Gold Crown 3 Face Lift

reverend

reverend

Table Mechanic
Silver Member
Here is a complete rail rebuild and refinish of a Brunswick Gold Crown 3. This thing has seen some time in a pool room in its previous life, so it needed a full over haul. All the sub rails were replaced as well as new cushions, facings, pockets feather strips and cloth.

This is a link to the entire album to view all the pics.
https://picasaweb.google.com/107120106453122431486/GoldCrownIIIFaceLift?authuser=0&feat=directlink


Here is what the rails looked like to start with.
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As you can see, there were different number of facings used on the rails, and there was no facing put on the end of the rail over the cushion in the pocket.
IMAG0503.jpg


As you can see, some creative things were done to the rails to try to "fix" them. Someone had captured the rail nuts in the rail before, so there was no easy fix in the past to repair or replace the rail inserts. A previous mechanic tried the quick fix of installing nut plates on the bottom of the rail, and even tried to use a t-nut.
IMAG0513.jpg


T-nuts can not be used in this way to hold a rail down to the slate.
IMAG0509.jpg



All the damaged wood was removed so a new poplar can be fitted in.
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Long Story short...
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There are more pics in the link above.
 
great work! table looks new! :thumbup:

I am so thankful my gc3 was in near perfect shape when jzmechanix did mine. I probably would of had a heart attack if it looked like that at first. :grin:

what pockets did you use?
 
Very nice work! It's still impresses me every time seeing a table that's been through so much abuse, and then see the same table looking brand new! Great job.
 
Great job Zach! Must have been a ton of work to get everything refurbished like that. :thumbup:
 
Thanks for the kind words. It sure was a project. This is the first Gold Crown I have sanded down to bare wood and refinished with stain/clear. I have always painted them before. This is definitely more work.

rrich1 - The pockets are Gold Crown 4 pockets
Donny - Yes that's my new shop. I built it in the backyard. It sure is nice to have a short commute.
Jack - It was a lot of work, but I think it turned out pretty nicely. I used a semi gloss poly over the stained wood, then paste wax to finish it off. It gave it a nice shine, and a little protection. It is also easy to touch up the finish down the road too. I took one of your ideas about buffing the tops of the rails with the cleaner wax, but it didn't do much. Did you have to do anything else to them to get the rails to look good?
 
reverend said:
Did you have to do anything else to them to get the rails to look good?
Click to expand...

I apply a coat of Mother's Carnauba wax to the formica and then I use a high speed buffing wheel mounted in my drill press to do the final polish. It works pretty well but if the rail tops have a really poor finish on them to begin with it only helps so much. :(

IMAG0220.jpg
 
reverend said:
Thanks for the kind words. It sure was a project. This is the first Gold Crown I have sanded down to bare wood and refinished with stain/clear. I have always painted them before. This is definitely more work.

rrich1 - The pockets are Gold Crown 4 pockets
Donny - Yes that's my new shop. I built it in the backyard. It sure is nice to have a short commute.
Jack - It was a lot of work, but I think it turned out pretty nicely. I used a semi gloss poly over the stained wood, then paste wax to finish it off. It gave it a nice shine, and a little protection. It is also easy to touch up the finish down the road too. I took one of your ideas about buffing the tops of the rails with the cleaner wax, but it didn't do much. Did you have to do anything else to them to get the rails to look good?
Click to expand...

Very good Zach, that's why you're the best in Arizona;)
 
Jack - I will have to try the buffer next time. I just was trying to do it by hand this time.

Glen - Thanks. I just got a call from Colby's to recover their Diamond. Maybe they will get some of their worn out GCs done too.
 
Speaking of drill presses I have 2 for sale.
1 standard and 1 radial arm. If anyone is interested and going
to the BCA show in July let me know.
 
reverend said:
Jack - I will have to try the buffer next time. I just was trying to do it by hand this time.

Glen - Thanks. I just got a call from Colby's to recover their Diamond. Maybe they will get some of their worn out GCs done too.
Click to expand...

Make sure they have you re-calibrate the rails at the same time, it's ALL or nothing....your job is to make all the tables you work on play BETTER, not just look BETTER;)

Glen
 
matteroner said:
You mean your not supposed to use the facings as sub-rail extensions :p

good work....
Click to expand...

I'll tell ya'll something, Zach was the biggest sponge there is to learning EVERYTHING he could while he was on the road with me, the ONLY thing he DIDN"T learn...was how to COOK:rotflmao1: he's a great table mechanic...and STILL willing to learn anything he can...any chance he gets;)

Glen
 
Reasonable alternative?

When the rails of a GC1, 2, or 3 need such extensive rebuilding, is it a viable alternative to use the Brunswick "rail conversion / upgrade"? I've read here that it can be used to replace GC1-3 rails with new GC4 rails.

Does Brunswick still offer it?
 
phill69 said:
what color stain did you use on the legs and shirts
Click to expand...

Take a look at my table in my profile, if you like the way mine turned out when I stained it I can dig up the stain that I used. I tried at 10 different shades/tints/brands before I found one that I thought matched the rails good. It will look slightly different on the legs than the rail blinds. The blinds are Maple, the leg sides Poplar, center is plywood, not sure which species.
 
Kinda glad this thread got resurrected.. I never gave Reverend the big "Thank You" he deserved for inspiring me to re-finish my table! Seeing what the end result could be, I went from apprehensive to excited about tackling the job.

For those asking about stain color, I found Minwax "Red Mahogany" to be pretty much a perfect match to the formica on my Gold Crown 3 rails.
 
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