Protection Ratings?

Here is something I wrote in response to a question at the Seybert’s forums.  Someone asked for a sort of rating for protection based on some criteria he established.  The question was asked several years ago and it was never really answered by anyone else.  So I took a shot at it.  Original thread is here http://www.seybertsbulletin.com/showthread.php?3700-Cue-Case-protection-quot-ratings-quot&p=42269#post42269

Originally Posted by Fenris 

Okay, I was just wondering about the protection a few brands of cue cases offered compared to each other. To make things easier for me, I will ask any responders to rate the cases on the following categories on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 = worst and 10 = best:

-Structural protection (against falls, being crushed, banged around, etc.)
-Environmental seal (water/moisture resistance/proofing, dust/sand shielding, etc.)
-Anti-theft (locks, closures, physical “armor”, etc.)

The brands I am thinking about are:

Instroke
Talisman
Jim Murnak
Whitten
Justis
On Q

If you know of other cue case brands that you feel offer good protection, feel free to add them in.

Thanks to any responders. And I know this is all subjective. 

Rating them based solely on your criteria and adding a few brands to the list here is my rating. Based on the fact that I have taken apart all of these cases. 10 is best and 1 is worst. The highest consideration is given to impact protection. And please consider that these cases are not crush proof like a Zero Haliburton – they provide the most resistance that they can using the materials that they do.

JB Cases – special tubing, extra padding, form fitted lids, sealed bottoms – 9 (because nothing is perfect)
Sterling Cases with JB Interiors – special tubing, extra padding, sealed bottom – 7
J.Flowers Tributes – (JB Case design) extra padding, sealed bottom – 7
GTF – reworked Fellini design by JB Cases – special tubing, extra padding, form fitting lids, sealed bottoms – 8
Instroke – Padded tubes, snug lid (I hope they are still snug) – 8
Talisman – unpadded tubes, loose lid – 4
Jim Murnak – unpadded thin tubes, rough liner, exposed metal, loose lid – 3
Whitten light – light model uses unpadded poster tubes, superior construction – 4
Whitten heavy – unpadded tubes – solid construction – 5
Justis – excess movement in the ProLight and Sport interiors, some padding, loose lid – 5
On Q – unpadded tubes, snug lid – 5

Please keep in mind that these ratings are objective based on inspection and dissection of the cases. But they are SUBJECTIVE based on the fact that I am a case maker with a vested interest in seeing my products at the top of the list. My thing is protection first so I naturally look at whatever the other guys are doing and try to be better than them. I think that we are BUT the fact of it is that all of these cases on the list are good products. Protection is simply layers like armor. If you are like me and prefer to toss your cue into the back seat and occasionally drop the case then you want more layers of protection between the cue and the rest of the world. If you are someone who is careful to handle the case so that it’s rarely knocked or bumped then certainly you can live with less layers of protection. The indisputable fact is that more padding is better than less padding. Around the net in every hobby or occupation outside of billiards wherever the best cases are discussed those cases are ALWAYS the most secure padded ones. In pool people tend to think of the outward appearance first and then make a judgement (assumption) that if the exterior looks good then the interior must be ok. This is unfortunately not true.

For whatever reason case makers often skimp on the interior because it’s a boring chore to make them, not nearly as exciting as doing the exteriors. And some case makers appear to have not studied the object they are protecting well enough. A pool cue is a precision instrument designed to focus energy into a small point. It is a collection of thin wooden parts held together by bolts and glue. It is not meant to be able to handle lateral stress, not meant to be bent or struck on the side. A cue appears to be fairly solid but in fact they are very fragile and it does not take much to induce stress cracks in any of the joints. Therefore when the cue is being transported it is advisable to limit movement as much as possible.

Therefore it is my opinion that padding in a cue case is essential to protecting the cue from bumps and stress while in transport. Other case makers do not share this view and they point to the fact that many people use their products with no harm to the cue. This is a very good point. My counterpoint is that this does not mean that the case is responsible for the fact that the cues have not been harmed and in any given situation the case with padding will protect more than the one without padding. I build cases for the day when the user is not careful and the day when something out of control happens.

So essentially there are two philosophies among case makers. One is the user-responsibility concept, that the user must be careful to adapt their behavior to the protection level of the case. And the second is the accident concept which supposes that things happen beyond the user’s control and the case should help to protect in those situations.

The major difference in both concepts is that both cases protect equally well when nothing is threatening. But the padded case protects better all the time. Assume for a moment that you have a simple situation with a dog in the house and you come home and set the case down leaning against the wall. Your dog joyously greets you and in the process sends the case clattering to the floor.

In this situation the unpadded case falls down and the cues inside hit the walls of the tubes violently or hit each other violently for a second or two before settling down. Maybe nothing happens to the cues at all. Then again maybe the violence created a tiny internal hairline crack that you can’t see but which over the next few weeks develops into an audible buzz.

If the case were padded then the chance that this occurs would be lessened to zero. In other words, just a little padding goes a LONG way towards keeping your cues safe from harm. After all no one wants to be without their cues, no one wants to play with cues that are buzzing or otherwise disturbing. The function of a cue case is to protect the cue and to me protecting against everyday life is very easy by using foam rubber and clever construction.

I have written a lot and I have also made a bet on AZB not to badmouth other case makers. So to be perfectly clear, I HIGHLY respect all the case makers on the list and I think each of them is building cases according to their honest opinion of what level of protection is sufficient. I happen to disagree with some of them but were I not a case maker then I feel that I would be happy with any of their products. I hope that no one takes this the wrong way and considers it badmouthing when I simply explain my position on padded protection vs. no padding.

Sincerely,

John Barton
Case Maker – representing JB Cases, Sterling Cases, Wave Cases, J.Flowers Tribute Cases and GTF Cases.

Update:  I didn’t really say anything about the latches but I should have.  Basically cases which use purse latches are going to have latch failure at some point.  The weight and motion dynamics of using a cue case put too much stress on a latch built for a purse.  Instroke has solved this by inventing the Diamond Latch which is strong enough for cases.  Murnak uses  purse latches.  OnQ’s latches are durable.  Talisman use a buckle system that works ok.  Whitten uses zippers which are high quality.  GTF uses a pressure fit for the whole lid and a spring latch that is durable but also easily replaceable should it break.  J.Flowers and Justis use line snaps which are ok as long as they hold up.  J.Flowers uses two for extra security while Justis uses one and sometimes two.  JB Cases typically uses a Puzzle Latch invented by myself which has either no moving parts with the magnetic version or one twist section with a strong rivet shank for the Puzzle Twist version.  Both versions are built with durability and strength.

There you go.

Jack Justis Leather Cases Comparison

I get asked all the time why I copied the Jack Justis cases with our J.Flowers Tribute series.  Well the answer is that I didn’t copy Justis I simply built a case to modern specifications for modern players’ needs with some of the tooling and coloring that was found on the original J.EF Q Cases.  It is actually Jack Justis who copied me and it’s George in respect to pocket lengths.

The tooling we use on the J.Flowers series cases is a common pattern that one finds in all types of leather work.  Nora Van Horn used it on the J.EF Q Cases (Flowers), Dennis Swift has used it extensively, lots of unknown cases have used it, the list is endless and Justis is one user among many to have used common tooling arrangements.

The fact is that while the general shape and lid style are like a Justis it’s not a copy of Justis but rather a convergence of features that happen to be the best practice for building cue cases.  In just about every category the J.Flowers Tribute case is a better case than Justis.  Even though it’s not a copy of any Justis case it is a big improvement over all Justis cases when one compares the features and benefits.

To give you an example and going by Jack Justis Cases’ price list found on his website,  this J.Flowers Tribute case would cost you $695 if it were a Justis.   Buy this case from a Sterling Dealer and you pay $375.

But that isn’t the end of the story with just a $320 savings.

When you buy a J.Flowers tribute case you also get the following things that Justis won’t even do if you beg him to:

1. You get the Ultra Pad interior.  This interior takes hours to make and features generous amounts of foam rubber and super soft fabric to hold your cues snugly and securely.  Pool cues are fragile and any extra movement should be avoided so that the many joints don’t develop hairline cracks and degrade the performance of the cue.  Justis interiors are loose fitting and allow the cues to slide around and bang against each other.

Each cavity in the J.Flowers case is secure from top to bottom with eva foam rubber at the bottom to further cushion the parts.  Justis puts NOTHING at the bottom, just raw wood and send out s note to tell his customers that they should NOT put their cues in pin down to avoid damage to the pin.  In a J.Flowers case you can literally throw your cue into the case pin down and have zero chance of damaging it.

2. You get a jump cue compartment on the lower pocket for the handle of a jump cue.  I created this space in 1996 on the Instroke cases.  Since then it has been copied extensively.  But not with Justis.  It’s more work than he cares to do so his customers have to sacrifice that feature in order to carry a Justis.  With us it’s standard and free.

3.  You get an L-Zipper set up (new in 2011) – this is a method of doing the zippers that allows the pocket to be opened on two sides at the same time which means easy access to the contents.  The zippers that Justis does are notoriously difficult to use and access the contents of the pockets.  We did do it that way at first and managed to make it a little easier than Justis’ method but the pockets were still a pain to get into.  In 2010 I developed the L-Zipper and began putting them on the custom cases and in 2011 they are being put into all the production J.Flowers series cases.  Once you try to use a Justis and then use one of ours the difference is clear and amazing.  In fact, there are items that you absolutely cannot carry in a Justis because the opening is too small but you can carry them with ease in our pockets.

4. You get a better fit and finish.  Jack Justis makes his cases so that the outer skin fits loosely to the interior body.  Basically it’s a bag holding a tube.  Our cases are made so that the skin and the interior fit snugly so that they become one unit.  We use better construction methods on every aspect of our cases from the rivets at the top to the nails in the leather.

5. You get decoration that is planned for the space and hand stamped.  Ok this one is not easy to compare.  Essentially Justis uses a roller embosser to do a lot of his stamping.  What this means is that the tooled designs are impressed into the leather by a machine as Justis cranks the wheel.  This is not a bad thing but it does mean less control over how the designs are done.  The end result is that sometimes the designs are simply cut off when you come to the end of the leather piece.  We carefully plot out where each  stamp is going to go and adjust the pattern to fit the space so that we attain balance and harmony throughout the piece.  Obviously this is a point that very few people would even notice but I think it’s important that people know that each and every stamp we do is hand placed and done with precision and human artistry rather than cranked through a machine.  But it is a bit unfair to apply this comparison to Jack Justis cases on a wholesale level because each Justis is somewhat different from the last in terms of the stamping designs.  So you can count this one as a half-bonus when you choose a J.Flowers tribute case over a Justis.

All in all you get a lot more case for a lot less money.  If we did copy Justis then the case would be even less expensive.  As it is we didn’t copy Justis Cases and you save quite a bit of your money and you get a better  case with daily insurance for your cue.  And protecting your cue better is our main goal anyway.

Want Something Custom Instead?

Sterling is a dealer of JB Custom Cases.  As a dealer they get their orders expedited because they have standing orders with us that can be switched out for a customer order.

So this season we were able to make a nice gift that Sterling’s customer wanted to give his dad.  The customer already owned a J.Flowers Tribute Case and he wanted something like that for his dad with the Memphis Tigers logo on it.  So we chose to do an iconic stamping pattern that Nora Van Horn often stamped on the J.EF (Flowers) cue cases.   So by ordering through Sterling the customer got the case in 3 weeks instead of 12 and his father has a custom made JB Case with some classic “Flowers” style tooling.

Go Tigers!

See the rest of this case here.  http://www.jbcases.com/gotigers.html

And remember,  just because you don’t see it on Sterling’s website doesn’t mean they can’t get it done for you.  As Sterling’s case maker I have set up our shop to be able to customize any case we make.  That includes all the vinyl cases, Wave cases, J.Flowers leather cases, etc….  If you have the time and are willing to spend a little extra then tell us what you want and we will try our best to make sure you get a case that is unique to you.

Here’s hoping that your holidays were great and that you slid into the New Year safely.

Winter – Wood – Your Cue

Winter is here and it’s league season.  Many folks take their cues to work because they have to go and play league after work.  So we often get questions about whether it’s safe to leave the cues in the cold car all day or not.

Let me tell you my personal experience.  All my life my playing cues have lived in the car.  It’s my experience that a good cue which has been properly made can withstand a lot of climate extremes without adverse affect.

I have seen cues which were left in hot trunks and cold trunks where the inlays were popping out and the cue was badly warped.  But none of this has ever happened to me.  So that’s my personal experience but you may want to follow a policy of better safe than sorry and bring your cues inside.  One thing is certain if you keep your cues at room temperature most of the time then they will always be ready to play.  I have had COLD cues in my hand and it’s not a good feeling.  So when you go in the pool room after having left your cues in the car all night then allow them a little time to warm up.

Now, what does Sterling do with their cases to help protect your cue against temperature swings?

Well, first of all we wrap the cues in a nice soft cloth which is a blend of cotton and synthetic fibers to give it a smooth non-abrasive feel and yet be strong.  That cloth is backed by foam rubber which is an insulator.  That is then inside a plastic tube which itself is an insulator to allow things inside it to warm or cool slowly as it inhibits the rapid transfer of heat.  Finally of course the outer covering provides another barrier to the environment.  If leather then it’s another natural insulator.

So if you must leave your cues in the car then at least if you own a Sterling case you can be confident that we are dong a little more to keep your cues in good shape.

Is it a “real” Flowers case?

You might have seen our J.Flowers Tribute cases.  If not then you can find them here, J.Flowers Cue Cases. And you might have thought who is this J.Flowers anyway?

In the early 80′s Jasper “Jay” Flowers introduced a new case to the billiard world.  Using plumbing tubes for the interior the exterior was covered with tooled leather.  The actual case maker was Nora Van Horn who owned a leather goods shop in Tampa, where Jay lived as well.  Legend has it that Nora Van Horn made the first case for Jay and he started marketing them.

The brand of the cases was J.EF Q Cases, which Nora would inscribe on each case and under that she would put her NVH maker’s mark.  According to Nora’s grandson who helped her during the summers and Nora’s son they would do about 20-30 cases a month.  As best we can tell this all went on until 1994 when Nora retired.

These cases inspired a lot of case makers like Jack Justis, Instroke, Dennis Swift and many others.  Plumbing tubes turned out to be just the right diameter for butts and shafts and one could fasten them together in any size and shape.  It seems though that most of the J.EF Q Cases were 2×4, 1×2 and some 3×6 models.

When I owned Instroke I was fortunate to meet Jay one year in Las Vegas at a show.  My booth was near the playing arena and an older gentleman came over during a break in play and started looking at the cases.  I gave him my pitch and he said that he used to make cases and that his name was Jay Flowers.  Well I was starstruck because to me Jay was the reason I started making cases.  It doesn’t mean much to other people but for me this was like meeting the Pope or something.  Anyway, we got to talking and he gave me his blessing to make a line of cases similar to those he used to make.  I took his number and promised to call him.

Unfortunately for personal reasons I never did call him and got out of case making the following year.  Then Jay passed away.  So in 2007, thanks to Sterling Gaming, I was able to start my own workshop and get back into case making.  In 2008 I decided to revisit the Flowers case project and so my tribute series was born.

What we did was to take the most basic tooling styles from the original J.EF Q Cases, simple tooling in a pattern that was fairly common and put that onto a modernized version.  Today’s cases need to be longer and people require larger pockets.  So I put a 15″ lower pocket with a jump compartment, an 8″ upper pocket, both at 1.25″ high.  The cases come standard with a side handle and a top handle and a shoulder strap.  For the interior I invented one we are calling the UltraPad which is without a doubt the most padding you will find in a cue case anywhere.

Instead of using plumbing tubes we are using one large tube made of a special polymer that resists impact and provides some insulation.  Inside that we divide the compartments with black soft fabric that resists moisture.  In essence you are polishing your cue each time you put it into this cue case.

I would like to think that we did Jay and Nora proud with these cases.  They had been mostly forgotten with only the people in my generation and above remembering the “Flowers” cases.  Now you know the real story about the duo that started it all for a bunch of us case makers today.  And when someone asks you if your new leather J.Flowers case is a real Flowers case then say “you bet it is.”

What’s the worst that can happen?

A long time ago in 1992 I was at my first trade show with my own booth.  I had rigged up this great demonstration where I duct taped an Instroke interior upside down with the open end facing the floor with bunjee cord to a big A-frame.  I would then put a cue in and pull that interior almost to the floor and let it go and it would shoot up and hit the iron bar with a big WHACK and then shoot out toward the crowd.

Then I’d hit the case with a baseball bat a few times.  And THEN after all that I would reach in with two fingers and gently pull the cue out.  It was a great demo.

Since then padded protection has been the cornerstone of my cases.  Now it’s no different.

So some folks ask me why it matters, what’s the worst that can happen they say?  It’s just a cue case.

Well, for me the worst that can happen is that the cue becomes unusable because it’s broken.  That can happen because it falls out of the case and strikes something.  It can happen inside the case if the case falls down and the cue hits the sides repeatedly.  It can happen if the case is crushed or impacted acutely enough to break the contents.

So getting back to that first show, I had a partner at the time who was something of a thug.  He was a bodybuilder/boxer and what we in pool would call a tush hog (bully).  So a guy walks up to the booth and my partner is giving him the pitch and the guy shows him a “hard” case that he just bought and says “this is as good as yours.”

So my partner asks to see it and then he takes it and BREAKS the case over his knee.  Then he pulls $100 out of his pocket and hands it to the guy and says, “I will give you another hundred if you can do that with our case.”

So the shocked customer bought one of ours.

I have plenty of similar stories where people’s cue were damaged in cases that they thought would protect the cues.

We try very hard to protect your cues from the not only the worst but also the incidental damage.

After all you play with the cue so it needs to be ready and in good condition when you need it.

Protection.

Hello Billiard Fans!

My name is John Barton and I am the guy who makes Sterling Cue Cases.  I have 20 years in the custom leather and vinyl cue case business.

My thing is protection first so a lot of what I write has to do with that.  In addition to working for Sterling I also have my own cue case business making high end leather cases, www.jbcases.com.

It’s through making true custom cases that me and my team can learn all sorts of new techniques that we then put into to the production case to make them better and better and still be affordable.

So with that in mind here is a little essay on what I think protection should be in cue cases.  If you agree with me then be sure to ask for it next time you are shopping for a case.

www.jbcases.com/protection.html

Now I won’t always be writing about cue cases and harping on protection – sometimes I will talk about things happening in the billiard world.  I work for Sterling Gaming and while we are proud to bring you these great cases we do a lot more in pool and I will talk about that from time to time.

So thanks for stopping by.  See you soon.