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Custom cue? I do. The year was 1997, i was big into snooker and was always after a high quality cue, but at the time i wasn't into snooker magazines where i would have probably seen adverts for custom cue builders. The only one even vaguely local to me was around 40 miles away, an elderly guy by the name of Tommy Edwards in Coalisland, he ended up dying a few months before i got the cash together for a cue to be made. 
As fate would have it i was watching the (at the time) Dr Martens Premier Snooker League on Eurosport one night, the match was Jimmy White vs John Parrott, it was mentioned by one of the commentators at the time that Parrott had recently posted his cue down to a "Cue Doctor" in London by the name of John Parris, his cue got lost in the post and they had to put him together a new one in the space of a Month or thereabouts. So that got me on the phone to directory enquiries the next morning and i called and got a Brochure sent out.
At the time id no real idea about cue making, i seen the times for Special, Paragon and Ultimate and assumed they had the Wood prepared in advance and id have a cue in 2 weeks. Wasn't untill i was about to place the order and was speaking to John that i was told 8 to 10 weeks. Nowadays thats probably lightning fast but back then it seemed an eternity. I must have been on the phone to John about twice a week as there was a doubt that 17.5oz could be acheived with an ebony butt of that length but the slimmer butt diamater helped a lot in that regard and it came out pretty much bang on weight.
Can still rememebr the specs i ordered:
Special cue Ash Shaft
57 inches long
26/27 inch butt (joint at 19", 1 inch crossover, 6/7 inch splices, only spec im not 100% about)
27.65mm butt
10m tip
17.5oz
Silver barracuda aluminium case
About 8 weeks later here comes parcel force delivering a rather long cardboard box, ended up getting that off pretty sharpish and was gawking at my first hand made cue, i couldnt believe the finish on it, upto that point id been using an ebonised "Burroughes & Watts" Regal cue which id had to sand down to get the lacquer off the shaft. Went upto the club with it and was knocking in shots left and right, the feel and responsiveness of the cue was amazing, id never felt a cue so smooth before and could barely believe it was made of wood. The older players in the palce couldn't believe that the splices were actual wood and were of the opinion they were painted on, they were so used to really old cues with lifting splices they seemingly forgot what they should really feel like. Had about a year of fun out of it but came into a bad patch later on where id convinced myself i just couldnt get used to the cue, ended up sending it back and trying other cues before settling on an exclusive, then sold it on and stopped playing for years.
Was just the other day i was thinking about this as i was on the Parris website and came across a video which apparently was made around late 98/99 titled "cue production", at the end you see a cabinet containing cues and im almost certain my special cue is in the rack, its the really long butted cue thats head and shoulders above the rest. Ended up calling about it to see if it was possible to get it back but John said the video was well over 10 years old and its long gone by now, would love to have that cue back
As fate would have it i was watching the (at the time) Dr Martens Premier Snooker League on Eurosport one night, the match was Jimmy White vs John Parrott, it was mentioned by one of the commentators at the time that Parrott had recently posted his cue down to a "Cue Doctor" in London by the name of John Parris, his cue got lost in the post and they had to put him together a new one in the space of a Month or thereabouts. So that got me on the phone to directory enquiries the next morning and i called and got a Brochure sent out.
At the time id no real idea about cue making, i seen the times for Special, Paragon and Ultimate and assumed they had the Wood prepared in advance and id have a cue in 2 weeks. Wasn't untill i was about to place the order and was speaking to John that i was told 8 to 10 weeks. Nowadays thats probably lightning fast but back then it seemed an eternity. I must have been on the phone to John about twice a week as there was a doubt that 17.5oz could be acheived with an ebony butt of that length but the slimmer butt diamater helped a lot in that regard and it came out pretty much bang on weight.
Can still rememebr the specs i ordered:
Special cue Ash Shaft
57 inches long
26/27 inch butt (joint at 19", 1 inch crossover, 6/7 inch splices, only spec im not 100% about)
27.65mm butt
10m tip
17.5oz
Silver barracuda aluminium case
About 8 weeks later here comes parcel force delivering a rather long cardboard box, ended up getting that off pretty sharpish and was gawking at my first hand made cue, i couldnt believe the finish on it, upto that point id been using an ebonised "Burroughes & Watts" Regal cue which id had to sand down to get the lacquer off the shaft. Went upto the club with it and was knocking in shots left and right, the feel and responsiveness of the cue was amazing, id never felt a cue so smooth before and could barely believe it was made of wood. The older players in the palce couldn't believe that the splices were actual wood and were of the opinion they were painted on, they were so used to really old cues with lifting splices they seemingly forgot what they should really feel like. Had about a year of fun out of it but came into a bad patch later on where id convinced myself i just couldnt get used to the cue, ended up sending it back and trying other cues before settling on an exclusive, then sold it on and stopped playing for years.
Was just the other day i was thinking about this as i was on the Parris website and came across a video which apparently was made around late 98/99 titled "cue production", at the end you see a cabinet containing cues and im almost certain my special cue is in the rack, its the really long butted cue thats head and shoulders above the rest. Ended up calling about it to see if it was possible to get it back but John said the video was well over 10 years old and its long gone by now, would love to have that cue back
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