i'm often interested in what great players use as tips. last i knew bernie plays with a supersoft kamui brown, last i knew brumback plays a moori (maybe it’s a medium or slow)....maybe i'm wrong but don't think so....tend to remember stuff like that. louis demarco recently put cloth and rails on my table, said he was currently hitting with a G2 medium….think efren plays with a doctored up elk master (they get harder than whore’s heart over time)….
i was convinced by a very good player that i needed to play a softer tip…hit with it for a couple months this summer…on my way back from new orleans, called josh treadway (before i even hit the mississippi line), was in his shop the next day getting kamui brown hards put back on my shafts…..
i think it’s what is good for you and what you are used to…..what you are confident and can spin it with…..
as lll says....jmho
I think you are exactly right about playing with a tip that works for you and that you trust to shoot any shot with...
Old schoolers like Buddy Hall, James Christopher and myself always played with milk duds... They seemed to last forever because they got so hard yet would scuff up nicely and hold chalk very well. On the road, it wasn't easy to find a milk dud, or a person to put one on for you... So all of us carried a couple of spares...
Most common tips used back then were LePro, Elkmaster, and Triangle if memory serves me.. All the house cues had Elkmasters on them because they were cheap and easy to get... LePro was played by a lot of the top players, but they were, ( and still are ) so inconsistent in quality... Out of a box of 50, you might get about 5 that's wouldn't mushroom out of control...
Now there are 100's of tips to choose from, and most are made with very close tolerances in uniformity, so it's easier now to find a tip you really like and be able to buy a dozen more that are almost exactly the same...
I really like a tip that feels like a balata golf ball when struck pure, if you know what I mean... A tip that seems to have the ability to compress ever so slightly into the CB and hold on a fraction longer, thereby giving more feel to the stroke...
This Kamui soft feels good, and I'm going to have the super soft put on another shaft just to see how it hits... That won't be a true test, because the shafts aren't the same, one has a little more deflection than the other and aren't made by the same manufacturer, however it should give me a good idea of its playability...
Sounds made when striking a shot have always meant a lot to me... I can't stand a cue that clanks or makes any metallic type sound.. I like to hear a consistent and solid thump no matter what the speed or where the CB happens to be struck...
I'm not a cue maker, nor do I ever want to be, and I don't know what all goes into the different parts of a jointed cue stick that make it deliver that consistent thump, I just know that when I hit one or two shots with a cue, I either like it or I don't, instantly I know if it feels good, it's always been that way for me, I wonder how others judge a cue?
