As long as the tip has some curvature; small tip 11.75, or 12mm helps, but most important is follow through, and loose grip, the longer the follow through the more spin, especially for long shots. Make sure you allow for cue deflection on fast shots, as well as swerve on low speed shots, watch cue elevation..
Too much English, Which tip shape to help?
- Thread starter asbani
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As long as the tip has some curvature; small tip 11.75, or 12mm helps, but most important is follow through, and loose grip, the longer the follow through the more spin, especially for long shots. Make sure you allow for cue deflection on fast shots, as well as swerve on low speed shots, watch cue elevation..
"We're work'n on the mysteries without any clues. We're work'n on the night moves".
Thanks god usualy the *right answers* can be soooooo short
Hope you re doing good Randy, have a good time.
lg
Ingo
VERY GOOD advice! A Rep worth (not able atm
). There are so amazing many players who are not able to play 3 shots in a row without *leaving the vertical zone* on the CB.
Even advanced players still have often problems to handle the vertical line- by far the most important thing if it s about cueball-control, timing and correct alignment.
But usualy i think i m talking with walls-- they all know already everything, and they don t want to work on such things- and in my opinion just because they KNOW HOW HARD that can be!
@ the most guys who answered in this thread- Perhaps read Mr. Goettlicher s Posting again- and then rethink your responses. His response was the only necessary answere til now. To talk about shape etc is try and error for everyone, just personal preference.
lg from overseas,
Ingo
JC
Coos Cues
This reminds me. Johnny Archer showed us how his tip is shaped and more importantly why during his clinic recently. That one thing alone I believe was worth the entire price of admission. My eyes were opened big time. Miscuing has almost vanished and I'm drawing futher and more consistently than I ever have before in my life. It turns out the shape of my tip was my bottle neck to improve these skills and I didn't even realize it. Same cue, same tip different shape. It doesn't use any coin profile making the nickle-dime argument moot. Thanks JA!!
Here's a drawing I've posted before on this topic. It shows four tips touching the cue ball at 30 degrees offset from center (about halfway from center to edge), which is about where the miscue limit is no matter what the size or shape of your tip.
There are two shaft diameters shown: top = 12.75mm; bottom = 10mm.
There are two tip shapes shown: left = nickel radius; right = dime radius.
As you can see, the larger diameter shaft (at top) contacts the cue ball farther from its edge at the miscue limit, and there's room at the edge of the tip to spare with either tip shape. This is because a 60-degree arc (30 degrees in each direction) on a nickel or dime radius is smaller than 12.75mm wide.
The smaller diameter shaft (at bottom) still has a small amount of room at the edge of the tip with the dime shape, but is right on the edge with the nickel shape. This is because a 60-degree arc (30 degrees in each direction) on a nickel radius is just about 10mm wide and on a dime radius it's just a little less than 10mm wide.
Conclusions:
- Nickel or dime radius only makes a difference on very small diameter tips.
- On very small tips it's better to have a dime radius than a nickel radius.
pj
chgo
There are two shaft diameters shown: top = 12.75mm; bottom = 10mm.
There are two tip shapes shown: left = nickel radius; right = dime radius.
As you can see, the larger diameter shaft (at top) contacts the cue ball farther from its edge at the miscue limit, and there's room at the edge of the tip to spare with either tip shape. This is because a 60-degree arc (30 degrees in each direction) on a nickel or dime radius is smaller than 12.75mm wide.
The smaller diameter shaft (at bottom) still has a small amount of room at the edge of the tip with the dime shape, but is right on the edge with the nickel shape. This is because a 60-degree arc (30 degrees in each direction) on a nickel radius is just about 10mm wide and on a dime radius it's just a little less than 10mm wide.
Conclusions:
- Nickel or dime radius only makes a difference on very small diameter tips.
- On very small tips it's better to have a dime radius than a nickel radius.
pj
chgo
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JC
Coos Cues
Nice drawing. Can you see how the flattening of the contact area makes for a larger contact surface at the miscue limit? It's not that much but it makes a big difference since a round to round contact renders the smallest contact area possible between the two objects. Flattening that contact area expands the grip a ton if you look at it as a percentage of friction. Since the tip compresses slightly on a firm hit you expand your contact a great deal with a flat surface at the point of your tip which contacts the ball at miscue limit. Try it, you will be amazed at how much difference that subtle shape change makes. Forget about nickle and dime.
JC
Wouldn't a smaller tip diameter allow you to impart more spin on the cue ball? For example, if you used max spin with both a 13mm tip and a 12mm tip, wouldn't the 12mm tip give you more side spin?
No. In fact, I see a problem - a flat tip surface can only contact the ball's surface at one place: where the ball's surface is at the same angle as the tip's surface. So, for instance, in order for the tip's flat surface to contact the ball's surface at the miscue limit, the tip's surface must be angled at 30 degrees - but then at any offset less than 30 degrees the tip will make contact on the "transition edge" where the flat surface changes angles or somewhere else.
The reason we use rounded tips is so there's a matching tip surface angle for all ball surface angles (up to ~30 degrees).
pj
chgo
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Nope. You can only hit the cue ball about 30 degrees offcenter no matter what size tip you use - this is the cue ball's miscue limit. You can hit 30 degrees offcenter with a large or a small tip (see my drawing above), so neither one allows you to "get more" sidespin.
In fact, you could theoretically hit farther offcenter with a larger tip (because it covers more arc for the same curvature), but anything over ~30 degrees is impossible anyway.
pj
chgo
flattened tips
Noticed the same thing with a lot of guys in New Town, in fact, Lee Heuwagon was miscuing and he went the to the Cue Repair Guy, and he said with layered tips your tip should be more flat than curved for better performance. I took the time to look at Shane's tip, and other well known players and saw this trend.
Noticed the same thing with a lot of guys in New Town, in fact, Lee Heuwagon was miscuing and he went the to the Cue Repair Guy, and he said with layered tips your tip should be more flat than curved for better performance. I took the time to look at Shane's tip, and other well known players and saw this trend.
JC
Coos Cues
All I can say is try it. It takes about 2 minutes to reshape your tip like this. JA believes this because it works. He didn't go out of his way to tell us this. It was in response to him helping one of our guys to draw better and the subject of tip shape came up.
I have never been able to draw the cue ball back to it's starting spot from six diamonds away with accuracy before I reshaped my tip like this. I can now do it with confidence. It's the same result, soft or hard tip. I have cues with both types.
JC
This is not a direct answer but might help with miscuing:
- Speed matters a lot when miscuing. Hitting hard with extreme draw is more likely to miscue than a soft hit. Think of it this way... when you hit at the very edge of the ball, you're not hitting the main mass of the ball, just a little sliver at the bottom of it. The ball won't depart from your tip as quickly as it would if you were hitting the central mass.
So what happens is this (I believe... maybe dr. dave has video to confirm): it doesn't run away from the incoming tip very fast, and the incoming tip actually strikes it twice. The ball doesn't have time to get out of the way of the tip. So you get a double hit and on the second hit, the part that's hitting the ball is the edge of the tip or even the ferrule. Then you get that awkward silence when everyone hears that noise you just made.
Bottom line is, if you are using extreme draw or sidespin, don't hit hard... let the spin do the work. In fact, for draw specifically, it was found that on long shots, hitting a little higher than the 'miscue limit' will actually get you better draw than hitting as low as humanly possible. If you find yourself tempted to use wild extreme draw, instead consider using normal draw that's nowhere near a miscue, and just hitting a bit harder.
For sidespin, super extreme sidespin should be done softly anyway because then it will get maximum 'take' off the rail. Hitting hard with extreme sidespin usually works against you.
- Speed matters a lot when miscuing. Hitting hard with extreme draw is more likely to miscue than a soft hit. Think of it this way... when you hit at the very edge of the ball, you're not hitting the main mass of the ball, just a little sliver at the bottom of it. The ball won't depart from your tip as quickly as it would if you were hitting the central mass.
So what happens is this (I believe... maybe dr. dave has video to confirm): it doesn't run away from the incoming tip very fast, and the incoming tip actually strikes it twice. The ball doesn't have time to get out of the way of the tip. So you get a double hit and on the second hit, the part that's hitting the ball is the edge of the tip or even the ferrule. Then you get that awkward silence when everyone hears that noise you just made.
Bottom line is, if you are using extreme draw or sidespin, don't hit hard... let the spin do the work. In fact, for draw specifically, it was found that on long shots, hitting a little higher than the 'miscue limit' will actually get you better draw than hitting as low as humanly possible. If you find yourself tempted to use wild extreme draw, instead consider using normal draw that's nowhere near a miscue, and just hitting a bit harder.
For sidespin, super extreme sidespin should be done softly anyway because then it will get maximum 'take' off the rail. Hitting hard with extreme sidespin usually works against you.
