We have a another new local site we are supplying  a Brand New 7ft  coin operated Supreme winner installed this Saturday .

I was called out to try and rectify a warped slate on a table which was heavily packed underneath the slate with Beer mats by the previous fitter in an attempt to level it ., and after explaining the cost of S/H and new tables my client became interested in Renting a Brand New table as their current table was over 10 years old and showing it’s age .

a typical bodge is to pack under slate with beer mats , I have a much better way of rectifying dipped slates .
We went through what a second hand one would cost or a Brand New one , then I explained about our Rental offers which include two re-covers a year at Winter and summer league starts  and new set of balls and cues and chalk every year .
They will now pay  a rental of £18.50p or £80 per month and every bit of maintenance is included including a re-cover every 6 months in better quality Strachan 6811 cloth .
They where paying £400 a year for two re-covers from the other firm and still playing on table that was showing it’s age at over 10 years old .
the pool team had started to moan about the table .
The Rental Supreme Winner in Black pearl table would be brand new latest edition  , I also explained that after taking into account what he was paying another firm for his table to be recovered twice a year in Club cloth , We would re-cover in a better quality Strachan 6811 tournament cloth  and a new set of balls and full maintenance of coin operation , nothing to pay extra after taking into account putting it against their tax bill as an expense to the business and the tax relief it was easy to see the deal suited them .
I suggested they advertise their table which had only just been re-covered , Which I believe they sold very quickly , and have now arranged for the New table to be installed this Saturday .

Two of our Rental supreme winners in Black pearl  tables that where installed at a local Stapleford pub .

there are a few differences from an old table that have been improved upon on the latest models , for example the slotted new ball rails means less of jump back out of pocket falls that you used to get with the old ball rails .

an older type ball rail of the Supreme winner , it is possible to have new rails fitted to old tables though .

also the latest editions have solid cast metal chrome corners , you can tell the difference from the older plastic chrome corners this metal one has raised lettering .
and thinner slimmer alloy trim behind the cushions .

The older plastic ones eventually lose the chrome plating and you can see the Supreme writing is sunken into the plastic and has no raised letters .
you may notice that the old ones can sometimes have black plastic trims just behind the cushions which break easy and the table always looks a mess , the later ones have alloy trims .
My client was very lucky that I had a spare Brand new one in stock , there is a 6 to 8 week waiting time for new tables to come out of the Factory , my next batch are due in on 31st of August .
I buy my Supreme winner 7ft coin op tables in pairs and they normally get installed within a few weeks of coming into stock as rental tables .
we are expanding our local sites as we go along steady and slowly increasing our superb two re-cover rental solution to pub landlords .
the word is getting out around the local pubs and clubs and we have new clients monthly inquiring about our pool table rental terms .
At GCL billiards we are a Maintenance company for Full size snooker table / American Pool tables / and UK pool tables .
I am aiming to set a limit on the amount of Rental tables we can operate along side our Cue sports table repair business .

We are slowly getting towards just over half way to our target of 40 local tables out on rental contracts .
May I point point out we are fully cue sports maintenance only table fitters , and do not operate gaming machines or football tables , therefore you have our 100% concentration on maintaining your Pool table and not sidelined to repair other types of amusement machines .
You have to ask yourself when looking for a pool table rental company , Would you want a one arm bandit mechanic to work on your pool or snooker table or a fully qualified time served Billiards fitter with over 40 years experience maintain it ?

our standards are that much better than the one arm Bandit fitter .

now and again I get small tables to re-cover , not my favorite type of tables to re-cover
but you take the rough with the smooth and pull one in n ow and again .
I would much prefer to work on sectional slate bed tables above 8ft size than tables of 5ft /6ft and 7ft type and even some 8fts made the same way .
So this table I took on and found a few problems that I have come across before ina  modern Dining table with one piece slate bed .

First of all the strip down , bed cloth off and cushions stripped for re-covering
These small tables are wood screwed on cushions , believe it or not I came a cross a 10ft made the same way the other week !
it is OK for small tables like this to be wood screwed , but table’s above 7ft and maybe some 8ft should all be sectional slate bed and bolted into slate bed bolts for the cushions fixings .you get a much better bounce with proper bolted into slate bed cushion bolts .

on Snooker tables there should be a rebated slot on the rear of the wood block that joins the wood polished surround of the cushion to trap the cushion cloth in
on this table it had screwed on blocks over the cushion cloth which was stapled behind the block for fixing .

a photo of a proper slip fitted cloth , note the thin slip of wood fixing the back edge of the cloth to the cushion .

The slate bed had a few streaks of Marbling , this is natural marble vein going through the slate sediment before it was crushed and formed many millions of years ago .
this slate is Italian and the table was made the 1990s /2000.
it is estimated that welsh slate was formed 400 million years ago . and it is not uncommon to find minute sea creature fossils trapped in the slate when an old billiard table two inch slate is broken

I managed to re-cover the screwed on cushion blocks and cushions because they did not do the trick of putting the rubber on over the screws , I have had a few of these tables to do in the past
it is pot luck if the person screwed the cushions on under the rubber or below it .
if the rubber was over the screws then i would have had to take the whole set of rubbers off and refasten the rubber .

The Original cloth was not in bad condition when comparing it to other tables I have recovered , but my client was not happy with the low quality thick fluffyness of the cloth
and required nice fast short napped Strachan 6811 29 oz cloth , this was the last piece of 29 oz I had in stock .
and only enough for a 6ft bed and cushions .

I will not disclose who I did this work for as it is unfair to start finding faults on their table and saying where it is .
but I like to inform people who may be looking for a dining table and to see the pitfalls of buying one that has not quite been made correct .
My client knows about these faults as I pointed out what could have been better made to him during strip down and re-cover and leveling .
my client actually inherited the table with the House so it cost him nothing but wanted it playing better .
He knows if he wished to upgrade to a proper made Riley Diner table what to now look out for .

a few things that would have made this table much better .

1)….Slip rebates in cushions so it could be re-covered with ease .
2)… Anti Bow beams under the slate bed to stop the slate bowing in the middle
3)… Large penny washers for the cushions screws
4)… higher quality bag nets .

the above table is a copy of the original Riley Dining dual height lifter tables like this one showing the Anti bow beams and lifters which they should have incorporated into their effort of a dining table . .

the modern Riley table is made like this now

I prefer the old type and especially the barley twist leg designed one

A very nice one I renovated in Lincolnshire recently

the same table with it’s solid oak table tops on .
some tables have a differnat type of anti bow mechanism , like this Burroughs and watts anti bow adjustable threaded bar version .
a simple device of wood beam across the middle a bar stretched under and threaded at each end fixed by bracket and adjusted with nuts lifts the center of the table up if it is sagging .

Just been over to a Caravan Park club house in the East Midlands to put back in playing order a very rough and neglected table that has not been touched for years .
the owners did warn me that the table had seen better days , and could not remember when the last re-cover was carried out .
this is what I found when I arrived ,
A club in the throws of renovation Decorators and builders and window fitters all working at the same time .

the club house having new Double glazing Fitted.

Proctors Caravan Park in Barrow on Soar .

the table is a Riley fluted turned leg circa 1910/20’s , but it had Riley Viceroy cushions fitted to it , an upgrade to this type of table .

having windows of three sides of the room you can see that the sun had faded the cloth to almost white !
the fact that it had tacks holding the cushion cloth on and not more modern staples fixings informs me of around the 1960′ early 70’s that the last time this table was re-covered
the cloth was very thick that was coming off , the table must have played very slow , and the rubber was cracking and deforming .

having stripped all the old cloth and cushion slips off the cushions I then cleaned and sanded the blocks ready to take the glue for the new rubber that I was fitting .
the six new Northern rubbers are aligned on my glueing board also ready for glue to be applied .
Take a look at the table at this stage then look at the finished photo further on down my report to see the difference .

I used the template as a guide and then opened them up a little more at the front to allow for the not so serious player to gain confidence and return to play on the table .
Not all clubs demand such tight tournament pockets , and after discussion with the owner it was decided to open them up a little , with these old table it is not possible to open them up to the rear
we have to leave some rubber on to protect the cloth from splitting .

The undercut of the rubber is hand rasped and sanded , and my aim is to keep the flat profile to the end of the rubber , in the old days they used to rasp a undercut to a point , it is now done like this on more modern tables , and looks a lot better for it .

and at 3 and 3/4 inch to the fall the pockets are around 1/4 of an inch more generous than TV match tables at the fall .
but are actually tighter at the rear of the pocket , due to having less of a gap on this period 1910/20’s table at the rear , over a more modern cut cushions as used on TV tables with steel cushions .

cushions finished having fitted new rubber and re clothed in Strachan 6811 30 oz tournament cloth , it was time to move on to the leveling of the table .
This table had ultra thick Welsh slates on it , these are very true slates unlike the more modern softer Italian and Chinese slates as used today .
the table leveled up very well , I only had to shim disc under 6 legs to gain the accuracy I was looking for .
Earlier this week I had to re level two table’s in a snooker club in Lincolnshire that had been leveled useing playing cards and beer mats between slate and frame , that job took some time to put correct .
So a lesson to anyone who assembles their own table , level it only by packing with shims under each leg , do not shim it under the slate bed .

with slate now level and the joints skimmed and sanded with car body filler it was time to lay the cloth on ready for tacking .

The bed cloth fitted and marked out , now ready to refit the cushions .

the finished table , you may also note I also replaced the nets and leathers

and a photo from the other end  , You can now see a vast improvement from when I started from the badly worn and faded cloth with bad deformed rubber .

to a more inviting fully refurbished playing area of the table you now see .
a more faster cloth fitted and with extra bounce from the new profile Northern rubber , from a ploughed field to a proper Billiard table surface .
and with regular Brushing and ironing it will stay that way .
The owners are to replace the old carpet with Carpet tiles and finish the decorating off , and fit the new modern ;lighting for the table .
I am sure the Caravan Park members and visitors will find the club more inviting and the table will get the use it deserves .

I have been over to my Local snooker club to fit another table with the Strachan 6811 tournament 30 oz pure new wool cloth .
This club keeps on top of the work by having me in on a regular basis , maintaining their Snooker and pool tables.
a small club with 6 full size snooker two with match play steel cushions  and 4 match play Supreme winner pool tables.
This was the table in the centre I have recently worked on , a Riley Regis circa 1980s .


The cushions off ready to be recovered .

A before photo showing the track marking wear on corner opening fall , and wear patches in cloth and faded cushions .

another satisfied client , the table now sporting a brand new strachan 6811 tournament 30 oz weight cloth .
if you are in the area of Beeston , Bramcote , Chilwell , Toton ,  Long Eaton , Sandiacre and Stapleford .
the Stapleford cue club is the best club for this area , the tables are well cared for with regular brushing and ironing .
As Carlsberg would say Probably the best snooker club in Notts !

Dennis Taylor on a visit to Stapleford Cue club for an evening with Dennis Taylor .

I have been over to the Cueball Club on Mansfield Road in Derby today to finish off the work of three full size re-covers on their snooker tables .
today I was working on table 1 in the corner of the room .

cushion stripped and recovered in the thicker Hainsworth Smart for better wear on the cushions , I find that fitting Smart cloth to cushion is much better for wear  ,than the thinner match cloth which easily splits on the facing edge and down the middle pocket falls where the ball makes contact with the wood end of the cushions and does not last long .
so we have gone with match cloth on the bed and smart cloth on the cushions , my client at the Cueball    ( Danny )   preferring Hainsworth over Strachan cloth .

here I have stripped the bed cloth off the slate bed and I am starting to fit the match cloth to the table .
stretched at each end then the middle falls are stretched  and tacked .
at this point I have to fit a large clamp to each side of the middle fall to pull each corner out , this prevents me ripping the cloth , and getting wrinkles in the centre slate fall .

Match cloth whether it is Hainsworth or the Strachan no10 is one of the hardest cloths to stretch out .
the cloth is thinner yet it is very unforgiving when it has to form around corners or falls like a centre slate fall .
thus the clamp is used to help things along .
I have wet the centre slate fall , this helps to form the cloth into the fall and look better , the cloth will shrink a bit into the fall as it drys .
you may see some odd fading’s on the TV table around the centre falls this is Starch , I prefer the old fashioned water damping rather than the starch for fitting wool napped cloths .
the damp cloth is also better to grip than shiny dry cloth so I keep my hands damp at all times when stretching cloth on to gain ta very tightly fitted cloth .

with the corner slate fall area pulled and tacked down and the ends stretched , you can see the wrinkles have been pulled out so it is now OK to take the clamp off .
you have to relocate the clamp at each side of the centre fall you as are pulling towards the corner pocket fall , so 4 operations of clamping and unclamping and pulling out of wrinkles .

as you can see a p erect fitted bed cloth around the centre slate falls , this is the hardest part of any stretching and fitting of bed cloths on snooker tables .

a corner pocket opening .

the centre pocket opening inwards view from inside of the table playing surface shows not wrinkles .

and the same on the corner pocket opening viewed inside the tables playing area towards the pocket .

the completed table 1  ready for play .