Frequently Asked Questions

Cue Creator® cues are custom made cues in most instances, with some that we carry in stock. The pricing on the cues is based on the high-quality shaft materials with the main shafts being North American ash and Maple are 100% American Made.

Pricing then varies depending on the woods used and splicing picked depending on your order.

Cue Creator® does outsource the joints, adjustable extensions and cases to others, but we also bring them back to the factory and each case and cue is inspected by the CEO in Sydney, Australia before being dispatched. We use a very well-designed brass joint with less side to side movement and a fiber ring between the brass and wood which helps reduce movement between the brass and wood seen on many other cues. For adjustable extensions we use Blue Moon which is the same as many other leading cue makers.

Ash is the most common and from the professional base of players 95% are using Ash. The reasons are a few from strength in the wood with power used to the sighting aids using the chevrons. For maple it has a different feel around in break building but has more shaft movement when power is needed.

Length of cue should be measured by having a 12-inch (30.48cm) bridge length from the hand and the tip almost touching the white. With your cueing arm you should find the correct position where your arm is at 90 degrees and you should have 1 inch (2.54cm) of cue behind that.

This helps the cue to be made in the correct length and achieve a good balance point. The balance point is when you put your cue under the cue to find that measurement and most will be from 16.5 inches (41.91cm) to 18 inches (45.72cm) from the butt end is a good guide on when measuring your cue.

Credit: thesnookergym.com/

Butt diameter on most mass-produced cues is 29.5mm and seen on a majority made today. The pro players although are changing that trend as we’ve seen them using down to 28.5 and most picking 29mm. The belief is with a smaller butt size the grip remains loser and a loser grip allows more cue ball control. When the cue grip is to tight it makes the cue respond poorly with side applied and various other shots so ask your coach or another top player about grip pressures.

One-piece cues to three quarter don’t have a lot of difference although there are some construction methods that we would say the One Piece is superior.

The standard one-piece cue is made using a 48-inch (121.92cm) shaft for a 60-inch (152.4cm) cue and then splicing on the butt wood. We do have a Pro Version one piece that uses the shaft wood from butt to tip. In this case the feel and balance of the cue feels much better than anything around. This is of course a more expensive way to make the cue as the best in ash or maple needs to be selected.

For a standard one piece to three quarter we don’t believe there’s a difference at all and it all depends then on the size of the case your happy to carry. We make a joint engineered by Cue Creator® in the USA that has mush less side to side movement and helps in the feel of the cue. In these standards made cues there’s no difference at all in playability.

The same can’t be said for two-piece cues. The two-piece cues is more common in American Pool but seen in some snooker cues. These are more convenient to carry around but the playability due to balance and cue weight makes it not a good playing cue for snooker over both three quarter and one-piece cues.

At Cue Creator® we only offer hand spliced cues. Hand spliced cues have a rounded point where a machine spliced cue has a sharp point. For all the best quality cues and what professional players use it’s hand spliced.

Ash or Maple is used on the shaft and hand planed down with various woods such as Ebony, Macassar or Rosewood glue onto these areas. The woods are then glued, and other decorative woods are used depending on the design picked by you our client.

Cue Makers have certain blends they use by mixing various oils but the main is linseed oil on the shaft and a wax used on the butt. The shaft also needs to be maintained over time and re oiled as the moisture content needs to stay between 4-8% so that the ash or maple doesn’t start moving.

We would recommend checking your cue every 6 months for the look and feel of the wood and keep it up the maintenance.

We do have a store located as per our contact us section and keep some cues in stock for immediate sales. The cues we normally carry range from 56.5 inches (143.51cm) to 60 inches (152.4cm) but as they sell will be reordered but to specifications that we pick. You’ll see on our website we have a range of cues for sale in the shop area.

For custom made cues to your specification ordered they have a lead time of 22 weeks for standard ranges and 22 weeks for the Pro Version one-piece cues.

These times are way below the industry standard which you’ll see if checking other manufacturers.

Cues will be sent in a tube if a case is not picked in the configuration area. We have an option with pricing at cost or below on the case to help protect when being sent. Otherwise without case we’ll bubble wrap and put it in a tube.

The common method people use is rolling a cue on the table, but this is not the correct way to check a snooker cue. If the cue was a straight taper it would also be whippy or lack strength in certain areas. Along our cues we have sections that are thicker, and you’ll find most good cues have this as well to help in the overall strength of the cue.

The only way to check a cue is like a gun barrel when sighting and look along the cue with one eye shut.

Using 000 steel wool is a necessary thing to keep in your cue case. With the ferrule try to only use wet and dry 1200 paper or better still steel wool. Keeping the cue joint is a must as when it has oil or grease build up and can sound like the ferrule or joint is lose.

Keeping these things clean as well as maintaining enough oil and wax on your cue will make it last for many years’ time.

Cue Creator® allows you to custom build your cue and control every aspect of the wood, veneers and finishes. The cue is built to the specifications that you have chosen.

During the development of this website we have sourced the highest quality products and woods that are available. Combine this with the best computer software and the latest engineering technology and we have what we believe is the future, for billiard cue manufacturing.

We do of course use handmade splicing on all our Snooker / English cues in this range, finishing the cues. The result is a cue that is custom made to your choices and configuration and without doubt, one of the best cues available in the world!

All USA Pool Cues are made using the latest in CNC machining and innovative new methods from McDermott Cues.

So please enjoy Creating your next cue. It will no doubt be constructed from the best materials, using the latest technology and designed exactly how you personally chose to do so.
This isn’t our only website for cue sports as we have others under : worldcuesports.com.au , sharpsnooker.com.au. As you can see we have great knowledge in Cue Sports and have been involved with it for over 25 years and helped various companies with cue development in the UK, Japan and USA.

Our players will grow as time goes by and we have several players who we are making cues for currently. We may add new players below in the future.

We’ll be on the lookout for players in other cue sports like Chinese Pool and Carom and then increasing our Snooker players over time.

Stan Moody

Alfie Lee

Yousra Matine

Mirjana Grujicic

For Cue care, there’s some basic rules on what to do so let’s go over those firstly:

1. Don’t leave your cue in a hot place like a car due to that the timber will warp. That also applies to extreme cold as well
2. Check that the joints are clean as well as a good ferrule as they can both create noises in the cue
3. Burnish the side of your tip and keep it in good order and check a few weeks before an event that it’s going to be in good order before it and you have got used to it.
4. Check a cue requires sighting down like a gun barrel this way you can see more than any other method. A common belief is to roll it on a table but that’s not as accurate as sighting along the cue. As there’s a flat spot depending on the balance point this can make a shaft lift in most cases.

Storing your cue

Our belief is that once you have arrived home if you want your cue to stay straighter for a longer time is to use a rubber hanger. This helps the shaft weigh being pulled on and we’ve found this method is far better than anything else around.

Cue Cases in some cases don’t hold the cue that well and if they are either hot or cold contain moisture in the case.

Cue hanger for billiards

Oiling your Cue

All cues over time need oiling as it helps keep a certain amount of moisture in a cue. A common amount is around 8-10% so if you have a digital moisture gauge you can check you cue.

We’ve found as you will have that there’s many different oils around and many cue companies make their own blends. The oil we use is called Liberon finishing oil but you can also use boiled linseed oil or linseed oil. We found standard linseed oil can become sticky in certain countries depending on the humidity.

Cues should be sanded down first with a 240 grit at most but I would recommend a 400-600 wet and dry sandpaper. Between coats of oil use 000 Steel wool.

Oiling a cue properly can take 2-3 days and applying coats until the cue becomes tacky and isn’t drying.

At that time you need to then rub it back with a cloth until all the tackiness is gone and your cue will be ok for 12 months or longer.

A cue that hasn’t been oiled in ash will show visible signs of the grain opening.

Cue oil finishes and shaft care

There are so many tips now on the market but the two types are either a pressed tip or a laminated tip. Both require different tools and care for.

Some basics are all the same, like running in a tip. Once you’ve installed the tip and trimmed to the edges etc and shaped it you need to do the following if you want it to bed in evenly.

If you hold your cue the same way when playing screw shots or topspin you’ll end up flattening out one spot and then like most do re shape it and it collapses again. The correct method is to roughly shape the tip and then hold your normal way playing some stuns and screws. You then keep rotating the butt around playing the same shots and rotate again.

This method helps the whole tip bed in and condense the leather. Once this has been done for an hour of play you can then shape your tip and you’ll notice it doesn’t collapse at all.

For all the Cue Sports games played there are different weight, tips used and sizes of ferrules etc.

All the below Cue Sport games use various size balls and you should thoroughly investigate the needs of the game and try different cues before deciding on a cue specification.

1. Snooker players use a 28.5mm butt to 30.5 and a ferrule between 9.3 to 9.8mm (Many Pro players now using 28.5 – 29mm)
2. For English Pool the cues are 8mm – 9mm in tip size (most pro players closer to 9mm)
3. For USA Pool the butt sizes are 32mm-33mm and ferrules between 11.5 to 13mm
4. For Carom the cues are shorter 56 inches (142.24cm) and 12mm – 13mm
5. Chinese Pool the cues are normally a Snooker type of cue with a pool ferrule and 11.5-12.75

Cue Creator offers shafts made from North American ash and Maple.

Cue Creator® Ash Shafts – Snooker / English Pool

The Ash we use is North American Ash and it’s hand selected for the straight grain and evenly spaced arrow shaped grain. Selection of the ash is made at lumber yards and we hand select the pieces we want.

Many timber yards make you purchase a pack of 144 pieces, but we have a good relationship with our vendor and hand select all of the timber used in our cues.

After selection in then naturally dries for over 1 year before being hand spliced into our cues and then rested in our factory in the USA at 8% humidity levels. This also helps it stabilize to be at the same levels as our other timbers used and helps the machining processes.

All shafts are checked for straightness between each craftsmanship process and then rested to cure naturally in our climate-controlled factory.

Cue Creator® Maple Shafts – Snooker / English Pool

Our Maple comes also from North America and is selected on the pattern that can be seen. We keep away from timber that has any blemishes that can be seen or tree knots. Maple shafts are great around the pack in snooker and English pool with the natural movement of the timber. With longer shot with power or side over a distance a maple shaft will move the cue ball more off line. Playing shots with reverse side and you’ll find a maple shaft will come inside the line of a ash shaft so it can create more angles and give more positional shots over a short distance.

All shafts are checked for straightness between each turn and then rested to cure naturally in our climate-controlled factory.

Kamui Black Soft Tip

• High-porosity allows chalk adhesion
• High-elasticity increases grip; reducing miscues
• Excellent balance between ball control and spin

Kamui Black Super Soft Tip

• Highest elasticity of the Black tips
• Maximum contact time between the cue ball and tip
• Generates more spin with a lower stroke speed

No goods will be sent until payment in full have been cleared. Shipping for your order will be calculated at the time of checkout.

All shipping addresses must have complete contact details that can be verified by a phone number. Delivery to work or non-residential addresses must be accompanied by full verifiable details such as company name, address, phone number and contact name.

The customer is responsible to be available for delivery and to sign and accept the goods. Any redelivery attempts may cost extra and may be passed on to customer if delivery address is unattended. Redirection of your delivery is available at an extra cost and must be first authorised through Cue Creator®.

1. The customer is responsible for all extra freight charges, which include redelivery, redirection, refused shipments and wrongly given delivery details.
2. Customers can track their order using the consignment numbers given in your email confirmation and delivery status can be tracked by the courier’s website.
3. All returns must be accompanied by a copy of original invoice. (Non Custom Made Only)
4. Returns be reported within 14 days of purchase and returned within 21 days of purchase. (Non-Custom Made) Custom made cues are not refundable.
5. Manufacturing defects is the only thing that we will look at to exchange although we have strict guide lines.
6. Taxes and Duties are due by the client in their country and not part of the cue price or general freight.

Shipping of faulty items will be covered by our business after being returned by the client and refunded once we inspect the goods. Upon arrival of the item will be inspected and the client contacted.

All products returned must include all components of the original delivery and with 21 days of purchase in an unused condition only. Any product returned without the full complement of parts that was originally supplied with, will not be fully refunded.

The return must be in new condition and not used and no returns will be accepted on made the specification cues or goods ordered in especially from overseas to complete the order.

A new Product would be manufactured should there be an issue of a manufacturing fault that could not be repaired.

For international shipping, there are fees associated within most countries. The prices quote on our site don’t include duties or taxes into your own country. These taxes can be checked on the below links or by contacting your countries government and enquiring. We ship our cues from Australia.

Import Duties and Tax Calculators can be found on the internet. (product Description is Billiards cue)

Please contact us for more information on duties if you have any concerns and we can help in looking at way to help reducing the fee’s and hassles involved in some cases.

With this we can in some cases look and what’s the costs are and forward an email for payments from our freight provider. This reduces the amount of forms and freight forwarding companies.

You’ll need to copy these links and open in your own browser to get them to work. Use Billiard Cues for the description.

The calculator only works a certain amount of times, and as many people have opened this you’ll need to copy the link and open on your own computer.

www.freightos.com, www.importcalculator.com