most you would pay for a foreign made cue
- Thread starter Mojocues
- Start date
Sorry I don't differentiate. When the Flag Waving starts I expect all foreign goods to burned in a huge bonfire and people to practice what they preach totally.
So if I understand you correctly you are fine with buying a cue that has all foreign parts as long as it was assembled in the United States? Starting with the tip?
This cue is from the Philippines made by Joel Dadivas, they are popping up in the classifieds now but a year ago when I got it they were not. This cue is the best playing cue I have every owned, I have owned some very good and expensive cues also. It plays better than Phillippis I have owned, Rauenzahn, Espiritu just to name a few and looks killer also. Price was around $350. :smile:
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I guess I was talking about all of the "asian" cues flooding the market nowadays. You hardly ever see a cue from the makers you mentioned. If there stuff was priced accordingly to the value like another poster said...then I'd pay pretty much whatever. And Mezz does make a fine cue. No arguements from me. I've just seen a lot of people have bad experiences with MANY an Asian cue.
I remember one time R. Phillippi was refinishing a "medium level" philippino cue. He took off the clear coat and the veneers came off with the clear coat. Turned out, all of the black veneers and gaps between the inlays and the wood were painted on with a magic marker. It was things and stories like that that have turned me off from many Asian makers. I've lived in Asia for years...I've seen how they do some things. Jury rigging is a way of life here and for all of the amazing things they make (technology/cars), they do a shitty job on a lot of things. They are just good at keeping it hidden.
I just can't see how any one of those cue makers you mentioned will ever compete with Black Boar, Bender, Carmelli, Scruggs, Phillippi, Searing or Showman (to name a few). But, that doesn't mean I won't give one a whirl.
JM2$.
I always respect your opinion JB, no disrespect intended. :smile:
Greg
I own a JD as well and yes, it is a beautiful cue and a great player too. But, the majority of his cues are below $500 (mine was right at $400). I wouldn't call these cues "high end" by any means just relating to price. DDesign and execution/quality are a different story.
I wouldn't say that there aren't some great cues that do come out of Asia from some really tallented makers. I just probably wouldn't pay thousands of dollars for them.
r,
Greg
In all of human endeavor the quality of goods rises while the cost of them goes down due to increasing access to knowledge and technology.
Thus it's inevitable that pool cues will get to the point that good ones are made wherever they are made. It's like that now but prejudice and ignorance lag behind objective quality reviews.
Fury has a state-of-the art facility five minutes from my shop. They have millions pieces of wood in various stages of curing. Hundreds of thousands of shafts hanging and color coded and dated as to their state of cutting.
They leave cues out in the elements, rain, sun, heat cold to test them. People play very high level, world class pool using Fury cues. They are, everything a cue should be.
Except they were not born in the USA. Poor Fury cues, forever relegated to second or third class citizenship because they were made on the wrong patch of Earth.
Well luckily for them there are plenty of Chinese players who don't much care where the cue is from and only how it feels in their hands. Thus Fury cues are accepted as what they are, very good playing cues that came from a long period of learning how to build good cues.
Sounds like the Filipinos are also starting to figure it out. And the Japanese figured it out long ago as there are many dead straight Helmstetter and Adams cues still being used today which were made 20-30 years ago.
Thus it's inevitable that pool cues will get to the point that good ones are made wherever they are made. It's like that now but prejudice and ignorance lag behind objective quality reviews.
Fury has a state-of-the art facility five minutes from my shop. They have millions pieces of wood in various stages of curing. Hundreds of thousands of shafts hanging and color coded and dated as to their state of cutting.
They leave cues out in the elements, rain, sun, heat cold to test them. People play very high level, world class pool using Fury cues. They are, everything a cue should be.
Except they were not born in the USA. Poor Fury cues, forever relegated to second or third class citizenship because they were made on the wrong patch of Earth.
Well luckily for them there are plenty of Chinese players who don't much care where the cue is from and only how it feels in their hands. Thus Fury cues are accepted as what they are, very good playing cues that came from a long period of learning how to build good cues.
Sounds like the Filipinos are also starting to figure it out. And the Japanese figured it out long ago as there are many dead straight Helmstetter and Adams cues still being used today which were made 20-30 years ago.
I agree but $400 is a good deal of money in PI for a cue I would think, not sure what that would equate to in US dollars. I just know that the works is very good, I think the shaft wood could be better, tips are cheap Le Pros and the wrap was not high quality, I changed those things besides the shafts which I had tapered down and am very happy. A year later the cue is straight and I live in AZ which has very little humidity so if it can stay straight here, it should stay good in other places.
It's cool. I think that people don't keep up with the times though. They make generalizations about "asian" quality without thinking that what happened 5, 10, 20 years ago may not reflect the current state of the art.
It's sad to me that there is so much predjudice on this forum. So many of the members have seemingly no regard for the fact that many other members are "asian" and "foreign" when they make bigoted, racist, and ignorant comments about the quality and work ethics and other aspects of people and goods not from or made-in America.
You are currently stationed in Korea right. Well maybe you can look around when you go to play and take notice of all the freaking awesome Korean pool gadgets that have been created there. For some reason the Koreans seem to be obsessed with creating all sorts of tip tools and other devices around pool.
A couple of these blow away anything similar made in the USA in the past 50 years.
So my point is that good quality, good ideas, innovation, can all come from anywhere. People tend to forget that pool cues weren't invented in the United States. In fact I would even go out on a limb and say that the majority of world championships and BIG tournaments in the last 20 years have been won by players using cues that were not made in the USA. For whatever that it worth.
Not fair to compare the low end imports with top-shelf domestic offerrings.
I AGREE BUT ...
but my questions is more like if your shopping for a cue like a Joss DO you consider a Mezz