Heated POOL TABLES

InsertCleverNameHere

Well-known member
Heated in the same way so many carom tables are…

Has anyone tried this? Just curious what the effects were specifically to the cushions, I’m sure the bed was much faster or I would assume so anyway.
 
Heated in the same way so many carom tables are…

Has anyone tried this? Just curious what the effects were specifically to the cushions, I’m sure the bed was much faster or I would assume so anyway.
Heating a tables playing surface don't make the table play faster, what it does is dry out the humidity moisture on the cloth, therefore reducing the drag/friction against the balls, so the cloth will play the same requardless of the environment the table is set up in.
 
Heated in the same way so many carom tables are…

Has anyone tried this? Just curious what the effects were specifically to the cushions, I’m sure the bed was much faster or I would assume so anyway.
Faster in the sense that humidity slows the table down, so the heat can keep the cloth dry. The last time I played on a heated pool table was around 2005. It was too fast for me. I think the recent US open could have stood to have heated table, around 80°F, not much. That was the feedback from a couple players.
 
Speaking of Gabriels pool tables, does anyone have any experience with their current model: Gryffon? They look fantastic. I’d expect them to be pretty excellent in every way but just haven’t seen one in the real world.
 
Speaking of Gabriels pool tables, does anyone have any experience with their current model: Gryffon? They look fantastic. I’d expect them to be pretty excellent in every way but just haven’t seen one in the real world.
Never seen one in person. IDK if one exists in the US. I played on their earlier model table and it was damn nice.
 
The new Gabriels system 'wraps around' the slate. Heats the bed and the cushions better than previous versions. https://www.gabrielsbilliards.com/technology-rafale-2-0/heating-system-2/ Gabriels at one time offered heating their pool table. Don't know if they still do. Not mentioned on their site.
Not meaning to correct you, but Gabriel's still uses heater boards under each slate, and what you're referring to as wrap around, is actually a heating blanket that when completely unfolded, attaches by the parameter edges to the outside edge if the frame under the slates, transmitting heat upwards to the slates, designed for billiards tables that don't have a heating system. And their 9fts, I've worked with them for over 20 years and never seen one heated.
 
Not meaning to correct you, but Gabriel's still uses heater boards under each slate, and what you're referring to as wrap around, is actually a heating blanket that when completely unfolded, attaches by the parameter edges to the outside edge if the frame under the slates, transmitting heat upwards to the slates, designed for billiards tables that don't have a heating system. And their 9fts, I've worked with them for over 20 years and never seen one heated.
Not what it looks like in those diagrams on their site. Of course you meant to correct me, its the reason you get up up every day. How you keep customers is beyond me. Surely you're not this big an asshole with those spending their $$. Maybe so. Back to Ignore you go.
 
The most famous (infamous?) pool match with heated slates has to have been TAR xyz Shane vs Earl in Ohio. It was on an old Brunswick 10' snooker table incorrectly converted to pool. Earl had a couple oil filled space heaters under the table. I was there for one day in person. It was in a warehouse that was cold. Earl was super nuts. I thought he was going to jump the stands and start attacking the fans. Yikes.
 
Not what it looks like in those diagrams on their site. Of course you meant to correct me, its the reason you get up up every day. How you keep customers is beyond me. Surely you're not this big an asshole with those spending their $$. Maybe so. Back to Ignore you go.
Have you ever worked on a Gabriel's billiards table???? I have, so while you're guessing, I'm not!! If correcting you for being wrong, and that makes me an a$$hole, what does that make you for being wrong, and hate to admit it???
 
Not what it looks like in those diagrams on their site. Of course you meant to correct me, its the reason you get up up every day. How you keep customers is beyond me. Surely you're not this big an asshole with those spending their $$. Maybe so. Back to Ignore you go.
I don't charge my customers for work they DON'T need!!!
 
RKC have you seen any of the Gryffon tables from Gabriels? What do you think of them?
I have nothing against the Gabriel's pool tables, they look and play great, MY problem is with how the rails are designed. Last time I saw Terry, he had a Gabriel's on display at the BCA Trade show, with aluminum extruded rails, but when I made a comment about how long did he think it would take to staple out the thin strip of wood inlaid into the extruded rail bottom, because it was a strip of wood, about 3/4" wide, 1/4" deep, and that was all you had to staple the rail cloth too, that and a MDF plug innthe throat of the rail to staple to, there's no way in hell that'll hold up after 3 to 5 recoveries, Terry didn’t want to talk to me anymore! People that design new tables NEED to take a look at the tables that have been in use commercially and take a look at the wear and tear the rails get put through, BEFORE they come out with their BRIGHT ideas for new tables. NO GABRIELS, PREDATOR, OR RASSON 9ft tables I've personally seen with stand up to the test of time, unless it's sitting in someone's home! Commercial use, hacks, will destroy those tables in 3 to 5 years, then what? Who's going to be repairing the rails on them? No, people don't look at that, they are only judging the tables by the way they look and play, they have no idea what's coming up down the road for the repair bills. Sam's Kim Steel tables were just like that, hit, sell, run!!! Leg levelers busting left and right, pockets nailed right through the finish of the rails because the cute little screw idea of mounting the pockets from the top with little wood screws failed horribly, and you couldn't keep the pockets mounted, because they stripped out of the aluminum rails!! And yep, they're the same company building the Predator tables today, nice job!!

I'm not into disposable pool tables, but I guess there's a lot of people out there with money to burn, so they can just keep buying the same tables over and over, and keep throwing them away too.

Personally, I will NOT even attempt to repair a piss poor designed pool table, I'd rather the owner throw it out the door, and maybe next time, buy a table worth while!!

And FORGET thinking about extending the rails to make the pockets tighter, they're hollow rails because they're extruded from aluminum! The ONLY way you're making the pockets smaller, is by changing the pocket facing thickness, like Gabriel's has, to about 3/8" facings, so then you can watch and see the points of the cushions in EVERY pocket eat their way through the cloth and be visible and keep getting worse and worse. But hey, maybe you can pay someone to recover the rails about every 90 days.....oh, that's right, more wear and tear on the rail design, 🤣😅🤣😅 go ahead, buy any of those 3 I mentioned😀😀😅🤣
 
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That is certainly problematic. I’m a carpenter with all the tools anyone could need to fix them but that doesn’t mean I’d want to invest my time in that way 3-4 years after purchase.
 
That is certainly problematic. I’m a carpenter with all the tools anyone could need to fix them but that doesn’t mean I’d want to invest my time in that way 3-4 years after purchase.
The real prople is no one wants to wait and see how the tables hold up, BEFORE they buy one, and then they're surprised when they find out they're turning into junk. I said a while back the Predator 9fts were going to be junk, but, nooooo, a lot of posters here on AZB acted like I hurt their feelings, and I had no idea what I was talking about, didn't know shit, the whole 9 yards. BUT, not one single poster said I was right, when the tables turned out to be shit tables. Jason Shaw quit innthe middle of a match, complaining about how bad the tables were....and still, not one single person said, sorry RKC, you were right!! But that's ok, now I want everyone to go out and buy them, and when they get done drinking that grape kool-aid, if they look all the way to the bottom of the glass, they'll see the PREDATOR condom still packaged!!!
 
Heated in the same way so many carom tables are…

Has anyone tried this? Just curious what the effects were specifically to the cushions, I’m sure the bed was much faster or I would assume so anyway.

When I put my GC IV table together I installed two 15 watt golden rod safe dehumidifier rods under each slate (one on each side). And, covered under the table with hot water heater insulation to trap the heat.

The table is out on an uninsulated enclosed deck. Keeps the slate 3-5 degrees warmer than the ambient environment.

Works great. Other people playing often comment how balls just keep rolling, ...

 
The real prople is no one wants to wait and see how the tables hold up, BEFORE they buy one, and then they're surprised when they find out they're turning into junk. I said a while back the Predator 9fts were going to be junk, but, nooooo, a lot of posters here on AZB acted like I hurt their feelings, and I had no idea what I was talking about, didn't know shit, the whole 9 yards. BUT, not one single poster said I was right, when the tables turned out to be shit tables. Jason Shaw quit innthe middle of a match, complaining about how bad the tables were....and still, not one single person said, sorry RKC, you were right!! But that's ok, now I want everyone to go out and buy them, and when they get done drinking that grape kool-aid, if they look all the way to the bottom of the glass, they'll see the PREDATOR condom still packaged!!!
Yeah there’s absolutely no shot in hell I buy any predator tables BUT I’m strongly considering giving Gabriels a chance. Would love to see a cross section of the rails first though.
 
Yeah there’s absolutely no shot in hell I buy any predator tables BUT I’m strongly considering giving Gabriels a chance. Would love to see a cross section of the rails first though.
There's a leveling issue as well, because I doubt Terry corrected the problem. The steel C channels have a timberstand type of material mounted to it for the slates to site on, and to staple the cloth on. When leveling the slates using the leveling system of bolts provided, or wedges, once the slates are all perfectly level, great! But now when you bolt the rails on, the rail bolt washers mount below the wooden frame on the C channel, and pull the rails down on the slate, what happens is the slate now gets pulled down everywhere between the leveling points just enough to throw it out of level. So, what you have to do is place a level on the slate in order to read the level changing when you bolt the rails down. If you see the level moving, you then need to place a wedge next to the rail bolt, on both sides, pound them in a little, then tight the rail bolt, and watch to see if the level changes, if it does, back off the rail bolt, pound the wedges in a little more, then repeat the process until the slate remains level at all the 18 rail bolts.
 
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