Pivot point and shaft selection

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Not Dead Ted

Formerly Dead Crab
Silver Member
Currently playing with a maple shaft, pivot point is at about 12 inches. This is pretty close to my natural bridge length, so I am getting good results minimizing squirt when using back hand english.

So what happens if I switch to a low-deflection shaft that has a pivot point of over 14 inches but continue to bridge at 12 inches? Does the end mass reduction outweigh the negative of bridging away from the pivot point? Or, does the bridge length need to be lengthened to experience the benefits of the LD shaft when using BHE?

Intuitively, I would think that for BHE having your bridge at the pivot point would be optimal. But, current popular thought seems to be that LD shafts help everyone without regard to bridge length/pivot point. Does the LD shaft actually require more complex combinations of BHE/FHE around their pivot point to achieve their claimed benefits?

It is time for me to get a new shaft. About $150 for a maple shaft, $450 for a Revo. I don't want to spend a lot more money for a shaft that requires an awkwardly long bridge to yield the same results.
 
I wouldn't worry about it

I wouldn't change to ld unless you enjoy going through the adjustment process over the next 6-12 months

12" seems like a long bridge to begin with, 14" wouldn't be a huge difference.
Bridge length is more relative to the shot.
Are you reaching, on the rail, long draw, short draw, etc
 
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Not Dead Ted said:
Currently playing with a maple shaft, pivot point is at about 12 inches. This is pretty close to my natural bridge length, so I am getting good results minimizing squirt when using back hand english.

So what happens if I switch to a low-deflection shaft that has a pivot point of over 14 inches but continue to bridge at 12 inches? Does the end mass reduction outweigh the negative of bridging away from the pivot point? Or, does the bridge length need to be lengthened to experience the benefits of the LD shaft when using BHE?

Intuitively, I would think that for BHE having your bridge at the pivot point would be optimal. But, current popular thought seems to be that LD shafts help everyone without regard to bridge length/pivot point. Does the LD shaft actually require more complex combinations of BHE/FHE around their pivot point to achieve their claimed benefits?

It is time for me to get a new shaft. About $150 for a maple shaft, $450 for a Revo. I don't want to spend a lot more money for a shaft that requires an awkwardly long bridge to yield the same results.
Click to expand...

I was curious and found some LD's (wood) Jacoby Hybrids the original ones that were used where people were selling them. You should be able to find them now because everyone seems hot for Carbon Fiber. The one I liked the best was the thinnest Jacoby Hybrid because it had some flex to it.

I've had carbon (nail like), thicker lds (nail like) and kiel wood (sort of nail like). I don't like playing with something stiff as
a nail. So I ended up going back to regular maple long pro taper.

I did not like regular maple if it was 13 mm short taper.

If you are playing with reg maple long pro taper, you will miss the action and deflection because the deflection isn't bad but its also dependable.

I went for a shot with carbon that would have had deflection and the shaft didn't deflect any on a soft hit. Sold the carbon because I need to know when the deflection is going to happen.

Buy them used and give us a report.
 
Until it was brought up on this site i had never heard of 'pivot point' in my life. You got a cue and you just adjusted to it without 'any' thought. some of this really esoteric cue minutia is overblown imo.
 
garczar said:
Until it was brought up on this site i had never heard of 'pivot point' in my life. You got a cue and you just adjusted to it without 'any' thought. some of this really esoteric cue minutia is overblown imo.
Click to expand...
One time this guy I was playing had a shot and he starts talking to himself....about everything he is doing on the shot....and now adjusting for throw.... he says....and missed, I pretended not to notice as I ran out.
 
Not Dead Ted said:
Currently playing with a maple shaft, pivot point is at about 12 inches. This is pretty close to my natural bridge length, so I am getting good results minimizing squirt when using back hand english.

So what happens if I switch to a low-deflection shaft that has a pivot point of over 14 inches but continue to bridge at 12 inches? Does the end mass reduction outweigh the negative of bridging away from the pivot point? Or, does the bridge length need to be lengthened to experience the benefits of the LD shaft when using BHE?

Intuitively, I would think that for BHE having your bridge at the pivot point would be optimal. But, current popular thought seems to be that LD shafts help everyone without regard to bridge length/pivot point. Does the LD shaft actually require more complex combinations of BHE/FHE around their pivot point to achieve their claimed benefits?

It is time for me to get a new shaft. About $150 for a maple shaft, $450 for a Revo. I don't want to spend a lot more money for a shaft that requires an awkwardly long bridge to yield the same results.
Click to expand...

Sidespin (English) - Dr. Dave Pool Info

Answers to frequently-asked questions (FAQs) about how to aim and compensate for various effects when using sidespin (english) in pool.
drdavepoolinfo.com drdavepoolinfo.com

pj
chgo
 
I play with a plain maple shaft, not even LD. I can shoot 7 feet from the OB with a lot of inside English and know where to aim the CB. If you play enough and pay attention to what is happening, one can adjust to just about anything to do with squirt, deflection, etc.

I have no idea what a pivot point is relative to playing pool- and I don't want to know. Adding thoughts to how the CB will react relative to equipment should be minimized IMO. Some will claim that is exactly what all this LD and CF stuff will do for you - I won't argue with science - but I will say that most equipment junkies in any sport are often not the best players.

I never forget- back in about 1997- when Zuglan's Joss tour was full of true pro caliber players, and I saw a guy came walking down the street in Stamford, CT. with a Meucci cue - one shaft- in his hands, no case, no glove, no extension, not even a break cue or a case. He WON that tournament that weekend - Chuck Altomare- goes to show you!
 
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Not Dead Ted said:
Does the LD shaft actually require more complex combinations of BHE/FHE around their pivot point to achieve their claimed benefits?
Click to expand...
drdavepoolinfo.com

System for Aiming With Sidespin (SAWS) - Dr. Dave Pool Info

What is the System for Aiming With Sidespin (SAWS)? System for Aiming With Sidespin (SAWS) is a full-length instructional video by Dr. Dave that covers a simple and methodical system to find accurate lines of aim for sidespin shots of any distance, speed, and amount of spin.. It is based on...
drdavepoolinfo.com drdavepoolinfo.com

pj
chgo
 
garczar said:
Until it was brought up on this site i had never heard of 'pivot point' in my life. You got a cue and you just adjusted to it without 'any' thought. some of this really esoteric cue minutia is overblown imo.
Click to expand...
People want a fool proof, set and forget pool experience. Fact is ball navigation is part of it. IOW for most situations, you will have a variety of options that will get you the same cue ball landing. The choice is often terrain dependent. I suspect this ability is atrophying in the modern tecked out player. Got some marbles in the way of your lab calibrated low left? No prob. Preset safety coming up...
 
Every shaft will need an adjustment and a learning curve.
Pivot point English doesn’t really work for low deflection shafts but it very much up to the level of deflection reduction.
With Predator shafts being the reference point , anything as good ad them will need to stay parallel to line of the shot on most shots.
On long and/or hard shots, you’ll need to compensate. I like to use the method that JJ shows here:


This is working well for any shaft
 
I think the pivot AT the back hand may diminish the cue angle at offset, which should diminish any shot-line error. You may lose some Rs per minute but not significantly so. There might also be an inversion effect between bridge pivot and backhand pivot that cancels out but retains accuracy over BHE.
What I don't like about the backhand pivot is you get down mechanically with reduced cognition. IOW, WYSIWYG. You may be oblivious to an errant landing BC your ass alarms didn't go off. They can't because you don't have a true shot image to check. This is a fail point in spite of what he mentions about pressure resistance.
 
skor said:
I like to use the method that JJ shows here:


This is working well for any shaft
Click to expand...
JJ essentially uses front hand english, but instead of moving the front hand after planting it on the table while keeping the backhand in place, he moves his front hand just before planting it on the table. Same result.

I would also note that JJ never hit the cue ball with speed using his method, yet he showed a miss using the parallel shift method when hitting the cue ball with speed. It makes no sense that you could hit the cue ball soft or with speed using JJ's method and still pocket the object ball because hitting the cue ball faster is going to make it deflect** more, yet JJ's method does not compensate for that. According to the video, JJ aims the same way for both slow and fast shots.

The bottom line is you can't aim the same way for both slow and fast shots when hitting with sidespin--unless you happen to be bridging at the natural pivot point of your cue with certain shots.

** I use the term deflection to mean the net of squirt - swerve. According to Dr. Dave, squirt does not change with speed, but when a cue ball is traveling fast it does not have time to swerve in the opposite direction of the squirt before it hits the object ball, so when you hit the cue ball with fast speed you are getting squirt minus almost no swerve, resulting in more (net) deflection v. if you hit the cue ball slow and the cue ball squirted then fully swerved before hitting the object ball.
 
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7stud said:
JJ essentially uses front hand english, but instead of moving the front hand after planting it on the table while keeping the backhand in place, he moves his front hand just before planting it on the table. Same result.

I would also note that JJ never hit the cue ball with speed using his method, yet he showed a miss using the parallel shift method when hitting the cue ball with speed. It makes no sense that you could hit the cue ball soft or with speed using JJ's method and still pocket the object ball because hitting the cue ball faster is going to make it deflect more, yet JJ's method does not compensate for that. According to the video, JJ aims the same way for both slow and fast shots.

The bottom line is you can't aim the same way for both slow and fast shots when hitting with sidespin--unless you happen to be bridging at the natural pivot point of your cue with certain shots.
Click to expand...
Actually it’s both front hand and back hand
 
Patrick Johnson said:
drdavepoolinfo.com

System for Aiming With Sidespin (SAWS) - Dr. Dave Pool Info

What is the System for Aiming With Sidespin (SAWS)? System for Aiming With Sidespin (SAWS) is a full-length instructional video by Dr. Dave that covers a simple and methodical system to find accurate lines of aim for sidespin shots of any distance, speed, and amount of spin.. It is based on...
drdavepoolinfo.com drdavepoolinfo.com

pj
chgo
Click to expand...
Thanks. That led me to the answer. Dr. Dave's data on the Revo with 12" bridge was more specific info than expected.
 
7stud said:
JJ essentially uses front hand english, but instead of moving the front hand after planting it on the table while keeping the backhand in place, he moves his front hand just before planting it on the table. Same result.

I would also note that JJ never hit the cue ball with speed using his method, yet he showed a miss using the parallel shift method when hitting the cue ball with speed. It makes no sense that you could hit the cue ball soft or with speed using JJ's method and still pocket the object ball because hitting the cue ball faster is going to make it deflect more, yet JJ's method does not compensate for that. According to the video, JJ aims the same way for both slow and fast shots.

The bottom line is you can't aim the same way for both slow and fast shots when hitting with sidespin--unless you happen to be bridging at the natural pivot point of your cue with certain shots.
Click to expand...

That's a pretty good assessment of JJ's technique. He's done it that so much that he's used to the allowances he needs to make on the shots and he thinks that he is making no allowances. He isn't hard stroking the ball as you mentioned. Bustamante plays all sidesways looking so he developed a similar skill because doing it that way means less allowances to have to contend with. They both played into their technique.
 
7stud said:
JJ essentially uses front hand english
Click to expand...
skor said:
Actually it’s both front hand and back hand
Click to expand...
straightline said:
Technically the backhand is fixed on center ball so all FHE.
Click to expand...

The “technical” definition is rarely exactly what’s needed - only when the cue’s pivot length is exactly at the grip hand and there’s no swerve. Since the shaft’s actual pivot length is almost never right at the “front” or “back” hand we’re almost always making subconscious microadjustments.

pj
chgo
 
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