Rollin', Rollin', Rollin', Get Those Cuesticks Rollin'...
A bent cuestick ruins accuracy. Even with a house cue, players like to check the merchandise carefully by rolling the stick to make certain it's straight and true.
Difficulty: Easy
Time Required: 30 seconds
Here's How:
- Place the cuestick on a pool table, and shove it across the felt with your fingers, sending it rolling like a bowling ball. Shove it hard enough to send it from one side of the table to the other. Any wobbling, even the slightest deviation, from a smooth rotating motion, indicates that the cue has bent and bulges out at some point, and/or that its tip is a mushroomed one.
- Most people err by rolling the cue too slowly. A quick rolling motion is necessary to show a small bend as a "bounce". Roll the shaft, butt, and the whole assembled together, for a thorough check of a two-piece stick.
- A word of caution is needed. Many players deceive themselves, thinking their straight cue is bent, because they rolled it on a table that wasn't level itself! Roll your stick on the "best table in the house", and if there isn't such a table designated, try one used infrequently and likely to be level, such as a Snooker or Cushion Billiards table. Forget using the floor, tables are far more level.
- My preference for examining a cuestick for straightness is to hold it at its butt and place the tip on the floor, the stick held at around a 60-degree angle to the ground. I look down along the length of the cue and rotate it slowly around. Any cue warp will show as an obvious bump.
