I think this will be an easy fix,
I'd suggest you remove the problem rail, flip it over, pull the staples, check if the rubber cushion has become detached from the rail. sometimes people use spray glue or not enough glue or put it together too quickly, then the bond breaks, then the ball won't bounce back right. Slow balls will loose all their speed .
You can check the height, I think its 63 1/2 or 64 % of ball size, but I personally do not think that's really the problem and it wont change by itself. if too low, the ball bounces off table on return. shoot a ball hard, if it bounces off the table it's set too low.
If too high ball gets driven down. If they are set too high it will cause a gully in the cloth near the cushion, that will happen but it will happen faster if it's too high, than if it's correct.
a cushion that's detached from the rail won't rebound properly because much energy is lost by the gap and movement between cushion and rail. the more solid and heavy the rail is the better it wil return the energy. a really good snooker table has heavy weights int he rails to help and it also makes them very quiet. most of these new tables are particleboard MDF, its heavy but I also consider it to be junk used in place of good hardwood but you can have your own opinion on that. there arediferent qualities of MDF some is High density HDF I suppose.. the MDF is medium density particleboard. Thats only imortant if you are buying a table, or new rails, but you have what you have there.
you can see how bad it is and maybe try to pull it off , clean and re-glue then re wrap your cloth over it.
my take on posting in that particular help section was that there is one particular individual that is just very rude and won't try to help and seems to want to promote his own business..
He's a know-it-all basically, the type that can't learn because he has the inability to listen to others and find new information or change his viewpoint on things. No doubt he has recovered quite a few tables. I'd just take some reply posts from so called " official pool table mechanics" with a grain of salt. Its hardly rocket science.
if you think the rail is loose just hold it and have someone shoot balls at it and compare.
It'll shake if it's loose and the sound will be different. I bet this is not the case especially since you checked and the bolts were tight.
bad bond between rubber and the rail, Just reglue it. Remeber you can't glue to dirt so clean it before the glue. Id use contact cement, the stinky older stuff not the newer water based. put it on both surfaces, let it get sort of dry to the touch then press it hard together.
with the cloth off so you can see better, just wiggle it, youll probably see it's just come a bit loose, thats my bet. your cloth looks nice so I'd just do the one problem area.
after , if it's not an end rail it needs to line up wiht the other rail so get down low and sight along the two. they should line up accurately with one another.
I service joinery equipment so I made myself a carbide scraper holder that takes spent paner blades ,You can go buy a carbide scraper. when they are sharp they are really good for removing the surface junk and getting things flat.. a blade like that has one sharp endge and is ground to about 25 degrees. Put the square edge toward you can pull and it will work wonders especially as you practice more, I'd try on other things to get the hang of it.
on the rubber side, that might be a challenge if both are rubbery ..
I have a small grinder I use, you can very delicately use an agle grinder. mine runs at about 1/3 the speed of a normal one, with a stone mounted. its a 220 grinder running on 110 to make it go slow. I can use that in a delicate way to remove rubber or contact cement. sort of feathering over, touching down carefully , not going all gung ho.. It'll make rubber dust..
you can cut rubber with a sharp knife but there is usually a problem with the rubber deflection , you can grind it away. It difficult to sand a rubbery surface.. on the wood rail you can scrape and I'd use a sharp and new carbide scraper.
you want the glue off so it can bond, but if there is some it's not such a problem ,mainly you want a flat even bond so you don't want any lumpy junk in between.
I think if you clean the problem rail, re glue it, re wrap the old cloth it will be ok. If not you arent; any further back so long as you aren't making a sticky mess of glue.
