Played shockingly bad with a house cue with an extremely rounded tip. Was the tip actually less forgiving of stroke/tip placement errors?

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BlueRaider

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Over the holidays, I went to Stroker's in Palm Harbor, FL, while visiting my in-laws with my wife. I didn't bring my cue, so I grabbed a house cue that looked normal at first glance.

But after missing several shots that I'm normally very high percentage on, I checked the cue and realized the tip was extremely rounded. It was basically a perfect dome/half-circle shape. Possibly the most rounded tip I have ever played with.

I didn't want to blame the tip, so I kept shooting with it, and I kept missing far more often than I normally do, and on shots that don't really present much difficulty for me (medium-distance straight-ins and very thick medium-distance cuts). The freshly covered tables at Stroker's were more forgiving than my preferred local table in TN (4.25" pockets with relatively slow, worn cloth), but it wasn't even that I was rattling balls. I was missing by a half-diamond on many shots where distance was remotely a factor.

I only shot for around an hour or so, and I never bothered to switch to a different house cue (partly because I was determined to figure out why I was missing). When I got back to my in-laws' house, I checked to see what Dr. Dave's website says about tip shape and accuracy and found this:
One advantage of a flatter tip is that a center-ball hit, with some tip placement inaccuracy, will generally have less unintentional english (and unexpected squirt/swerve/throw). In other words, a larger, flatter tip is more “forgiving” with misalignment errors for near-center-ball hits.
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I should mention that my playing shaft is an OB Classic+ with a fairly flat Triangle tip. It's quarter shaped or even flatter, whereas this 13 mm house cue tip was rounder than a dime. Also, I play mostly center ball/vertical axis.

I found this diagram that actually looks like a fairly accurate representation of the tips on my cue (left) and the house cue I used (right):

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All of this to say: is it actually reasonable to attribute some of my poor play on the extremely rounded tip (due to it magnifying my stroke errors/tip placement errors)?
 
xX-Wizard-Xx said:
Probably had more to do with playing with a low deflection shaft ... Because of this you can't adjust to house cues or other cues with standard shafts.
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Look at snooker they have crazy mushroomed tips and still play with precision .... You can attribute your issues most likely to deflection
 
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It's sort of like when a cue ball is resting against the cushion and you have to make a lengthy shot. It is very difficult to hit the center of the upper portion of the cue ball, making that shot very difficult. Those shots are very difficult, and I would imagine an overly rounded tip makes it a bit harder. Not to mention all the other characteristics of a house cue compared to your playing cue.
 
BlueRaider said:
... All of this to say: is it actually reasonable to attribute some of my poor play on the extremely rounded tip (due to it magnifying my stroke errors/tip placement errors)?
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You didn't say what kind of shots you were missing. So far as we know, you never play with sidespin, so the suggestion above that your misses were due to squirt/cue ball deflection is just a guess. If you were missing shots with sidespin and you were consistently missing on the too much squirt side, then the cue probably had more squirt than you are used to.

What kind of shots were you missing?

But to answer your question, the roundness/height is almost irrelevant unless it was due to the tip expanding up like an accordion and then all bets are off. Was the tip solid?
 
BlueRaider said:
I checked the cue and realized the tip was extremely rounded. It was basically a perfect dome/half-circle shape. Possibly the most rounded tip I have ever played with.
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I'm not an instructor. I absolutely hate a too rounded tip. My tips are all right at 12.5mm and I put between a quarter and a nickel radius on them. I don't even like dime radius. I've got tips already installed that were perfectly round like you describe, basically a half sphere and I hated them. I took the tip shaper to them and they played nicely.

If my tip gets too round I feel like I'm more prone to miscue. No clue if it's something to do with my mechanics or what but flatter is my preference. I feel like with a rounder tip I can't stray anywhere from center ball.
 
boogieman said:
I'm not an instructor. I absolutely hate a too rounded tip. My tips are all right at 12.5mm and I put between a quarter and a nickel radius on them. I don't even like dime radius. I've got tips already installed that were perfectly round like you describe, basically a half sphere and I hated them. I took the tip shaper to them and they played nicely.

If my tip gets too round I feel like I'm more prone to miscue. No clue if it's something to do with my mechanics or what but flatter is my preference. I feel like with a rounder tip I can't stray anywhere from center ball.
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Very similar thoughts. Imagine if the tip were a pinpoint how difficult it would be to make proper contact. I think this theory would fit any tip that gets rounder/pointed then a quarter nickel dime shape.
 
If the tip was also very soft/mushy, which many house cue tips are, it’s possible a tip that tall would deform laterally a great amount when striking the CB slightly off-center, possibly accentuating the already high deflection of a house cue.
 
The main culprit was most likely the difference in cue deflections, weight and balance points. The difference in tips could cause you some issues but not to the extent you're describing.
 
SeniorTom said:
Imagine if the tip were a pinpoint how difficult it would be to make proper contact.
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That would actually make it easier - because you would be able to see more clearly exactly where the pinpoint is contacting the CB. With normal tips you have to estimate how far from the tip's center it will contact the CB.

On the other hand, the more rounded the tip is the closer you have to stay to its center to avoid miscues.

pj
chgo
 
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Thanks for the replies everyone. I think I figured it out while practicing today.

Gradually, my perception of center ball has shifted a few mms to the right of actual center ball. So I was hitting every vertical axis shot with a small amount of right spin.

I suspect that shooting with my LD shaft masked this error to some degree (although I had noticed some inconsistency creeping in lately), but shooting with a HD house cue exposed it big time.

It’s funny because I had this issue probably 5-6 years ago and it slowly worked it’s way back into my game again, albeit not as bad as the first time.
 
BlueRaider said:
Thanks for the replies everyone. I think I figured it out while practicing today.

Gradually, my perception of center ball has shifted a few mms to the right of actual center ball. So I was hitting every vertical axis shot with a small amount of right spin.

I suspect that shooting with my LD shaft masked this error to some degree (although I had noticed some inconsistency creeping in lately), but shooting with a HD house cue exposed it big time.

It’s funny because I had this issue probably 5-6 years ago and it slowly worked it’s way back into my game again, albeit not as bad as the first time.
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If your stroke is otherwise pretty straight and you simply have a perception issue making you hit off center you could do what I did (and sometimes still do just to check). When down on the shot and addressing the ball, lower your bridge until you can see the bottom of the cueball. It is easy to see the spot where the cueball touches the felt. That point is the center of the cueball vertical axis. If you line up your tip to the bottom of the cueball, you can just raise your bridge again, and your good to go. If you still hit off center after doing that then it is either a stroke issue or your eyes aren’t in the correct position over the shaft.
 
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