gatorcc said:
I just talked to Greg at Warehouse billiards and he told me that this is a form fitting case and that the first time or two you put cues in it, it will seem to be to small but put the cues in with the joint protectors and the case should get used to the cues. He asked what cues I have and told me that those cues should fit in the case with no problems. I am trying his idea. Hopefully it doesn't cause any damage to my cues I don't think it will.
Please return it and reserve the one I showed you in the other thread. The cases Sterling now has in stock are not my design and while good they are no better than anyone else's as they all come from the same factory that doesn't really "know" how to build a good cue case.
All the new cases have been designed by me using the same principles I built with when I owned Instroke.
Let me be real clear here. Almost all of the inexpensive cases currently on the market are not built right. That includes the ones that Sterling has. Those cases are adequate at best and they will work for most people.
Sterling is rotating through it's stock and as new shipments come in the old stock from the old factory will be replaced with new stock.
Why am I telling you this? Well it's simply because I want the people who come to AZ to have the benefit of purchasing the very best that I can offer. Until now that was the same as everyone else offered because those cases came from the same source.
But in my two years here in China I have taught one factory how to make better cases and built another one up from the ground up.
From this shipment on ALL of our cases will be from these two factories under my supervision and NONE of our cases will be from the old place that I have no control over.
Now, you can certainly purchase from any other seller but only the new Sterling cases can be said to have been made by a high end cue case maker with 18 years of experience in this field. And when I say 18 years of experience then I am talking about 18 years making high end cases from the perspective of a cue owner and player who values his equipment.
This is going to be long winded and I apologize in advance.
The fact is that none of the cue case making factories in Taiwan and China have anything to do with pool. They make bags and if you specifiy length width capacity then they build you a bag that satisfies those measurements. They don't care about the finish on your cue, the moisture levels, whether your cue will get damaged through rattling in the case, whether the parts touch, whether the cue is hard to get out or easy or gets stuck. They don't care how your case is used so they use inadequately constructed stress points. They copy other people's designs and make no effort to really improve them and in fact take shortcuts that make the case worse.
They do this because the importer comes to them with the well designed model and says "I want this and I want it cheaper". So they make it cheaper. And because no one can "see" beyond the first few inches you assume it's all good.
I spent a few years doing cue case repair after I sold Instroke. When I took the cases apart people were genuinely surprised and dismayed to see how their cases were made and what kind of things were inside to contribute to harming their cues.
What kinds of things am I talking about?
Liners that don't extend all the way down. Imagine putting your cue against pebbles or plastic beads? Would you do that? Well some cases only have liner down about a third of the way.
Liners made of plastic flocked material that forms hard spots. Tough little nubs that can actually cut your finger.
Nails that stick into the cavity. My own custom Joss was damaged in this way when the bottom gave out on a Whitten copy and the cue slid out through a ring of nails in the bottom. I had taken the case in on trade and was just using it to take my cue to be refinished. Mark Smith, the cue maker can verify this.
Liners that soak up water like a sponge and keep it in the case. Would you wrap your cue in damp towel? This is what some case liners do.
Foam that is brittle and cracks inside the cavity. You have no idea what quality of foam inserts are used. Expanding foam is essentially air and resin. Any foam core case can be broken easily. But the worst ones are the ones that are so brittle that the start to crumble from normal use. This leads to little foam fragments inside the case.
And I could go on...... Just when I think I have seen the cheesiest way to build a cue case I find another one that leaves me shaking my head.
A few months ago I went to the old factory - the ones who currently make the majority of the world's cue cases. They were proudly showing me a prototype that they were doing for a famous brand of cues. The case looked very good but the strap holder was fully too weak for this 6lb case. I almost casually ripped it off the case. I had to tell them WHY that it was wrong and show them how to fix it. AND this is a company with something like 30 years in the business. There were other problems with the case but I wasn't being paid to teach them - they wanted me to focus my efforts on helping them out but they already ripped me off for millions by stealing my designs so I wasn't inclined to make their products better. I only did this on the strap holder because of my friendship with the owner of the famous brand of cues. It would have royally sucked IF they had sent out all these cases and the strap holder started ripping off the case bodies. And they still might as I have no idea where they were at in the production of this case.
Anyway, please please don't confuse the NEW Sterling Cases with the older ones. All AZ folks who read this I implore you to ask for the NEW cases if you consider purchasing a Sterling case. Once we rotate through the old stock then this won't be an issue.
I truly wish that we could afford to BURN all the old stock. But that isn't going to happen and the cases are adequate enough even if we do have a whole wall of defective ones that we probably will throw away.
The new improved and redesigned models carry my personal lifetime guarantee. Beyond whatever Sterling does I will personally replace or repair any case that was built under my supervision as long as I am able to do so.
Ok that's it. Hope that I was clear enough.
