Shaving felt?

cyork2 · Jan 13, 2011

Short version -
Can you shave the felt on a pool table or do anything similar to reduce felt fuzz that slows down the playing surface? I had to vacuum the felt on a table I just bought and I think I have slowed down the playing surface slightly. The felt is Simonis and I know the felt is on right side up since Shane showed me the difference before it was put back on.

Long version -
Just got a new table set up - 9ft Gold Crown 1 that Shane (Cuephoric) set up for me and he did a FANTASTIC job.

The felt was in good shape so I decided to hold off on changing it out. Since it had a spot sticker on it Shane wasn't able to put his patented stretch on the felt so it is stretched fine but not super tight.

However the felt was filthy - years of sitting unused and uncovered had left pattens of dust and dirt and who knows what *shudder*

So I took out a vacuum cleaner, set it on a low setting, stuck on an attachment and vacuumed the felt. I then brushed the felt and now it looks fantastic.

The table plays a bit slower than I would like and looking at the felt my attention with the vacuum may have maybe caused a bit of felt fuzzing. Nothing major and maybe I'm just being crazy here but that is what I think has happened.

So - have you ever heard of or have you ever shaved your felt? If not is there anything else that could be done to cause the felt to tighten up a bit? Maybe use heat or steam to cause it to shrink a bit thus making it tighter (but seems like it would be impossible to make it shrink uniformly so that is probably a bad idea)?

Thanks in advance,
Craig

matteroner · Jan 13, 2011

I have done it ....same situation pretty much ...except I had to use the backside of the simonis cuz the front side was nasty....I used a #40 blade on oster clippers ......it takes forever and eventually you will decide it's not worth it an replace the cloth.....you need to lube the blades every pass and last time I did it my clippers almost crapped out....these are expensive clippers ...about $100 and used to cut pet fur...but it definately helped ....a conair clipper would probably be destroyed by this process ...
I have also heard of people ironing the cloth to get it to lay down ....but I don't think I can really recommend that ...

I would also question whether your cushions are dead if you are getting slow play

btw, i am not a mechanic ....more of a hobby mechanic ..

QuickEdward · Jan 14, 2011

matteroner said:
I have done it ....same situation pretty much ...except I had to use the backside of the simonis cuz the front side was nasty....I used a #40 blade on oster clippers ......it takes forever and eventually you will decide it's not worth it an replace the cloth.....you need to lube the blades every pass and last time I did it my clippers almost crapped out....these are expensive clippers ...about $100 and used to cut pet fur...but it definately helped ....a conair clipper would probably be destroyed by this process ...

Am I the only one here thinking .oO WTF? lol, no offense.

matteroner · Jan 14, 2011

QuickEdward said:
Am I the only one here thinking .oO WTF? lol, no offense.

no I was thinking "wtf am i doing" as I was doing it ....but I had nothing to loose as it was a salvage procedure .....I read about doing it somewhere online and I had the clippers ...so what the hell ....

it helped ....but now I am on to new cloth so it was just a temporary fix.

btoneill · Jan 14, 2011

Sounds worse then trying to shave a cat!

matteroner · Jan 14, 2011

btoneill said:
Sounds worse then trying to shave a cat!

by far ....and I would know because i'm a vet.....

Club Billiards · Jan 14, 2011

I'm definitely thinking the stretch being backed off has more to do with your table playing slow than you vacuuming it...IF you used a brush attachment and not something with a beater bar.

Side note...is it funny to anyone else that most of us who read this probably CRINGED about bringing clippers anywhere near Simonis, yet we don't hesitate to use them on...our FACE!?

reverend · Jan 14, 2011

Club Billiards said:
I'm definitely thinking the stretch being backed off has more to do with your table playing slow than you vacuuming it...IF you used a brush attachment and not something with a beater bar.

Side note...is it funny to anyone else that most of us who read this probably CRINGED about bringing clippers anywhere near Simonis, yet we don't hesitate to use them on...our FACE!?

Its funny you say that...I was thinking the EXACT same thing!

matteroner · Jan 14, 2011

reverend said:
Its funny you say that...I was thinking the EXACT same thing!

the other thing is I wonder what the machine that simonis uses to trim the felt....i imagine it as a 80 inch long clipper blade .....but maybe I am wrong ....it would be neat to go behind the scenes at simonis ...

QuickEdward · Jan 14, 2011

matteroner said:
the other thing is I wonder what the machine that simonis uses to trim the felt....i imagine it as a 80 inch long clipper blade .....but maybe I am wrong ....it would be neat to go behind the scenes at simonis ...

I think you might be confused about how worsted cloth is made. The yarn or thread used to weave worsted cloth is put through ginning machines that force the fibers of the yarn to lie parallel to each other.

matteroner · Jan 14, 2011

QuickEdward said:
I think you might be confused about how worsted cloth is made. The yarn or thread used to weave worsted cloth is put through ginning machines that force the fibers of the yarn to lie parallel to each other.

this is from the website:
http://www.simoniscloth.com/quality-features/the-cloth
"Simonis cloth is specially woven and sheared specifically so the direction of the ball is not affected by the cloth. Our special manufacturing processes make the difference. "

i am talking about the shearing process i guess ....can you explain how that takes place ?.....hmmm..

here is some more...

Simonis Cloth starts with very fine combed wool yarn. This long-fiber wool is then tightly-twisted and woven (the worsted wool process) into cloth. Then it is specially sheared perfectly flat and finally finished in a tradition of craftsmanship that our mill in Verviers, Belgium, pioneered and has refined for over three centuries. The result is a beautiful precision cloth that achieves the smoothest, most accurate and most consistent play surface available.

Dartman · Jan 14, 2011

matteroner said:
the other thing is I wonder what the machine that simonis uses to trim the felt....i imagine it as a 80 inch long clipper blade .....but maybe I am wrong ....it would be neat to go behind the scenes at simonis ...

First off it's not felt, it's cloth (regardless that 90% of the consumer world calls it felt).
Here's a little clip from the mill. Of particular note is the personal inspection so you rarely find a flaw in the cloth.
http://www.simoniscloth.co.uk/video/video.swf

matteroner · Jan 15, 2011

Dartman said:
First off it's not felt, it's cloth (regardless that 90% of the consumer world calls it felt).
Here's a little clip from the mill. Of particular note is the personal inspection so you rarely find a flaw in the cloth.
http://www.simoniscloth.co.uk/video/video.swf

fine so it's cloth ....but keep in mind that felt is a type of cloth

"Felt is a non-woven cloth that is produced by matting, condensing and pressing woolen fibres."

so you would always have to say woven cloth if you were talking about simonis because cloth does not = woven.....
in fact the REAL way it should be said is fabric:

"Textile refers to any material made of interlacing fibres. Fabric refers to any material made through weaving, knitting, spreading, crocheting, or bonding.

my point is that it is sheared in the manufacturing process ....

nice video...I would like to see the process step by step though ....i am amazed by the person with the tweezers ....i mean seriously does that guy spend his whole life on one ream?

RackemBilliards · Jan 15, 2011

Shaving cloth

cyork2 said:
Short version -
Can you shave the felt on a pool table or do anything similar to reduce felt fuzz that slows down the playing surface? I had to vacuum the felt on a table I just bought and I think I have slowed down the playing surface slightly. The felt is Simonis and I know the felt is on right side up since Shane showed me the difference before it was put back on.

Long version -
Just got a new table set up - 9ft Gold Crown 1 that Shane (Cuephoric) set up for me and he did a FANTASTIC job.

The felt was in good shape so I decided to hold off on changing it out. Since it had a spot sticker on it Shane wasn't able to put his patented stretch on the felt so it is stretched fine but not super tight.

However the felt was filthy - years of sitting unused and uncovered had left pattens of dust and dirt and who knows what *shudder*

So I took out a vacuum cleaner, set it on a low setting, stuck on an attachment and vacuumed the felt. I then brushed the felt and now it looks fantastic.

The table plays a bit slower than I would like and looking at the felt my attention with the vacuum may have maybe caused a bit of felt fuzzing. Nothing major and maybe I'm just being crazy here but that is what I think has happened.

So - have you ever heard of or have you ever shaved your felt? If not is there anything else that could be done to cause the felt to tighten up a bit? Maybe use heat or steam to cause it to shrink a bit thus making it tighter (but seems like it would be impossible to make it shrink uniformly so that is probably a bad idea)?

Thanks in advance,
Craig

Shaving cloth is one of those things that seems like it should work, but probably won't give you a result you're happy with. It's kind of like the people we have once in a while who want to shampoo their table with upholstery cleaner to clean it. Yeah, it cleans but, no, you shouldn't do it. I would think it would be impossible to shave it uniformly even throughout the table and you'd end up with a table that rolls bad. If you get a Simonis x-1 table cleaner it should clean and smooth the cloth at the same time. Normal use will make the cloth smoother over time as well.

Dartman · Jan 15, 2011

matteroner said:
...I would like to see the process step by step though ....i am amazed by the person with the tweezers ....i mean seriously does that guy spend his whole life on one ream?

You could probably arrange a mill tour if ever in Belgium. That would be interesting considering the age of the company.
Here's a more detailed recap of the manufacturing processes - http://www.iwansimonis.com/?page=manufacturing&language=en
They do have many employees with tweezers, needles, etc that help assure a top quality product leaves the mill.

jwpretd · Jan 15, 2011

Shearing machines are part of the cloth manufacturing process. They work pretty much like reel-type lawn mowers: there's a drum with a spiral blade that cuts against a straight blade (called a ledger blade - god only knows why I should remember that). They shear the full width of the cloth in one pass. There are some that shear only one side of the cloth and others that shear both sides.

For what (little) it may be worth, baize was (and may still be for all I know) the correct technical term for the cloth used for billiard tables, among other things (gaming tables, doors, etc). Originally, this was a napped cloth that imitated felt. I don't why it was desirable to imitate felt. I presume it was because felt was more expensive to make and was considered more luxurious than woven cloth.

TheWizard · Sep 7, 2018

jwpretd said:
Shearing machines are part of the cloth manufacturing process. They work pretty much like reel-type lawn mowers: there's a drum with a spiral blade that cuts against a straight blade (called a ledger blade - god only knows why I should remember that). They shear the full width of the cloth in one pass. There are some that shear only one side of the cloth and others that shear both sides.

For what (little) it may be worth, baize was (and may still be for all I know) the correct technical term for the cloth used for billiard tables, among other things (gaming tables, doors, etc). Originally, this was a napped cloth that imitated felt. I don't why it was desirable to imitate felt. I presume it was because felt was more expensive to make and was considered more luxurious than woven cloth.

This is actually quite accurate and still true since the cloth used for Snooker, English 8Ball, English Billiards and Chinese 8Ball is napped cloth which is technically called 'Baize' and of course napped cloth has been the traditional cloth for centuries.

It wasn't until Simonis developed the 760 and 860 napless cloths did they really become the standard for pool since before Simonis 760 and 860, the only napless cloth available was for 3Cushion Billiard tables and of course, those tables have heating systems to make them play much vaster.

Pool had mainly used a napped cloth that was alot like snooker cloth, but with less nap fibres and so the cloth was still a bit faster than what had been used for Snooker for Decades.

One practice that countless people in the USA and other countries don't realise is the importance of having and using a billiard iron, which is thermostatically controlled to heat the iron up to a specific temperature, and then the iron is slowly and streadily run over the playing surface cloth in straight lines, lengthways so to level out the cloth fibres again.

This should be done though after the table has been brushed and cleaned of any chalk dust, dirt, etc.

I have learned alot over the years from playing all cuesports and worked in billiard rooms here in the UK, as well as having chatted many times with top level table mechanics over the years too.

realkingcobra · Sep 7, 2018

TheWizard said:
This is actually quite accurate and still true since the cloth used for Snooker, English 8Ball, English Billiards and Chinese 8Ball is napped cloth which is technically called 'Baize' and of course napped cloth has been the traditional cloth for centuries.

It wasn't until Simonis developed the 760 and 860 napless cloths did they really become the standard for pool since before Simonis 760 and 860, the only napless cloth available was for 3Cushion Billiard tables and of course, those tables have heating systems to make them play much vaster.

Pool had mainly used a napped cloth that was alot like snooker cloth, but with less nap fibres and so the cloth was still a bit faster than what had been used for Snooker for Decades.

One practice that countless people in the USA and other countries don't realise is the importance of having and using a billiard iron, which is thermostatically controlled to heat the iron up to a specific temperature, and then the iron is slowly and streadily run over the playing surface cloth in straight lines, lengthways so to level out the cloth fibres again.

This should be done though after the table has been brushed and cleaned of any chalk dust, dirt, etc.

I have learned alot over the years from playing all cuesports and worked in billiard rooms here in the UK, as well as having chatted many times with top level table mechanics over the years too.

On problem you're overlooking is that if wax was used to fill the seams, heat will wick the wax right up into the cloth

Shaving felt?

cyork2

AzB Silver Member

matteroner

AzB Silver Member

QuickEdward

New member

matteroner

AzB Silver Member

btoneill

Keeper of the Cheese

matteroner

AzB Silver Member

Club Billiards

Absolute Billiard Service

reverend

Table Mechanic

matteroner

AzB Silver Member

QuickEdward

New member

matteroner

AzB Silver Member

Dartman

Well-known member

matteroner

AzB Silver Member

RackemBilliards

Player, Room Owner

Dartman

Well-known member

jwpretd

AzB Silver Member

TheWizard

AzB Silver Member

realkingcobra

Well-known member