REBUILD A CUE

jdsons

jdsons

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I have a 1968-69 cue that is not straight. The lift or warp whatever is not bad. It appears to be at the joint and C ring area. I am not sure. I was lead to believe that a cue can be taken apart and put back together, rebuild. Are any makers offering that's service. If so, how much does that run???

Julian
 
A cue can't easily be taken apart and put together, it's not LEGO..
Can you replace individual components in a cue? To a certain extent. But if a cue has so much wrong with it that it doesn't make sense from a time or money perspective it's often best to leave it. Time does funny things to materials and it can be very hard to match colours, weave patterns etc.
 
Unless it's a one of a kind or stupid sentimental, I am not sure it'd ever be worth the time and money to try and disassemble a cue, hoping to un-warp it.

When cues warp, it's not because the joint gets tweaked or bent, it's because the wood was affected by moisture and has stressfully warped into a new shape. At this point, it's pretty much kaput.

It's probably possible, but the amount of time and money to do it, just buy a new cue.
 
RidgeRaider said:
Unless it's a one of a kind or stupid sentimental, I am not sure it'd ever be worth the time and money to try and disassemble a cue, hoping to un-warp it.

When cues warp, it's not because the joint gets tweaked or bent, it's because the wood was affected by moisture and has stressfully warped into a new shape. At this point, it's pretty much kaput.

It's probably possible, but the amount of time and money to do it, just buy a new cue.
Click to expand...
Do you work on,
Or build Cues???
 
Michael Webb said:
Do you work on,
Or build Cues???
Click to expand...
I do a bit of both.

If someone brought me a warped cue and a budget less than a blank check, I'm not sure I'd ever entertain deconstructing a cue to unwarp it.

This may say more about my skills as a cue maker, or it may say more about my customer service skills and setting expectations. I don't mind being judged.

In either case, I don't want to be on the hook for the time of deconstructing a cue, possibly discovering a disaster (even the greatest cue makers have sold disasters) and not being able to meet clients expectations with the reconstruction they'd be hoping for if everything didn't go perfect. All for what? It's not like someone is actually going to be willing to pay thousands to straighten a cue, like I said before unless it's insanely rare or sentimental, I just don't see the payoff being bigger than the risk. Not like I just go grab another TAD off the shelf if I find a disaster and get blamed for it.
 
RidgeRaider said:
I do a bit of both.

If someone brought me a warped cue and a budget less than a blank check, I'm not sure I'd ever entertain deconstructing a cue to unwarp it.

This may say more about my skills as a cue maker, or it may say more about my customer service skills and setting expectations. I don't mind being judged.
Click to expand...
Ok!
 
jdsons said:
I have a 1968-69 cue that is not straight. The lift or warp whatever is not bad. It appears to be at the joint and C ring area. I am not sure. I was lead to believe that a cue can be taken apart and put back together, rebuild. Are any makers offering that's service. If so, how much does that run???

Julian
Click to expand...
I rebuild cues all the time. if it isn't too bad, I'd recommend not cutting it apart. As Mike said, send it to Fred as your first option.
 
jdsons said:
I have a 1968-69 cue that is not straight. The lift or warp whatever is not bad. It appears to be at the joint and C ring area. I am not sure. I was lead to believe that a cue can be taken apart and put back together, rebuild. Are any makers offering that's service. If so, how much does that run???

Julian
Click to expand...
Hard to say without actually seeing/holding the cue.
As others have mentioned, this can probably be done.
There are a lot of different factors to determine the cost of the repair or if it can even be done. An example would be a warped forearm which makes it a tough nut to crack. Not much you can do there but build a new forearm.
Contacting Fred first is always your best first option and make your decision from there.
Each cue repair such as this is unique in it's own.
For me, there is no set price for doing a repair such as this.
I've done everything from making your SW butt straight again to eliminating a buzz noise in a Gus without damaging/removing the original finish.
(Thanks Barry for all of your help and insight on accomplishing this)
You are the only one that can determine if the cost of the repair is worth the total value of the cue after it is completed.
Good luck
 
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