Rhino shaft buyers, let 'er rip.......

[Dave-Kat]

You guy's are slaying me.....I got the itch to pull the trigger for a 12.5 but still on the 'fence' as I tried this CF experiment a few years ago only to go back to my maple shafts Do these Rhino's play/feel more like a Cynergy ? I hear they feel less hollow and more like maple.

Couldn't get passed the feeling I was hitting a hollow foam filled 'pipe' ......which they are

 

[SKILLZELITE]

@SSP
Im aware of that via meucci yrs ago, Im referencing which cause less.

 

[SKILLZELITE]

You guy's are slaying me.....I got the itch to pull the trigger for a 12.5 but still on the 'fence' as I tried this CF experiment a few years ago only to go back to my maple shafts Do these Rhino's play/feel more like a Cynergy ? I hear they feel less hollow and more like maple.

Couldn't get passed the feeling I was hitting a hollow foam filled 'pipe' ......which they are

To me they play like a revo only with a little more feel.
The closest I think youll get to a maple feel in a cf shaft Is the Tiger Fortis, then Prime or Engage. Kielwood is a good in between a quality maple and cf shaft.
Also even with Cf shafts the tip plays a big part in the feel & sound, so if it seems hollow to you , swap out the tip for something softer, itll change the feel as well as the sound.
Look heres the thing, Its a cheap shaft thats worth trying out, if you dont like it , flip it for 120 .
I look at it like I spend 160 eating delivery/take out twice a week .
If you view it from that perspective its not a big loss if it turns out to be a no-go for you.

 

[Cornerman]

The shaft doesn't "deflect" the cue ball deflects with ANY shaft when struck off center, you must account for this while aiming when using ANY shaft, LD shafts only help limit A SMALL AMOUNT of the cue ball deflection when struck off center, if you play with the same cue and shaft you will learn the amount of defection that your shaft has, there were no such things as LD shafts back when Efren, Earl Strickland, Mike Sigel and many others played and did very well, it's the Indian not the arrow.

Useless pontification. I’m not sure who you’re trying to save. Everyone here has heard that all before.

My Rhino shaft played great, and I ordered another one for my Schuler. Can’t wait til it gets here.

 

[Cornerman]

You guy's are slaying me.....I got the itch to pull the trigger for a 12.5 but still on the 'fence' as I tried this CF experiment a few years ago only to go back to my maple shafts Do these Rhino's play/feel more like a Cynergy ? I hear they feel less hollow and more like maple.

Couldn't get passed the feeling I was hitting a hollow foam filled 'pipe' ......which they are

I do not think my Rhino 12.4 plays, feels, sounds or goes through my bridge the same as my 12.5 Cynergy. I would say that my Rhino feels like a CF shaft.

 

[garczar]

You guy's are slaying me.....I got the itch to pull the trigger for a 12.5 but still on the 'fence' as I tried this CF experiment a few years ago only to go back to my maple shafts Do these Rhino's play/feel more like a Cynergy ? I hear they feel less hollow and more like maple.

Couldn't get passed the feeling I was hitting a hollow foam filled 'pipe' ......which they are

As opposed to a chunk of a dead log??

 

[garczar]

Ok, didn't understand the part about "a tad less on hard spin shots".

Sorry, should have said squirt. On power shots the Mezz was maybe a bit less. Again, not enough to have to make any big correction when using other cf shafts.

 

[garczar]

To me they play like a revo only with a little more feel.
The closest I think youll get to a maple feel in a cf shaft Is the Tiger Fortis, then Prime or Engage. Kielwood is a good in between a quality maple and cf shaft.
Also even with Cf shafts the tip plays a big part in the feel & sound, so if it seems hollow to you , swap out the tip for something softer, itll change the feel as well as the sound.
Look heres the thing, Its a cheap shaft thats worth trying out, if you dont like it , flip it for 120 .
I look at it like I spend 160 eating delivery/take out twice a week .
If you view it from that perspective its not a big loss if it turns out to be a no-go for you.

Cheap to me has a bad connotation. The Rhino is a quality product sold at a fair price. The 'big boys' are making a killing selling shafts at 400+.

 

[L.S. Dennis]

I got one and I have to say that I was skeptical to say least but for the price but I thought it was worth a gamble. The shaft turned out to be everything they said it to be and more. I mated the 12.5 shaft to my Helmstetter and like I said I have nothing bad to say about it. Maybe the best thing this shaft may do is to force Revo, and all the rest of these very expensive cf shaft makers to cut their prices by about 40 per cent. That's good old fashioned competition!

 

[SKILLZELITE]

@garczar I understand where youre coming from, although I used the word cheap, in the literal intitial definition of the word, wasnt intended as a slight.
Also I agree , well known brand names are over charging, perhaps 100 over a rhino price is justified, but 200 ,300+ is greedy as hell.

 

[Dave-Kat]

As opposed to a chunk of a dead log??

.......yea a fine tuned very old hand crafted 'dead' log

 

[Poolmanis]

I just ordered a 30" Rhino pro-taper in 12.5mm to be a backup. When it arrives, I'll do a careful natural pivot-point measurement of its deflection, and compare it to my current player (Cuetec Cynergy 12.5) and my old Predator Z2 shafts. Think I might have an old 314.2 laying around that I could throw it to the test as well.

Side-note for anyone playing with a Cuetec Truewood butt: the Cuetec joint diameter is 21.3mm (older Cuetec butts, 2019 and earlier, are 20.0mm), and the Rhino is supposed to be 21.5. I figure I won't notice a 0.2mm difference in diameter (that would be a net difference of 0.1mm around the circumference of the joint).

If it bugs me (I'm a "chin on cue guy", so can feel joint size difference on some shots), I might take the risk of sanding down the joint of the Rhino a bit on my lathe. It's only money lol.

Which of those shafts have least deflection?

 

[DeadStick]

Which of those shafts have least deflection?

The z2 shaft is the lowest I’ve played with. Too low for me, as I prefer the natural pivot point to match my bridge length, and the z2 would require an 18-19” bridge length.

 

[L.S. Dennis]

Which of those shafts have least deflection?

I just ordered a 30" Rhino pro-taper in 12.5mm to be a backup. When it arrives, I'll do a careful natural pivot-point measurement of its deflection, and compare it to my current player (Cuetec Cynergy 12.5) and my old Predator Z2 shafts. Think I might have an old 314.2 laying around that I could throw it to the test as well.

Side-note for anyone playing with a Cuetec Truewood butt: the Cuetec joint diameter is 21.3mm (older Cuetec butts, 2019 and earlier, are 20.0mm), and the Rhino is supposed to be 21.5. I figure I won't notice a 0.2mm difference in diameter (that would be a net difference of 0.1mm around the circumference of the joint).

If it bugs me (I'm a "chin on cue guy", so can feel joint size difference on some shots), I might take the risk of sanding down the joint of the Rhino a bit on my lathe. It's only money lol.

Actually I was thinking of doing the same thing to the shaft collar to may it equal to my Helmstetter butt collar which is 21.2mm and the shaft collar on the Rhino is 21.5mm. It would only need to taken down a measly .3mm to make them even. This could be done with either a small file or a tiny strip of sand paper no big deal.

 

[Poolmanis]

The z2 shaft is the lowest I’ve played with. Too low for me, as I prefer the natural pivot point to match my bridge length, and the z2 would require an 18-19” bridge length.

That what i wanted to hear haha. I play Z2 and many believe carbon shafts have less deflection than it..
Mezz Ignite and thin Revo are almost same but i feel just a hair more deflection. I don´t use Dr. Dave methods but i normally test deflection to shooting 45 degree cuts with certain speed and inside english. It have edge of shaft towards edge of ball when shooting Z2, I can make that shot 20 times a row so i trust that to be good shot to use measure.
Then i take another shaft and aim same and do enough repetition to see if i miss thin or if i make it. If cue have more deflection I miss shot thin. Also i count only shots that have about same speed(where cueball lands tell me speed objectively.).

 

[dendweller]

That what i wanted to hear haha. I play Z2 and many believe carbon shafts have less deflection than it..
Mezz Ignite and thin Revo are almost same but i feel just a hair more deflection. I don´t use Dr. Dave methods but i normally test deflection to shooting 45 degree cuts with certain speed and inside english. It have edge of shaft towards edge of ball when shooting Z2, I can make that shot 20 times a row so i trust that to be good shot to use measure.
Then i take another shaft and aim same and do enough repetition to see if i miss thin or if i make it. If cue have more deflection I miss shot thin. Also i count only shots that have about same speed(where cueball lands tell me speed objectively.).

I do the same thing. Set a ball up on the second diamond on the rail, shoot from around the center of the table with inside, if I overcut it consistently, I got more deflection than I'm used to.

 

[SSP]

@SSP
Im aware of that via meucci yrs ago, Im referencing which cause less.

I'm saying don't sweat the amount of deflection your shaft has, if you like how it hits you will learn to adjust to the amount YOUR shaft has, to me it's easier to process what is going on if you think of it in the right way, didn't mean any harm at all, I use a CF as well, I like that it doesn't warp, not affected by temp or humidity, ect.

 

[hang-the-9]

Not bs at all. I AB'd this shaft, a Cynergy and a Mezz Ignite the other day. When shooting from about center table towards the middle diamond on the end rail the difference in squirt in all three MIGHT have been 1/8", probably less. Pretty impressive when you consider the Rhino tested is 12.8, the Cyn is 12.5 and the Mezz 12.2. BTW, deflection does NOT increase with speed. Speed just carries the initial 'squirt line' further out. ALL shafts do this. Its called' physics'. Have you tested ANY CF shafts side-by-side yourself? Or are these statements merely guesses/opinions? I've tested most CF shafts on the market today and the difference in the best/worst in terms of deflection is tiny. What's 'naive and narrow-minded' is to just assume that so-called 'big name' shafts play/perform different without actually putting this theory to some kind of test.

You are combing the technical mechanics of the shaft with the stroke into two separate things, but the result is the same. If you hit harder, the cueball moves out more from the line of aim, causing more deflection to adjust for. It may not change say the % of the movement of the ball for a given speed in the shaft, but the aiming point will change just the same. So a lower deflection shaft hit harder could have the exact same adjusting for aim as a higher deflection shaft hit softer. The end result is the same no matter how the ball arrives at the destination.

 

[slach]

I have 3/8-10 12.4 Rhino shaft I'm using on an old McDermott butt. The original maple shaft fits this butt perfect at the collar. The Rhino shaft screws on just slightly off center at the collar - proud about 1/2 the thickness of a business card on one side and a touch less than flush on the other side. The shaft by itself rolls perfectly straight but with a tiny wobble when rolled with the butt. The problem might be with the McDermott pin/collar but I can't tell, it's the only 3/8-10 I have. Anybody else notice something like this?

Regardless, it's a minor issue to me and the shaft is for sure a keeper, hits very solidly without the vibration I sometimes noticed on hard shots and sounds a lot like the maple but with far less squirt. The medium tip it came with is softer feeling than the solid techno-duds I've been using but also spins the ball easier.

 

[Tennesseejoe]

The z2 shaft is the lowest I’ve played with. Too low for me, as I prefer the natural pivot point to match my bridge length, and the z2 would require an 18-19” bridge length.

Honest question...If you use a shaft with a 12 inch pivot point but shoot with a 18 inch pivot point: Does deflection increase, decrease, or move to infinity?