cast doubt on the import production cue.
In 1991 I purchased ten cue from a dealer in Ft. Walton beach Florida. These cues were bought to take back to Germany. They were made by a company I had never heard of out of Wisconsin. Pechauer. Because I wa buying those cues using money given to me by a room owner in Germany I was ever so careful. I inspected them thoroughly at home. On all ten cues the joints came off! I was quite upset but I took them back to Starcade where Andy Grubbs (rip) called Jerry Pechauer (whom I did a lot with in subsequent years), and it was all taken care of. Would it be fair to vilify Pechauer cues based on that initial experience?
What if those cues had ended up in Germany? Perhaps more than a few people would have gotten the impression that USA cues aren't that great.
The point of this story is that quality is not an accident that comes with any particular location. It is a process that comes with experience coupled with opportunity and desire to improve.
You ask me a couple pointed questions, one is "why do they (Asian manufacturers) not build cues that they would want to put life time guaranty on."
My answer to that is that I am not in their position so I can not tell you what they are willing to do in the arena of lifetime guarantees. As a person who builds products however I can tell you that lifetime guarantees are more of a marketing tactic than a useful feature. The companies that give them rely on the fact that very few people will qualify for the guarantee under the conditions that they set. But it's looks good for ad copy and is a persuasive feature. You can bet that any company that is giving out "lifetime" guarantees however has the cost of that aspect built into the price of the product.
I could easily offer a "lifetime" guarantee on any cues we sell. Let's analyze the warranty; it's against defects in material, workmanship, and warpage. Defects in workmanship and materials are quite obvious - if a cue arrives with a defect in either of those areas then it's going to be covered by pretty much everyone. I have had cues replaced years later that developed problems related to issues in this area all without a "lifetime" warranty in place. Conversely I have had items disqualified for repair/replacement by folks with "lifetime" warranties when it was "deemed" to have been abuse/neglect as the cause of the problem.
So you can see that it's more of a marketing thing that goes largely untested due to the fact that most claims and their handling are not made part of the public record.
Then that leaves warpage. On this point only McDermott and Pechauer offer a guarantee against warpage. I guess I need to ask what they are doing to the wood to impregnate against elemental influence? Personally I have to say that due to the wide range of enviroments a cue can be placed in that guaranteeing against warpage is kind of lunacy - UNLESS of course you know that most people don't leave their cues in the kinds of enviroments that are likely to warp them and for the small percentage that do and who then file a claim you can disqualify a good number of them for "abuse/neglect".
Lastly, in this thread I made no comparison among cues made anywhere until this post. I only answered the one contention that professional players disdain production cues if they are not paid to use them. I did that with one example that I know if of a player who went out and achieved wonderful results using the cue brand she was sponsored by after the sponsorship ended.
But to answer the question of why I continue to talk about the virtues of Asian made cues, it's because they are no different that American made cues, or European made cues. They are made by people and machines using the same processes and some are terrible and some are fantastic and which is which depends on the input to determine the output.
Whether you want to "sing praises" or not you cannot escape the fact that this ball we live on is getting smaller each day and the people you are able to sneer at today because they are half a planet away are going to be your neighbors tomorrow.
Just yesterday I heard a great line that sums this all up - most people have a bad impression of Chinese goods because all they see from China is the low end products that the importers want to purchase. And that is 100% true. China has 5000 years of civilization to draw from. They had high art, printing, and literature when Europe couldn't even read.
If you want high quality chinese cues then be willing to pay for them. As it stands right now though the quality isn't too far off and the gap is closing every day. China is providing a range of cues that are perfectly fine for all levels of play. Some of the world's best use 100% Chinese made cues and play jam up with them.
If you don't believe in what you sell then stop selling it.
The Woim 