Scale Billiards Tables
- Thread starter jviss
- Start date
There are 6' tables already on the market. Most use 2 1/4" balls.
I would think that you could source a smaller profile cushion rubber, trim the thickness of the rail, lower the nose height of the cushion, and use smaller balls.
I like your theory, but it just doesn't seem practical, at least from a sourcing perspective. You will be very limited in quality of cushion rubber and ball sets. I also think that it would take quite a lot of R&D to get the scaled-down version to play similar to the full-size version. This, of course, assumes that you are trying to mimic the characteristics of a modern day table of high quality.
Even assuming that you nailed it, with a perfect replica, selecting a cloth would be another challenge. Easy to think that you could just slow it down with a non-worsted cloth. However, you are using 1 1/2" balls... You would have to perform several comparative experiments, just to determine how the 1 1/2" balls react on different grades of cloth. Maybe a worsted cloth would still be the way to go.. I don't know, as I've never messed around with 1 1/2" balls.
Sure seems like it would be a fun project to play around with. I can't see there being any money in it, but it could be fun.
I would think that you could source a smaller profile cushion rubber, trim the thickness of the rail, lower the nose height of the cushion, and use smaller balls.
I like your theory, but it just doesn't seem practical, at least from a sourcing perspective. You will be very limited in quality of cushion rubber and ball sets. I also think that it would take quite a lot of R&D to get the scaled-down version to play similar to the full-size version. This, of course, assumes that you are trying to mimic the characteristics of a modern day table of high quality.
Even assuming that you nailed it, with a perfect replica, selecting a cloth would be another challenge. Easy to think that you could just slow it down with a non-worsted cloth. However, you are using 1 1/2" balls... You would have to perform several comparative experiments, just to determine how the 1 1/2" balls react on different grades of cloth. Maybe a worsted cloth would still be the way to go.. I don't know, as I've never messed around with 1 1/2" balls.
Sure seems like it would be a fun project to play around with. I can't see there being any money in it, but it could be fun.
So what size balls would you recommend for a 12' table, 3"? Just wondering, do they change the cup size on golf courses based on what par is? Par 5 gets bigger cups than par 3??
i often thought that it would be interesting to build a nice, small slate table that accepts 1.5" balls.
the rails and pockets would have to be scaled down from a standard pool table to .66666667 % i think it would be a fun game.
i think that ball size matters more as you go down in size because it gets too crowded to play on.
the rails and pockets would have to be scaled down from a standard pool table to .66666667 % i think it would be a fun game.
i think that ball size matters more as you go down in size because it gets too crowded to play on.
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agreed..... we started off playing Carom and it was fun when we were kids.... i have a set of those small balls and when i had my Valley bumper pool table i wondered about scaling it down to make a 1.5" ball pool table. way too much work though. it might be easiest at first to start with a toy table and put those rails on a piece of slate. then later if you wanted to better the design, you'd have to get custom cushions and build rails for it. it can be done. it'd be fun to shark someone by inviting them to play on your home table. lol...
i think you'd have to change the cushion nose profile to be sharper to compensate for the small balls for rebound and nose height. . IMHO custom cushions would have to be made. as far as cloth is concerned, it seem like you'd have to get very thin, worsted cloth. otherwise it would be too thick on the cushion nose and the balls wouldn't roll fast enough.
Nose height is only one part of the equation, how thick do you suppose the sub-rails would have to be, that measurement effects how the nose plays too.
Do they???? So let say you have a sub rail thickness of 1 1/2" and another 1 11/16" thick. According to you, if the nose height is set to 61% of that 1 1/2" ball.....it'll react the same regardless of the subrail thickness....right? Is that what you're saying?
I get a laugh out of you guys with 3D cad programs trying to design a pool table, that's why so many pool tables using the same cushions play so differently, because you have no idea what you're doing, it just looks like you do...LOL
I don’t think you could use any cushion rubber that is designed for 2-1/4” balls, and it’s not so much the size that would be the show stopper. Heck you could scale down anything to be the proper dimensions. It would be the difference in weight between the smaller and larger balls that would nessitate a softer rubber for the smaller balls in order to get an accurate rebound and speed.
Seeing how you think I'm being so rude and hateful, since you have no idea what you're talking about, let me help you out with something...Einstein! First of all, drop the K66 cushion idea, they'll never work, instead take a look at the Northern L step cushions for snooker, the don't have a point at the front of the cushion for a reason, the English snooker balls are 2" so the flat nose means you don't need to worry about the nose height. Second, they're soft....did I mention that they're SOFT, so smaller balls will rebound of them a lot better?
Instead of coming on here like you KNOW something, why don't you show a little respect to those of us that DO know something, instead of you trying to come off as some mind of college educated fool because you have a 3D cad program a d can draw up anything and it'll work!! I can draw a space ship, that don't mean you can build it and fly it to the moon!
yes the nose radius would be .6666667% smaller compared to 2 1/4" pool balls. that's a lot.... you won't get the same rebound because the 1.5" balls are so light and on banks the small balls must sink into the cushion to play like a big table. but it still might play ok, we won't know until we try.
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