This invention relates generally to a cue tip usable at an end of a billiard cue stick, and, more particularly, to a cue tip formed of multi-durometer polyurethane materials.
Cue sticks are used by players for striking balls during the course of play of billiard table games, such as pool, carom, or snooker. A cue stick has a striking end and a gripping end. A cue stick may be one-piece or multi-piece. Commonly it may be a two-piece cue stick that is separable into two generally equal portions, the shaft and the butt. The shaft extends from the distal striking end, which is fitted with a ferrule carrying a cue tip, to a proximal joint collar. The butt extends from a distal joint pin to the bumper at the proximal end of the cue stick. To join the two portions to create the full-length cue stick, the joint pin and joint collar are engaged.
The distal tip of the cue stick, the cue tip, is used to strike the cue ball. Cue tips typically have the shape of a short cylinder with a flat proximal face for attaching to the ferrule and a convex distal face for impacting the ball. The cue tip typically has a diameter of 13 mm in size, though the size may vary from 8 mm to 14 mm. The energy from the strike is transferred from the cue tip to the cue ball, with the result being the desired accuracy, speed, and spin. Due to the importance of the cue tip in the striking of the cue ball, attention has been focused on the cue tip.
A variety of cue tips are offered to players. Cue tips are available in multiple styles, with a variety of curvatures, and with options in hardness. The hardness of the cue tip may be selected based on the player's style of play and preference and the purpose of the cue. For example, a player may select a different hardness when breaking the pool cue, when spin is desirable, when a hard strike is wanted, etc. Though some very hard pool cue tips, such as breaking cue tips, are formed from phenolic resin, most pool cue tips are made of layers of compressed leather. The level of hardness may be varied by the manufacturer by the amount of compression pressure that was used in compressing the layers of leather with more compression resulting in a harder cue tip.
Softer tips have some advantages. They provide more control and enhance the spin or “English” that can be created when the point of impact is not on the center of the cue ball. These advantages originate because the softer tip absorbs more of the strike impact causing the tip to stay on the cue ball for a slightly longer time.
However, softer tips also have disadvantages. The smooth convex shape of the distal surface will become misshaped or flattened more quickly due to the effect of the repeated ball impact on the softer material. And the softer tip will tend to “mushroom” or bulge out over the top edge of the ferrule. Thus, the tendency toward deformation makes it more difficult to maintain the softer tip than the harder tip.
A harder tip will generally last longer, hold its shape longer, and provide a more efficient hit by providing more speed to the cue ball for a given cue speed. A harder tip produces a more powerful strike, because hard tips do not absorb as much impact and do not stay on the cue ball as long as a softer tip would. Though harder tips play more consistently, last longer and require less maintenance, they create less spin and are more liable to miscue if the cue ball is not struck at the center point.
Currently, the hardness or softness of a cue tip is dependent upon the pressure applied to layers of leather during the manufacturing process, so there is no way to finetune the hardness or softness to meet the needs and preferences of players. Particularly professional players may desire customized cue tips for particular plays.
Accordingly, there is a need for a pool cue tip that can be manufactured to have a precise hardness (including hard, medium hard, medium, medium soft, and soft) characteristic, which allows the pool cue tip to meet the demands of players.
The discussion above is merely provided for general background information and is not intended to be used as an aid in determining the scope of the claimed subject matter.
The present invention is directed to a billiard cue tip having multiple polyurethane layered regions with adjacent regions having different hardnesses or durometers. The hardness of these regions can be easily varied and finetuned by the manufacturer to meet the preferences of players.
The cue tip includes at least three sections or layers, a proximal layer configured to attach to a ferrule of a cue stick, an intermediary layer, and a distal layer that impacts the cue ball during the strike. The proximal layer is substantially cylindrical with a flat proximal end that is typically adhesively attached to the flat distal surface of the ferrule. The outermost portion of the distal layer has a convex curve. The cue tip may include one or more intermediary layers disposed between the distal layer and the proximal layer.
Adjacent layers have different hardnesses or “durometers”. Commonly, the durometer of polymers and elastomers is measured on scales developed by Albert Ferdinand Shore. These scales are the “Shore durometer A” scale and “Shore durometer D” scale. Higher numbers on the Shore A scale and Shore D scale indicate a harder material that is more resistant to indentation. Lower numbers on the scales indicate a softer material that is less resistant to indentation. The A scale and D scale overlap, as shown in
In one aspect of the invention, the distal layer of the cue tip is formed of a material having a hardness that is less than the hardness of the proximal cylindrical layer of the cue tip, which forms a softer cue tip.
In another aspect of the invention, the distal layer of the cue tip is formed of a material having a hardness that is greater than the hardness of the proximal cylindrical layer of the cue tip, which forms a harder cue tip.
In further aspect of the invention, the cue tip comprises three layered regions of polyurethane material.
In an additional aspect of the invention, the cue tip comprises more than three layered polyurethane regions.
In a further aspect of the invention, all layered polyurethane regions except the distal region are cylindrical.
In another aspect of the invention, the multiple polyurethane regions comprise at least three layers, the distal layer has a hardness less than the hardness of the proximal layer and less than the hardness of the one or more intermediate layers.
In an additional aspect of the invention, one or more of the intermediary layers comprise polyurethane infused with another substance.
In a further aspect of the invention, one or more of the intermediary layers comprise compressed layers of leather.
In another aspect of the invention, the one or more intermediary layers comprise compressed layers of leather that are adhesively bonded to adjacent layers.
In another aspect of the invention, the distal layer, one or more intermediary layers, and the proximal layer are chemically bonded together.
The object of the invention is to provide a pool cue tip which gives an improved performance over the above described prior art pool cue tips and which allows the manufacturer to finetune the hardness of the cue tip to meet the preferences of players.
These and other objects, features, and advantages of the present invention will become more readily apparent from the attached drawings and from the detailed description of the preferred embodiments which follow.
The preferred embodiments of the invention will hereinafter be described in conjunction with the appended drawings, provided to illustrate and not to limit the invention, where like designations denote like elements.
Like reference numerals refer to like parts throughout the several views of the drawings.
Shown throughout the figures, the present invention is directed toward a multi-durometer pool cue tip formed of layers, at least some layers of which are formed of polyurethane materials having different hardnesses or durometers than adjacent layers. The polyurethane used has hardness values ranging from 60 Shore A to 80 Shore D. In one aspect, all-polyurethane multi-durometer pool cue tips are disclosed in which all layers are formed of polyurethane materials. In another aspect poly-infused multi-durometer pool cut tips are disclosed in which polyurethane is infused with another substance to form one or more layers. In a further aspect, hybrid multi-durometer pool cue tips are disclosed in which at least one layer is formed of compressed leather and is combined with multiple layers of polyurethane. The pool cue tip of the present invention provides a manufacturer the ability to finetune the design of the layers of materials to fashion a pool cue tip with customized characteristics to meet the needs of players having an array of playing styles and for use in a variety of playing situations.
Referring now to
The cue tip 10 comprises multiple sections or layers 40, which include at least a proximal layer 40A (the innermost layer), a distal layer 40N (the outermost layer), and one (penultimate proximal layer 40B) or more intermediary layers that are fixedly joined together during the manufacturing process. The proximal layer 40A is substantially cylindrical with a substantially flat bottom 39 that is configured to be attached to the substantially flat top 49 (
By varying the layer materials, the thicknesses of the various layers 40A, 40B, 40C, . . . 40N, the hardnesses of the layers 40A, 40B, 40C, . . . 40N, and the numbers of layers 40A, 40B, 40C, . . . 40N, great flexibility is provided to the manufacturer to produce a pool cue tip 10 with specific, defined qualities. Though both hard and soft cue tips are now available, the inventive cue tip 10 can be produced in a multitude of varieties and is not limited to merely hard and soft variations. For instance, a thin distal surface may be softer to enable the player to create spin, but the layer or layers below the distal surface may be harder to provide stability and reduce maintenance requirements.
An exemplary soft cue tip 10 comprising three layers 40A, 40B, 40N polyurethane, with each layer formed of a polyurethane material having a different durometer, is shown in the exterior view of
An exemplary medium/soft cue tip 10 comprising four layers 40A, 40B, 40C, 40N of polyurethane is shown in the exterior view of
An exemplary medium cue tip 10 comprising five layers 40A, 40B, 40C, 40D, 40N of polyurethane is shown in the exterior view of
The exterior view of
The exterior view of
Another exemplary hard cue tip 10 is shown in the exterior view of
An exemplary cue tip 10 that may be used for breaking or for jump shots is shown in the exterior view of
In
To form the cue tip, a first thermosetting polyurethane composition (for forming the first layer) is created by mixing an isocyanate compound with a polyol compound and a curing agent. Additives may also be included, such as catalysts, surfactants, accelerators, chain extenders, cross linkers, pigments or dyes, and fillers. Preferably, an open casting method is used, and this first liquid thermosetting polyurethane composition is poured into a mold (which may be a flat open-top tray up to several feet long by several feet wide) to form the first layer (40A or 40N) of the cue tip 10. The particular mixture will remain liquid and mobile for a period (the “filling time” or “pour time”) sufficiently long to transfer the mixture from the mixing reservoir into the bottom of the mold to create the first layer. After being received into the mold, the mixture begins to become creamy and begins to gel.
The mold containing the polyurethane mixture is then heated by being placed in an oven or on a heated table to speed polymerization and crosslinking within the polyurethane. After partially curing the first layer, a second layer is created in the same manner, by mixing and dispensing an isocyanate compound, polyol compound, and a curing agent onto the first layer. In one exemplary method, the second layer is dispensed onto the first layer immediately after the first layer beings to gel. In another exemplary method, the second layer is dispensed onto the first layer after the first layer has been partially cured. In both of these exemplary methods, the first layer is chemically bonded to the second layer through crosslinking and/or polymerization of the polyurethane compositions of adjacent layers.
Typically, a mixing method employing an isocyanate prepolymer may be used, which is known as a prepolymer method or a two-shot method because two separate mixing stages occur. A prepolymer is an intermediate stage product that offers operational convenience. An isocyanate prepolymer is created by pre-reacting an excess of isocyanate monomers with the polyol components. The polyol hydroxyl end groups are reacted with isocyanate groups leaving isocyanate functionality at the termini instead of hydroxyls; the prepolymer contains isocyanate-capped polyurethanes, isocyanate-capped versions of the original polyols, and residual unreacted monomeric isocyanate. The isocyanate-rich oligomer composition is much easier to handle on the factory floor than the original monomers (less prone to crystallization, lower volatility, etc.). Optionally, a phenol-formaldehyde resin formulation, a novola, may be used in the two-shot method in which an excess of phenol is reacted with the isocyanate.
The isocyanate prepolymer forms a first liquid stream and the curing agent along with additives forms a second liquid stream. The two streams are mixed by a mixing head and dispensed by the mixing/dispensing machinery into the mold to form the first layer, which is partially cured. Then, for each subsequent layer, the composition of the first or second streams is changed to achieve the new polyurethane composition of the desired durometer. The desired durometer for each polyurethane layer is achieved by judicious choice of structure and composition of the components (isocyanates, polyols, curing agent, additives) of the polyurethane composition and choice of appropriate reaction conditions. Then the mixing, dispensing, and partial or full curing is repeated until all layers have been mixed and poured into the mold. The layered polyurethane is then cured and demolded.
After curing and demolding of the flat layered sheet of polyurethane, the unrefined cue tips 10A are cut from the layered unit. Therefore, the upper surface 30A is not convex, but it is substantially flat, being formed from the top or bottom of the flat layered sheet of polyurethane. The cut and unrefined cue tip 10A is seen in
The cut and unrefined cue tip 10A may be sold as is, to be shaped by the end user or the technician that will affix the refined cue tip 10 to the ferrule. Or the unrefined cylinder of
The bottom surface 39 of the pool cue tip 10 may be slightly roughened for better adherence to the top surface 49 of the ferrule 11, if desired.
The cue tip 10 of the present invention is easier to maintain and less shaping is required than conventional cue tips. The composition of the layers prevents mushrooming. These advantages reduce the need for replacement of the cue tip, thus providing ecological benefits. Through carefully design and ordering of the layers, the cue tip 10 of the present invention can offer a customized experience with specific characteristics for particular type of shot or to enhance a player's style. Further, the inventive cue tip 10 provides a vegan alternative to the conventional compressed leather cue tips.
The invention illustratively disclosed herein suitably may be practiced in the absence of any element which is not specifically disclosed herein.
Since many modifications, variations, and changes in detail can be made to the described preferred embodiments of the invention, it is intended that all matters in the foregoing description and shown in the accompanying drawings be interpreted as illustrative and not in a limiting sense. Thus, the scope of the invention should be determined by the appended claims and their legal equivalents.
This nonprovisional application claims the benefit of co-pending U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 62/934,227, filed on Nov. 12, 2019, which is incorporated herein in its entirety.
Number | Date | Country | |
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62934227 | Nov 2019 | US |