Wavy slates

[RunningSide]

Quick update of project: I haven't had any chance to work on the table, hopefully on Sunday...

[DeanH]

we like pictures on TSF

[cyberheater]

Thank you Geoff. I don't understand half of what you say but I love snooker and snooker tables and I love reading your in depth knowledge of the tables.

[Geoff Large]

just to show how accurate that 18 inch GG tube is , put a £20 note under one end , take a reading , gently pull £20 note away leaving the level exactly where it was , the bubble will move at least one digit maybe two when the note is taken away .
I have an electronic one that will do the same .

Here is the Digital Level in action on a pool table with a £20 note being 0.1 out when the note is under and 0.0 when it is taken away
http://gclbilliards.com/2-more-pool-...f-rail-system/

[billabong]

Sadly, I love all that precision stuff.

We use one of these for calibrating granite surface tables.
1 x division = 0.01mm over 1m.
Spend more time cleaning the table & underside of the level, than we do measuring. . .

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...irit_level.jpg

[RunningSide]

Ok. Now and finally the slates are reasonable leveled. I must say that it was my demand for ridiculous accuracy which mainly caused problems here.

Yes, there was small steps on slate joints, but these steps were easily handled as Maryfield and Geoff suggested earlier here by using a card in tack wood. I think that these fixings were acually so minimal after all that I don't expect these have any notable long term influence.

And yes, the slates are wavy a bit as descriped in a picture in my first post, but after all steps in joints were taken care, the lowest spots are now max 0,15mm (mostly in between 0,05 to 0,1 mm) measured with straight edge over two joints. So, I believe that these low spots will have no big influence on the roll of a ball.

The 18 inch level I used here is way too accurate like Geoff says. So, these little "waves" were disturbing the leveling process all the time. I ended up using my long leveling tool on even longer (100cm) aluminium bar (60x60x4mm) and two playing cards sitting under the bar on measure points (see the pics, I can't explain this). Like that way I measured over two joints and from center of a slate to the other slab center. By this way, I think I reached good enough leveling. Now, the next step is to start seaming the joints and filling all imperfections and divots. Hopefully my car body repair stuff is good enough and easy to sand, as I can't find any real Bondo from here in Finland. I guess I'll better test this stuff of mine some elsewhere first...

Some pics here: The first one is showing how much I found chalk and other dust from under the cloth, which had been on for 4-5 years. There is an image of line-up lol. Two other pics showing my too-accurate-alu-calibrated-level-tool.

a dusty line-up.jpgcenter to center.jpgover joints.jpg

Now, I really feel relieved and happy to move on to the next stage. Thank you Geoff for your efforts and great postings, thanks to Maryfield too.

[Geoff Large]

Looks like someone likes lining the balls up , those dust tracking marks show me that you practice the line up or the previous owner did , crossing through each shot to pot the next ball in opposite or middle pocket , thats why it leaves that big X of track mark dust under the cloth .
another problem that many get with dust under the cloth is Number 4 cushion which is Black end cushion, all the dust you brush down the table nap ends up here before brushing down the corner pocket , but some dust going through the cloth , some piles up under the cloth like a ramp and the ball hitting the end cushion bounces up off the rubber on this cushion very often , only solution is to take cloth off and clean slate .
when you take the cloth off you may notice small dots of hardened dust in front of the cushion by about 4 inch from the nose building up as it gets more closer to the cushion .#
using sand paper sand the slate dust off .

[Geoff Large]

Just to show what anyone really requires to make sure slate is true is this straight edge off ebay

Starting at £300 but if you where to buy new it would be over £1000 + vat
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1213126171...84.m1423.l2649

[RunningSide]

Wow!! That would be nice to have! Thanks for sharing this link. Now I also know the proper expression for that tool in English: "engineers straight edge". It is sometimes a big difficulty to me to google and learn new stuff without correct terminology. Many expressions in Finnish are also way different and not possible to translate word by word and vice versa.

I've not started seaming the slates yet, maybe tonight I hope.

[RunningSide]

Hello! Finally my new old BCE Westbury is erected and clothed. I must say that it is very fast now with Hainsworth Precision on it. A lot faster than I was ever expecting. This has been an interesting adventure for me so far. And I'm happy to say that I find the result very satisfying at the end.

I wanted an old westbury (I simply like it's outlook) table and not refurbished as I like to do things and I was having very tight budget here. At first I did some sanding and filling on cushions. Also, there was many cracks in the wood to be glued around pocket bolt holes. I have left the re-rubbering and clothing the steels to later, when I'm able to concentrate more on that extreme task.

The frame blanks was bent sideways and the other main frame blank was also a bit sagged approx 3mm from center. I was not happy to plane (shoot) it straight as this is extremely demanding job and I'm not that skilled, especially there was very little margin for error (there is wood only something like 6mm above the leg tops). Sideways bent big blanks like these are also very difficult handle on any planing or cutting machine bed. Planing with hand plane was out of question with my skills! So, I decided to make it a bit different way (I'm also quite curious of trying different ways to do things): I used the actual frame only like a facade to hide new adjustable side blanks I made. These blanks are adjusted like adjustable muntins on center of the slates. I made slate contact surfaces out of 40x40mm oak. I also made new beams for muntins and strengthened all bolt contact areas with metal plates. I forced the frame facade quite close back to its original form by using some more crossing beams (not sure if that is correct term).

The slates did cause me struggle a bit as described earlier. I was simply demanding too much of accuracy. However there was also one cracked slate, which had a repaired corner, and that was a bit high after repair work, and this part of slate was resting on frame. I needed to sand that down, and still after two sessions of sanding and fitting I needed to use one card shim under the neighbour slate. After all struggling, finally, I was happy with the slate leveling, so it was time to start joint filling.

These slates had some horrible long and deep scratches here and there, especially on slate number one. And plenty of smaller ones. I decided to do number one completely with filler. Carefully I scraped the excess by using blades of planing machine. On other slates I filled only where it was needed. Scraping the excess was the slowest part, after that scraping I did very light sanding with grit 400. This all was filthy two days job. But, now afterwards, I must say that these slates play very nicely now, and I do not regret a bit applying this much effort on getting stable and straight frame under the slates and having done the joint and scratch filling properly.

Now, the re-rubbering will be the next step (maybe after an year or so) and on that stage I'll put new leathers on pocket plates and new nets and ball runners too. At this moment, I just tied the pockets to bags as we are having here a baby who is just about to start learning the walking process: I don't want to sacrifice those new runners.

Here is some pics. Not very informative ones as I'm always too busy to stop for shooting pics when in action, but anyway here you are:

[RunningSide]

more pics:

[RunningSide]

some more pics to come when ever it is possible again

Edit: Oh, limited space for images got full.

So, I moved pics to photobucket...


http://s1373.photobucket.com/user/Ru...tml?sort=9&o=0