school me on chalk...

OK it's late so I'll be short since I actually have to prep a client for year end tomorrow... At least I get to help spend some money even if it's not mine =)

Basically chalk is made up of 3 parts... Binder, Fillers and Abrasives.....

Binders have one purpose... Hold the friggin chalk together... Clay has been used for years and will continue to be...

Fillers... For years fillers were just to make up volume but recently they have found out that using certain fillers will make the chalk go on smoother... ie Kamui... Some fillers can also help bind the chalk when it's pressed... Fillers have a lot to do with the chalks feel but not with how it works....

Abrasives... This is where the rubber hits the road... This is also where the premium chalk can excel if their QC is right... With a cube of masters there is no real standardized abrasive size.. Abrasives are measured in microns.. Too small they don't bite and too large your chalk feels gritty...

If you look at the surface of masters magnified you can see that there is not a consistency to the abrasives across the surface... Different micron sizes and some ares that are nothing but filler... If you put only filler on your tip you will be very surpised when you misscue after chalking... And if you say it's never happened I'd have to call BS...

On a premium chalk like Blue Diamond you will see a better distribution of abrasives there will be no filler only areas but some areas will be weak because the micron sizes vary... Small micron sizes don't do much more than filler so if you hit a patch of that stuff you might get a sliding feeling from your tip instead of a full misscue....

Kamui is 30 bucks because of the purity and consistency of the minerals they use... And because of the QC they put into making the chalk... Kamui under magnification is consistent in distribution and micron size.. If you misscue with Kamui it's ALL on your stroke.. It's not because you didn't get what you thought you paid for....

Now with that said as long as your tip is porous and doesn't glaze over for the most part the leather lets the abrasives set into the face of the tip... Most of the abrasives used are ruptile... which means that they fracture ad create new biting surfaces under pressure.. This means that you can likely shoot several shots before you run out of chalk.. Or what it really means is that you can rupture the abrasives several times before they are too small to create a bite... That's why Kamui can last a game or longer... You start with large micron sizes so as you break it down it keeps on biting....

OK that's longer than I intended but I'm a pool nerd and Outsville is working on chalk hopefully by Tunica... It's not gonna be $30 a cube but it's not going to be $2 bucks a cube either... Man I have toooooo many projects.. Tips and a COR tester will be out around Derby and I hope to enlist AZ's help on evaluations....

Chris Renfro
 
chalk

madmiller said:
Master's work fine and worked fine for me until I got me a cube of Kamui.
I just don't like to chalk after every other shot and that's what you have to do using Master's. Or at least every 5 shots. If you don't do that, then miscue is about to happen.
With Kamui I chalk every other rack when playing a game and maybe every other 50 shots when practicing and I like that. When I shoot I don't wanna be distracted by anything, especially chalking my tip. And it's been working great for me.
As far as the price goes - I think that 30$ goes a long way. I had my cube of Kamui for over 5 months now and still haven't used 1/3 of it yet. At this rate it's gonna last me definitely over a year. At least.
Kamui is the best chalk that works for me.
But if I liked to chalk all the time like a lot of players that I see do, I would definitely go with Master's.
Click to expand...

Hi
all the tests I have done with kamui chalk , my numbers are not the same as yours. not a big deal. I get about 8 shots before I start to miscue.
Please no offence I was just trying to add to the mountain of input.

MMike
 
Master chalk has served the masses well over the years. I use and prefer Pre Flag, Blue Diamond and Russian Magic. All three are a cut above the rest.

However you see it, if you think that a 30 dollar piece of chalk is going to make a huge difference in your game, good luck to ya.

When you step up to the table, your opponent slaughters you and he is only using Master chalk, what will your excuse be?
 
TSW said:
I'd rather not know and keep my thirty bucks.

Seriously though, I tried Kamui at Valley Forge a year or two ago. Chalking is part of my pre-shot routine so I would go through it far too fast to justify the expense.
Click to expand...

I do it after every shot because its routine and helps me slow down to look at my next shot...
 
Blue Hog ridr said:
Master chalk has served the masses well over the years. I use and prefer Pre Flag, Blue Diamond and Russian Magic. All three are a cut above the rest.

However you see it, if you think that a 30 dollar piece of chalk is going to make a huge difference in your game, good luck to ya.

When you step up to the table, your opponent slaughters you and he is only using Master chalk, what will your excuse be?
Click to expand...
I use Kamui chalk for a few reasons, but not because it makes a difference in my game. I can shoot the same with Master's, Balabushka, Blue Diamond or even Silver cup.
But if I use anything else than Kamui, then I have to chalk all the time. And I hate it. Some people chalk because it's the part of their PSR and it's fine. My PSR never included chalking , I like to shoot fast. Chalking distracts me from one thing that I like the most- the game itself!
As far as the situation when someone beats me at the table, I don't care what he uses, I never cared for their equipment. If a person slaughters me shooting with a broomstick one-handed, it's his skills, not what he uses to shoot with.
 
The new Predator chalk is great and it is inexpensive, it coats the tip great and stays on for atleast half a rack if not more.
 
Dear Desert Shark and Others--

I wrote this once for the Forums not too long ago, but, since it seems peculiarly appropriate to this exchange, I'll repeat it. I think it applies no matter what brand of chalk you use.

About three years ago I read an article in Billiards Digest about how to chalk a cue properly. The point was that one should scrape the chalk across the tip and not bore the tip into the chalk. I tried it with a new piece of chalk and found I couldn't negotiate the little tip-sized indentation in a new piece of chalk, so I took a carpenter's file and scraped the piece of chalk down just to where the exposed side it was completely flat. Since then I have been scraping my cue tip across the chalk. After a couple of weeks, you have a piece of flat chalk with wavy surface which fits the shape of your tip. It is much easier to chalk the tip. Also, I have the definite impression that the tip stays chalked longer. I play about nine or ten hours a week. In a year, I have used about half of a piece of Master's chalk. I think I chalk only after every seventh or eighth shot. I don't miscue.
 
I also prefer Triangle chalk. It's made by the same people as Masters but I can feel it being a bit grittier. I like that as it sort of helps scuff any glaze on the tip and hold better.
 
Don't get sucked in... you'll hear people claim they can tell a difference in the chalk (in terms of how the cue hits the ball, how much spin gets applied, how far they draw, whatever). It's simply not true. Try doing a chalk "Pepsi Challenge" and guess what chalk was used by how the ball reacted.

Is it possible some other brand's composition makes it 1% less likely to miscue than master? Maybe, but that's really only helpful if you have perfect chalking habits (meaning you chalk after every shot, and apply it carefully to coat the whole tip). If you aren't already a careful chalker, worry more about that than about which brand you use.
 
I knew a guy once who claimed he could chalk his cue just as well with drywall. Hmmmm, can't seem to remember his name. :)

Personally, I use either Blue Diamond or Masters (Blue). I really haven't noticed a difference between the two. I do notice a difference between the green and blue Masters though. The blue seems much better. Has anybody else noticed that?
 
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Blue Hog ridr said:
When you step up to the table, your opponent slaughters you and he is only using Master chalk, what will your excuse be?
Click to expand...

Let's see...anything other than that he or she was the better player?

I'd probably blame it on George Bush. That seems to work well...
 
I have noticed that the red, green and blue master and silver cup chalk has a different grit. This is actually what prompted this thread. A friend of mine has a tan table and only uses tan chalk to not mess the felt. To each their own, but I noticed on his house cues (I won't use different color chalk on my tips because of this) that it seemed a little grittier going on but performance was still the same ad far as I could tell.

Now I know how my play cue reacts because of the hours spent with it so comparing with his cue and his chalk, I was mostly concerned with the weight distribution on his cue, but did feel application of the chalk was different. But then again his house cue has a distinctly different tip. So it could've been that.

I'm getting my play cue re-tipped soon so maybe I'll try some different chalk.
 
One factor no one else has mentioned - If you chalk less, and/or if the chalk is less powdery then there is less mess from chalk residue on both the ferrule, shaft, hands and cloth.


I've not tried any of the other premium chalk brands mentioned, but I have tried a piece of Kamui at a friend's house and noticed right away that it basically eliminates most of the mess associated with chalking, both because you use it less and because it seems to have create almost no powdery residue.

The only downsides to Kamui, other than the cost, is it can put marks on the cue ball. Regular chalk does this too but the Kamui marks are a bit more noticeable due to the denser nature of the chalk.

I don't "hate chalking on every shot" as several others have mentioned. (It's part of my pre-shot routine now.) In terms of performance I don't believe I've ever fully miscued for any reason other than my own incompetence, but I believe it is certainly possible I've missed some finesse shots when the level of grip between the cue tip and the cue ball was not quite as expected due to inconsistent chalk. What I have no way of knowing is if a premium chalk would really eliminate such errors or not but I'm open to the possibility.

I am strongly considering changing to Kamui for the sake of keep my equipment clean, especially on my home table.

HTH, YMMV.
 
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CreeDo said:
Don't get sucked in... you'll hear people claim they can tell a difference in the chalk (in terms of how the cue hits the ball, how much spin gets applied, how far they draw, whatever). It's simply not true. Try doing a chalk "Pepsi Challenge" and guess what chalk was used by how the ball reacted.

Is it possible some other brand's composition makes it 1% less likely to miscue than master? Maybe, but that's really only helpful if you have perfect chalking habits (meaning you chalk after every shot, and apply it carefully to coat the whole tip). If you aren't already a careful chalker, worry more about that than about which brand you use.
Click to expand...

I actually passed that test, Creedo....as a matter of fact, it was tougher
than a blind test...they switched names on me.

When I was a kid, I would only use National Tournament chalk.....
...then at some point, Masters and Triangle felt better.
What I had followed was the chalk, not the brand name.

National had moved to Macon, Tweetens took over the old place in
Chicago, close to one of the world's best supply of silicon sand.
 
What's the education behind the Pre-Flag Masters vs. the Flagged Masters Chalk...lead...mercury...???

I love hearing the opinions between this issue...

And, is there any difference between the green vs. the blue Masters Chalk...??? Pre-Flag or Flagged???

I happen to believe that the Pre-Flag Green is the best...but I also know that it seems that the majority of players like the blue.

I would like to see the chalk under a microscope, to identify if one is of a finer grit than the other...

Any thought, would be appreciated !!!!!!!!
 
jwe711 said:
What's the education behind the Pre-Flag Masters vs. the Flagged Masters Chalk...lead...mercury...???

I love hearing the opinions between this issue...

And, is there any difference between the green vs. the blue Masters Chalk...??? Pre-Flag or Flagged???

I happen to believe that the Pre-Flag Green is the best...but I also know that it seems that the majority of players like the blue.

I would like to see the chalk under a microscope, to identify if one is of a finer grit than the other...

Any thought, would be appreciated !!!!!!!!
Click to expand...
Tweetens says there is no difference between pre-flag and flag...
...they put the flag on after 9-11 but did not change the ingredients.

I believe them
 
pt109 said:
Tweetens says there is no difference between pre-flag and flag...
...they put the flag on after 9-11 but did not change the ingredients.

I believe them
Click to expand...



I guess I'm confused...I'm thinking that the flag has been on long before 09/11/2001...in my opinion...but I don't know exactly when...

...not argueing...and maybe I'm wrong...but trying to learn...
 
Masters: cheap and works well
Silver Cup: slightly more and works well
Blue Diamond: slightly more than that: works well
Predator: has to be great because Predator said so
Kamui: works well but you have to make monthly payments
 
pt109 said:
I actually passed that test, Creedo....as a matter of fact, it was tougher than a blind test...they switched names on me.
Click to expand...

If I'm reading you right, you preferred a certain chalk, but at some point you found you didn't like it anymore... and later you found out they had moved and changed their name? And I guess as a result of that move they were using new or different ingredients?

Let me ask you this.

Let's say I had 2 cubes of chalk, one masters and one, I dunno, triangle or predator... and they were both the same shade of blue. I randomly chalk your cue with one or the other, and each time you hit a spin shot and then mark down which chalk you think was used.

Out of 100 shots, how often do you think you'd get it correct? What if I upped the ante to 3 different brands?

jwe711 said:
What's the education behind the Pre-Flag Masters vs. the Flagged Masters Chalk...lead...mercury...???

I love hearing the opinions between this issue...
Click to expand...

OK but you may not love this opinion :)
It's just a silly superstition.

Tweeten themselves said it's the same, and explained why they changed it (due to 9/11).

If that's just a lie or rumor, and it's really due to lead poisoning caused by the dye, why would they decide to change the wrapper too? Why not just change the formula but keep the old wrapper? If you wanted to avoid scaring people, wouldn't you keep everything looking the exact same rather than make some big obvious change that will cause people to ask questions?

If the chalk feels different at all, it's because the shit's a decade old. And you don't need to scan it under a microscope to decide if it's better or not. Chalk's only real job is to prevent miscues. So it's easy to test... Have a pro hit a thousand balls with new Masters, in normal playing conditions. Count how many times he miscued. Then have him hit a thousand more with pre-flag Masters. Count how many times he miscued again. I bet you find no significant difference.
 
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