preparing A.N. Other table

[taffy]

I've just done 50 hours on a Narrow Sams. new underboard in 6mm ply with a razor sharp front edge, 4mm furniture pads abound, carpet underlay, ski-drops all round she is a thing of beauty and goes into the Social Club at newnham croft this weekend.

the slate is backed by a piece of wood across the holes but it intrudes inwards a little on all 9 holes. the pocket rings couldn't drop and someone had tried to iron them down! The pocket rings look similar to the scarlet red ones but are brown. I had old Mick remove 2mm from the shoulders of the rings and they all drop in nicely now.

Another thing I noted was that the shaft on the timer is stamped "N.E." and then "I.O.M" and I recalled reading somewhere that the last tables manufactured were by Sams and even after Sams someone on the Isle of Man made them for a time. Can anyone enlighten me more on this?

I wish Sav you would get those rings made!

Taffy

[Sav]

Brief reply;

1) I believe the final clocks were made on the Isle of Man, though I have never investigated this, would be an interesting project for my planned marshalling on Manxland next year.

2) Rings, I am STILL not in possession of the correct final version of the CAD file. I have chased this but cannot procede further until I get it. The table with the prototype rings will be going into the Five Bells in Eastry which will be our new home  after Chrimble if our league restarts.

[taffy]

Yes I've already booked the manx up as it is 100 years and they are going to make a special effort I'm sure!

Taffy

[Sav]

Nov 27, 2021 17:29:26 GMT taffy said:

Yes I've already booked the manx up as it is 100 years and they are going to make a special effort I'm sure!

Taffy

Where and when are you staying?

We'll be there for an extended fortnight, staying in Peel.

Mind you you're going a bit early for the centenary in 2023.

[taffy]

yes, you could be right. 1923. Motorhome and not sure where we'll pitch up.

Taffy

[taffy]

This past Month I have been doing up a pre-war Sams that I was delighted to find for sale over at Fleggburgh near Gt. Yarmouth. I agreed an off-screen price (£1,250) and gathered as much cash as possible.

It came without a timer which given that i need one was a hell of a risk and I am unlikely to find another. However....... I'd visited an auction site for the first time in yonks and what was for sale? The front legs of a Sams table with the timer AND the lock up at Skipton. I won this Auction the next day for £10 (£12 gross) and so I was "Back in the GAME!".

The undertray is very old and I ripped out the carpet-laden padded landing areas and turned them into ski-drops, extra blue felt was found to cover bare (and disgusting) areas. I then used 4mm self-adhesive furniture pads to keep the balls from banging away plus the usual carpet underlay but just along the sides of the wooden dividers.

As the balls don't fly back like the post-war Sams, there was no need to use underlay on the base in order to slow the balls down; blue is therefore the predominant colour still! A bar and a cross-beam were made from ply and suitable stained darker with a little hard wood for the timer to stroke and the timer to sit upon.

The first real experiment was with the front score discs which looked like old transfers so I bought some water transfer paper and followed the instructions. They said that I was to design the item, print it on the glossed paper and then lacquer it. This i did but foolishly only printed what i needed as I guess I'm tight. I lacquered over the print and then cut each one out. Then i dipped them in warm water and the transfer fell off the white background and was on my thumb ready to fit. It often stuck to my thumb and broke up readily but while wet i was able to splash and push the bits together. The black inked rim then seemed to dissolve slightly but that just gave it an aged look which I'm happy with. Later I lacquered them and sealed them in for good.

The lessons are;
print more than you need
lacquer twice
they break up too readily..
...but they work!!!

I designed them in 'photos' getting the shape right and testing with a sheet of A4. When happy, the numbers went in next. Well worth it and now I can use the decals for other things? A scoreboard perhaps? why not!

With the timer, i took that down the Village to Bob Upandown who cryogenically cleaned the clock part and vapour cleaned the rest. Looking back, i should have removed the front face from the base and had the face cryo'd as well as the vapour cleaning was a bit too intrusive! Three screws and it would have been apart.

As luck would have it, i bought a spare used Tally-Counter a few years back which will be added and also I salvaged the lock off the £12 table end making it truly the best value bar Billiards item I've ever bought, the key for the lock I'd had done before.

Parts back and many parts painted or greased, oiled or polished, buffed up or loctited it now looks brilliant and is away for the "£1" treatment....that isn't old Mick's price for the work; rather, the coin it'll take!

But the timer still wanted more....It wanted a cover, a coin shute and a money collector and who should come to the rescue but "Big Al" Alan Mee (Alan Turner here) who had a new cover, shute and money collector. So the job is truly done now.

The holes for the hinge screws were worn oversize and only 4" long screws tightened up but went through the undertray. So, I found some rare 6mm self-tappers on Ebay just 15mm long and they work a treat!

The next problem was the cloth.
The blue cloth is "shag-pile" (I like that word, swearing on pro-boards....surely this one will get through...LOL), I'll say it again, "shag-pile" blue Strachan cloth and what with the cushions, despite it being new cloth years ago and unplayed...it was dead. So i thought; 'well, I have nothing to lose here as it'll have to come off if i can't get it to speed up?'

So, I got a razor blade in a handle which is usually used for scraping windows and I scraped away for about 3 hours on this lightly pulled cloth. I was removing heaps of blue cloth and just twice i managed to 'nik' the cloth which might have been OK but i superglued the gap immediately and the slight 'niks' became 1000% visible now due to the glue.

Each time it happened it happened when i was; left-handed, racing away at it and on lifting clear dragged the corner of the razor up the cloth at an angle. There is no need for this and next time I will take the corners off the blades to lessen the chances.

How did it turn out? well it is now premier cloth in everything but name! I'm really chuffed and the balls roll with great pace now.

I then pulled the slate clear and tightened the cloth down hard over the side, re-stapling. I felt that this was the right order...but next time I may try it the other way round.

Previously, i had removed the Strachan cloth from the rails and created new rails ready for new rubbers. What with 5/8th Northern Rubber no longer being available, i thought I'd be the first to try full-scale Snooker rubbers of 3/4" on a table.
My old mate Damon was unavailable for the Chippy work so i had to learn to router myself this time, router the wood I mean!

So with very thin wood, and routed sweetly by "moi", I glued in the 3/4" rubbers which i got from 'Ronnie' in Wales. The cushions bowed and bulged out like it was archery time and after clothing them the screws drew the cushions in nice and tight. I also got a pot of glue from Ronnie and it really is good stuff as the 3/4" comes with a webbed string strip backing and it never looked like coming apart.

The end result is a fast table with a beautiful bounce from the cushions, I'm well pleased with it. Are the rubbers even better and bouncier than the 5/8th? No; they add nothing. But, they are both excellent.

You'll note that the cues fit in the end of the table on a pre-war Sams and when the table needs attending around the tray, all this weight needs lifting. So I tried for hydraulic rams from the tailgate of my old scrapped Citroen. Alas, while the hard wood was strong enough, the softwood under the top wasn't so I need some metal plates making to spread the load. Another time perhaps.......

So on this table I have done yet again more new ideas and they have all worked out better than I could hope for. The scraping of the cloth and the water transfers are a knock-out, the cushions 'just-as-good', the cryogenic and vapour cleaning are excellent ideas.

I finished by cutting a '30' and a pair of '10' discs with my 1mm cutting disc and doing it by hand to match the amatuerish way a predecessor had done the two '20s'.

The layout of a pre-war Sams
I'm guessing that this table is circa 1937-1939 as there are even more grandiose scoreboards (1934-1936?) -but only a few!
The bottom half of the table is narrow while the 'top' is wide. Because it has 9-lanes in the undertray, some of the gaps are too narrow but it is great to see the balls in a Sams NOT smashing the bulkhead.... way better.
The feet are not a good shape and roll in circles not on the spot which torments the legs. They needed a greater degree of curve in them. On top, the 200, 100 and the 50s are much, much further down the table so the game plays like it is a narrow. The 200 is 200mm further down than my own Sams ands still 150mm further than a post-war.
Also, these early skittles are VERY substantial! Wide yes, but also heavy. I like the heavy but the wide bit makes balls behind the far middle hole (30) not-much-fun!
Other than the 4 holes location, the pre-war table is better in nearly every department.

cheers!

Taffy

Photos are of;
condition of the clock when I got it
a little super glue required
cloth drawn down and re-stapled

[taffy]

three more photos.

1. front decals which look suitably 'aged'.
2. the scoreboard - a thing of beauty!
3. size matters! huge new cushion rubber is next to the old tiny rubber.

Taffy

Attachments:

[Sav]

Thanks to Jon I am now in possession of what should be the final version of the CAD file for the rings.

I'm trying a local firm and should have a prototype to check against the set in our league table on Monday. 

[taffy]

Latest table to join the Newmarket Stables of one David 'bach boyo' Lloyd is a narrow Sams I was fortunate to buy off 'Ozzy' here on the site at a more than fair price! So a thanks to Phil for thinking of me and after a trip to hailsham it was soon back in the workshop.

As with all my tables I always try a new idea or two and stick to other tried and tested ideas that i now consider to work!

So, it was off with the laquer using a belt sander and orbital sander for the little stuff. so, 3 coats of Danish oil and 2 coats of natural beeswax. a new premier cloth made for a Jelks only made it lengthwise by about 5mm...it was fully stretched and just made the wooden frame on the ends.

The table lacked the usual 4 items namely;
The timer cover (and funnel shoot) on top
the money box underneath.
the tally counter.
the bar (a wooden board)

I added the usual ski-drops and know the dimensions in the top of my head. I also narrowed the wood for this as the lanes in a narrow are well; "narrower"!.

The big difference this time was that i decided to lower the under tray by 40mm. This means the balls come down FAST and straight into the fingers of the player breaking them.....sorry, freudian slip there.... no, i counteracted the speed by using the carpet underlay.
The task was easy to do; 30-minutes work it was that easy, all i had to do was chop the threaded heads off the table's coach bolts for the tray to fit nicely.

I then used rubber foam strips in each lane of the ball tray (by your knees) and hoped the last downhill bit wasn't going to see balls take off and crack a knuckle. If it worked I knew that the balls wouldn't keep bouncing back out of sight.

WORRA TREAT! the balls are now silent, fast and there's not even a 'boom' from the very thick rubber pads. a 100% succes and something I'll do again. Now the undertray IS visible for the last 10" of downward travel when viewed from the side, but, I used some 5mm ply and some mastik/silicon and sealed the view off (as well as helping with the noise containment).

I'm presuming that old Alfred Sams decided to make the tables tamper proof when he introduced the 'bulkhead bang' that is all too familiar to everyone.

The second new idea was the use of waterslide decal paper. I downloaded what to me is the correct script/font and best that "I" could see; "Old Stanndard TT" its called which is one that won't be lost on Sav! Now not being great with computers i knew this was going to go wrong so I found the script, asked to download it, clicked, looked in my MS Word screen and there it sat! Old Standard TT.

I'm not over happy with my efforts and will have another go. I also used that bloody awful, cheap rubber I found for sale on ebay on the front edge of the bar and I can now say 'yes, it has a deserved place on a BB table...just not on it but under it!'. New peradon balls complete the job.

I decided to save the score discs and tacs, converted the timer to the £1 coin, and left the cushion rubbers as they felt nice and supple. I even left the leatherette - but not the D and it has an old/new quality to it now.

From now on I think, any new Sams I get will have the undertray lowered the 40mm and i may put a security bar across to make it anti-tamper.

Taffy

[taffy]

The table was donated by Dunstable Fire Service to someone in April 1990.

The ski drop across the top 5 now consists of a vertical piece of wood screwed to the end frame, then a piece of damp MDF (4mm) that has been sawn to miss the runners and then soaked into its curved shape is added.


The waterslide decals after 2 coats of laquer to strengthen them and seal the numbers in. they are still incredibly delicate....3 coats next time!

I should have put them on like this but used black. or white on 'clear' and be able to view the wooden background.

Taffy

[taffy]

Can anybody sell me one of these old pre-war Sams skittles?

cheers

Taffy

Attachments:

[tommo III]

Your best bet is Alan Mee:  ask him nicely and I'm sure he'll make you one.

[Sav]

I've got several old pegs but don't remember having one with rings on the stem.

New one won't have the patina of age.

[taffy]

Apr 14, 2022 18:01:52 GMT Sav said:

I've got several old pegs but don't remember having one with rings on the stem.

New one won't have the patina of age.

agreed!

[tommo III]

Get Al to make two identical then.   Then bury them in the garden for a week.   Then dig 'em up .... et voila !

[taffy]

Well I've just finished Jelks3 today and she is a beauty! She had been fully refurbed by Bar Billiards Ltd and the moths had eaten the cloth.

It came to me in need of a re-cloth and not a lot more - I hoped. Anyways, the darn thing had a cracked slate

and so I did the trick of red oxide primer again by building up layers of it and then ordinary grey primer. I promised last time I wouldn't brush it on the next time....clearly I don't even listen to myself because I did it again and, again created a lot of work! The red oxide dries immediately and won't spread on the brush which is a big problem. I MUST spray it on next time! I reckon I spent 25-30 hours on just the slate.

I tapped the rings through the cloth from the top and this worked like it used to, the cloth ripped last time but this time the rings are a better fit and don't have the sharp edge of the scarlet red rings.

I decided to keep the old score discs but on swopping out the 30s for 10 and 10 for 30s I was short of '10's so I repainted the discs.

I did this by dint of simply cutting the masking tape out over the current discs and then laying the masking tape in the right place and painting through onto the disc.
   
a little cleaning with a razor blade and i'll polish it up soon. Job done!

The bar made a racket stopping the balls so I put furniture pads on the leading edge and it is 70% better. The real culprits are the hinges, they can rattle with each ball. If I were still in the car trade and the paintshop to boot, I would find little plastic teets used to hold panels on etc that the hinge pins could wear to quieten them down.

New cloth, weighted mushtittles, mechanism to £1 thanks to my mate Mick the engineer, a money box from Alan Mee. I also was in a jam over the cushion rubbers and so I bought a new set of 5/8" Northern Rubbers off of Masters of Games. Now they supply 3 side rubbers and I had 2 end rubbers still in hand so I used only two of the new side rubbers and an old end one. The result is I need to do this purchase once more and I'll have a set of cushion rubbers spare.

The cushion screws have pulled the wood out in several places so i was forced to buy 2 1/4" jappaned screws and glue in match sticks.....all good now! Don't ask if Swan Vesta are better.....

I bulged out the coat hangers this time so that they accept cues more easily. I have lightly laquered (car paint aerosol cans) some scratched bits which at least protects everything while keeping the 'patina'. I also kept the leatherette the same for that reason.

Several jobs around squaring the slate, the centreline, where the D cloth, 'the dot' go have been refined recently and the tables quickly play symetrically now.

on all my recent tables, the balls bounce upwards going down the ski drops and that makes more noise than anything. It might be time for double padding for a proper soft landing on the next one.

Nice to get another Jelks in, I like them laquered more than I do the Sams. I think laquered Jelks and waxed Sams; they then both look right!

Should have a place for this sorted this weekend on the way home from Northampton.

Taffy