Viking Shaft

:?: What is so special about a Viking shaft.

[Jim]

That’s a great question, and I hope you don’t mind if I integrate my response into another question a dealer asked me the other day; “What’s so special about a Viking cue?”. First of all, I don’t know that there’s anything “special” about a Viking cue. There are, of course, a number of features and benefits of a Viking cue that have contributed to it’s popularity, like how EVERY Viking cue comes standard with a “quick-release pin” for ease of use, and an interchangeable weightbolt system that allows the weight of your Viking cue to be adjusted to where you feel comfortable with it. Or that our weightbolts sit about 8 inches up from the bottom of the cue to eliminate that “butt-heavy” feel of a cue with the weight at the very bottom of the cue. But to sit down and describe why it is “special”, is like my asking you what is so special about the car you last bought? You can rattle off the list of features the salesman told you, or you read in the brochures, but the real reason you thought the car was “special” when you bought it, is in how it made you feel. I equate saying my cue has a “nice hit”, to saying my car has a “nice ride”. If you feel comfortable using the cue you use, then it’s the right cue for you. Like most things in life, having confidence in it, makes it successful. And what makes someone feel confident in his sporting goods equipment varies with each person. That’s why baseball dugouts have dozens of baseball bats, instead of just three bats all with the same “perfect” weight, length, girth, etc. That’s why great golfers don’t all use the same brand clubs.
Sure, there are some necessary basics to producing a quality cue stick that need to be adhered to. Shafts need to be turned down gradually, and allowed to sit between turnings, to relieve the stress on the grain. Therefore, every Viking cue shaft is turned on a lathe at least 9 times, with 2 – 2 ½ month intervals between each turning, until that shaft has been here a minimum of 18 months. Ferrules need to be durable enough to hold-up under terrific impact, and still produce a “good hit”. A couple years ago, after several years of experimenting with a variety of ferrule materials and designs, Viking developed a ferrule that NEVER cracks, and still delivers a “soft, controlled hit”. In fact, the “hit” of a Viking cue is the feature that seems to garner the most “kudos”. Inlays, and the cavities the inlays go into, need to be precision cut, so as different types of material (wood, plastics, metals, pearls, etc) all expand and contract at different rates in changing temperatures and humidities, the inlays don’t rise-up out of the cue. Viking Cue Mfg. uses CNC machining equipment that allows us to make the exactly desired cut each and every time, eliminating the glue-line that looks like the snake that swallowed the mouse. These are only some of the basics followed by many cue manufacturers (not most manufacturers, but many).
Once you’ve narrowed your choice of cue brand down to those at least doing the basics correctly, it comes down to personal preference. Some cue companies believe a hard hit is the best, so they produce cues with short, stiff tapers, and use only stainless steel joint collars. Other cue companies believe that a soft hit with easily-attained English is most important, so they produce cues with long, narrow tapers and non-metal joint collars.
Viking Cue Mfg. has no one style that we hold out in front of us that we claim to be the best. We really do believe that the best, most comfortable, most confidence-building cue for one person, is not necessarily the best cue for the next person. That’s why we don’t profess to know the best cue for you. We just make sure we extend to each player as many possible options as we can, at a reasonable price, so each person can get the cue the way they want it. That’s why we don’t just offer cues in 19-21 ounces, we offer them from 15-25 ounces, by ¼ ounce increments. That’s why we don’t limit your selection to 12 or 13 mm tips. We offer 9-15 mm tips, by ¼ mm increments. If you are tall, have long arms, and have problems with a normal length cue pulling out of your bridge sometimes, we offer cues up to 6 inches over or under-length. Whether you believe you want a 4-6 inch pro taper, a 12-14 inch pro taper, or a European taper, we do it for you. That’s also why we offer 6 different joint styles on any Viking cue. NOBODY KNOWS BETTER THAN YOU WHAT KIND OF CUE, ONCE IN YOUR HANDS, IS GOING TO MAKE YOU FEEL CONFIDENT IN YOUR PLAY.

What makes a Viking cue so “special”? You do! My Viking cue is “special” to me, because I got it the way I wanted it. Yours will be “special” to you when you get one the way you want it.

agree with everything you said jim. Though I would hope to see better quality of butt wood used. For example higher quality birds eye maple. Of coarce for very low end viking ,considering your price it may not be fair to ask for such but even for the higher end ones dont seem to look as nice. The figures just dont seem to pop out or have depth. Maybe some linseed oil and shellac would help. Why no curly maple available? Lastly is the design . Mcdermott and Lucasi's offer better looking ones , though playability wise they dont match up.


As far as Viking's playability, options, service they are tops . I Love my viking.

[Jim]

In a question posted just prior to yours, posted by “Lou” on August 16th, he mentioned how he had a custom cue maker make him a simple cue made from a wood called Goncalo Alves, the same wood Viking uses in their VM38, VM39, and VM40. He noted that a gorgeous piece of wood was used in his Goncola Alves cue by the custom cue maker, and wondered why our cues using that same wood had less eye appeal. Any wood products manufacturer has access to the same wood anyone else does. The question becomes “How much do you want to pay for it?” I would be very interested to know which other features the cue had, and how much the custom cue maker charged for that cue. I would tend to guess it was more than $140-160 range our VM38-VM40 retail for.
One needs to keep in mind that wood distributors aren’t dumb either. They know there’s more of a demand for the pieces of wood that have more striking grain. They know that any wood products manufacturer would sooner have wood with “knock-your-eyes-out” grain, whether they’re making a cue stick, a coffee table, or a gun stock. I suspect they have customers constantly asking them for some of that wood with the prettiest grain. I also suspect this is a problem they confronted many, many years ago, and very quickly realized they can charge more for the wood with the best grain. Most people are aware that if you call a lumberyard for some pine boards, you have the choice of three or four different grades of wood, from “knotty pine” to “clear” boards with no knots at all. The more desirable the piece of wood, the more it costs. Why would anyone not assume the same rules apply to other types of wood. Sure, Viking can buy the better- grained boards of Goncalo Alves, but that raises the cost of making that cue. If material costs increase, retail prices increase as well. Then we no longer have a cue that retails for $140. Lumberyards also know that raising the price of the “choice” pieces of wood just “a percent or two”, does little to deter demand for it, so they’d still have everyone asking for the nicer wood. They also know that only a small percent of all the Goncalo Alves they get in has that “choice” grain. Say for example, only 15% of the shipfull of wood they get in has “choice” grain. Then they need to raise the price of “choice” wood to the point where only 15% of their customers are willing to pay that price for the “choice” wood. Otherwise they’d have more requests for “choice wood” than they have supply. So, unfortunately, “a percent or two”, doesn’t cover it.
Then you have to keep in mind what Viking Cue Mfg. is trying to do when they produce a VM38-VM40. They are trying to produce a quality cue at as reasonable a price as they can. Remember, these are the least expensive cues we make. Yet, each has a quick-release pin” as standard equipment. Each has an interchangeable weightbolt system in case the customer later decides he wants his cue an ounce heavier or lighter. Each has a shaft that has been turned on a lathe 9 separate times, with 2 to 2 ½ month intervals between each turning, until that shaft has been here a minimum of 18 months. Each has a three-piece butt half to help ensure long-term straightness. Each uses the same high-quality Irish linen for its wrap that we use on the high-end cues. Each has a high-impact plastic buttcap. We believe that these are all essential elements of a quality cue. To make a one-piece butt half, or to not let the shafts age properly, or to remove all the excess wood from a shaft in three turnings rather than nine, or to use a nylon wrap instead of linen, or to eliminate either the “quick-release pin” or interchangeable weightbolt system, would each diminish the quality of the cue. To construct a Viking cue that has all these features, AND A GOOD HIT, that retails for $140-160, is no easy task. That’s why no other American-made cue offers all those features in a $140 cue. And the fact is, Viking is finding it tougher and tougher to do, and make any money it.
The bottom line; yes, the least expensive cues we make are bland in appearance. They’re meant to be an inexpensive, long lasting, high-quality, good-hitting cue. That’s all! If you want more esthetics, it costs more money. And we have those for you if that’s what you’d like.

In my post I did mention that it would not be fair to ask for highly figured or preety wood for low end vikings BUT FOR THE HIGH END Viking, the quality of the wood just dont seem to match the price . Also why no Curly maple available ? Does one need to have a custom made Viking (which you do offer right ?) to get one with Curly maple ?

Playability wise I commend your company as for both low end and high end Vikings are all well constructed and plays well.

[Jim]

I do thank you for your compliments in both your postings. It is nice to hear you comment specifically about Viking cues playing well, and being well constructed. Though we are always trying to improve the product in every respect, it is satisfying to know we’re at least accomplishing the “playability” and “quality construction” objectives. Put it this way; if we had to choose between producing a “drop-dead gorgeous” cue that had a horrible hit and quality issues, or a quality cue with a great hit but with appearance issues, we’ll take the latter every time. If I read your comments correctly, your concerns don’t lie with the designs. Providing 77 different models of cues, we hope everyone will find one or two that appeal to them, and having just finished our 6th record sales year in a row, it appears customers are indeed finding a design that agrees with them.
As for why you don’t see more “highly figured” pieces of wood in our catalog cues, I believe we’re back to what I was talking about in the last post. We can offer any degree of wood for an appropriate price. Yes, for an extra $75 you can let Seyberts know you would like a hand-selected piece of wood with “choice” grain, but we don’t want to promote that. Why? Because if a normal load of incoming wood is, let’s say, 15% “choice” grain, then we can obviously not endure requests for “choice” wood from more than 15% of our customers, or we won’t have enough “choice” wood to go around. Sure, we could then, in turn, purchase loads where 50% of the wood is “choice” wood. That load, of course, would cost us more. That, in turn, would raise the retail price of the cues because our load of wood costs more. We could, if we wanted, offer nothing but the fanciest of grain on all cues. That way all the cues would have extremely beautiful grain. That would raise the cost of all the wood, and all the cues. And there are companies that choose to produce cues like that. But that’s not who our market is. We don’t want an offering of nothing but top-of-the-line cues, all with top-of-the-line prices. That would put our products out of the price range of most of our customers. AGAIN, our objective is to offer a long-lasting, quality cue with a good hit, at a reasonable price. Every manufacturer has their own objectives. These are ours.
There are other factors too, that make the most sense to those who understand the practicality of production. Doing what we do, over and over, day after day, gets us good at what we do. It gets done economically and efficiently, by employees who’ve been doing their particular job day-in and day-out. When we have to pull one guy aside to make a special order cue from scratch (like making a cue from “choice” wood), it now takes that employee away from his normal job. Doing his normal job, he can produce products at a regular, consistent rate. When he gets pulled aside to work on a special order that has to be walked through the shop, his productivity level drops. So it’s no longer a matter of just extra material costs, it’s the cost of loss-production while he’s spending time on one special order cue. That’s precisely the reason most cue manufacturers don’t offer all the options we do. It’s very time consuming.
“Curly maple” is a different , even more elaborate grain than “choice” wood. Pieces of wood with “curly maple” are even less common than “choice” grain. So the same problems I mentioned with “choice” wood are even greater when asking about “curly maple”.
Besides, keep in mind the wood you see in our catalogs are “average” pieces of wood. No two pieces of wood look alike. Wood isn’t produced on an assembly line. It’s grown, and every piece is different. If we used nothing but the fanciest pieces in the photos, what would the customers say when not every cue comes out looking as fancy as the sample in the catalog? Sure, we could show catalog models using nothing but the fanciest of woods, and produce cues using nothing but the fanciest of woods, but then we’re back to the same problem of having rising material costs and rising retail prices, and we’re not interested in producing only high-end cues at high-end prices. Every manufacturer has its own “target market” (remember “Marketing 101” from school?). We have ours. Others have theirs. To cater only to “high-end” cue buyers, is not our objective. AGAIN, we aim to provide a high-quality, good-hitting cue at as reasonable a price as we can. Yes, we can make you that cue with the “fanciest of woods”, but it’ll cost you.

[Jim]

P.S.: I found some info on the Internet that illustrates just how highly valued pieces of “choice wood” really are. Try a website entitled: www.curlywoods.com They apparently specialize in nothing but pieces of finely figured wood. They have pieces that are selling for $40-60 per board foot. Also go to “Google” on the web, enter “Curly Maple” and enter the second listing. Another good one can also be found via “Google”; “curly koa”. Curly koa is apparently an Hawaiian wood with some beautiful grain. They show pictures of pieces already cut for making guitars out of, and they sell the set of boards for $120-350. And that’s just for the boards, and realizing they’re for guitars, the boards are probably only 1/8-1/4 inches thick. For cues we have to start with 1 ½ -2 inch thick boards. Each of these sites show some gorgeous pieces of wood and wood products. Well worth taking the time to check out.