Thai\Chinese cues and ebony.

[narl]

If we are to believe the spiel it's perfectly easy to get a thai\chinese made cue with jet black ebony for under ?100. Cues like grand cues, tiger cues etc all make this claim. So how are they doing this? Is the ebony dyed, is it ebano, or is it some other material they're using that looks like ebony but actually isn't? I remember a while back someone made the claim that the "ebony" on some of these cues is actually Delrin which is a type of plastic\polymer.

I can see how it would be hard to tell without actually destroying a cue as ebony polished up has a feel that isn't dissimilar to a really smooth surface which delrin could easily replicate.

[trying]

Think I read a post on here that some were rosewood(? or another type of wood at least) which was stained black

[ADR147]

If we are to believe the spiel it's perfectly easy to get a thai\chinese made cue with jet black ebony for under ?100. Cues like grand cues, tiger cues etc all make this claim. So how are they doing this? Is the ebony dyed, is it ebano, or is it some other material they're using that looks like ebony but actually isn't? I remember a while back someone made the claim that the "ebony" on some of these cues is actually Delrin which is a type of plastic\polymer.

I can see how it would be hard to tell without actually destroying a cue as ebony polished up has a feel that isn't dissimilar to a really smooth surface which delrin could easily replicate.

They are not cheap in Thailand anymore - I bought about 30 when I was there last month and generally the were ?200 plus. Also there is not actually a thing called grand cues - it is a broker who sources cues from lots of different places and they come in very different levels of quality!