Pictures of new Valley 7ft Replacement rails.

Good find with the post!
I've been wondering where the subject went to, and why I haven't seen anymore on it.

Great work guys!:grin-square:

I hope that everyone in the country decides that they have to have them- They definately look like an improvement-
 
Can these rails be bought pre-covered and shimmed to tighten the pockets up?
 
Klink said:
Can these rails be bought pre-covered and shimmed to tighten the pockets up?
Click to expand...

You can extend the length of the rails which in turn would make the pocket target smaller, but as far as tightening up the pockets, that's a whole nother story. The slate shelves on Valley tables is so shallow, tight pockets or not, once the balls are in the pockets...they're going to fall, because there is no slate to support the rattle of a ball in the pocket...so, either the ball is in...or it's out. Talk to Kerry about making the rails longer, but be advised, that will also make the rails stick out in the corner pockets past the pocket castings by quite a bit, so you're also going to have to make sure the pocket liner does not interfere with bolting up the cushions flush to the rail caps, you may even have to cut back the pocket liners a bit just to make room for the extended rail blocks:wink:

Glen
 
I am no expert on bar tables but I suggest the following: If you want tight pockets on any bar table and a deeper shelf I would make those little bolt on rails thicker so they went into the play area more. Perhaps not too much because it would look funny but up to 3\8 or even half of an inch wouldn't look bad. Now you have room to make tighter pockets and have a deeper shelf. Doesn't seem that hard to me. Yes you would also have to replace the bolts and the playing surface would be reduced slightly. You could purchase rails and just glue on a boardplate to accomplish this. Maybe I just invented another method, yes I think I did. Well the idea is there, would be happy to do it but I am working on billiard blocks right now. This would be a fun project I think and then you could get better angles on the pockets also.
 
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OTLB said:
I am no expert on bar tables but I suggest the following: If you want tight pockets on any bar table and a deeper shelf I would make those little bolt on rails thicker so they went into the play area more. Perhaps not too much because it would look funny but up to 3\8 or even half of an inch wouldn't look bad. Now you have room to make tighter pockets and have a deeper shelf. Doesn't seem that hard to me. Yes you would also have to replace the bolts and the playing surface would be reduced slightly. You could purchase rails and just glue on a boardplate to accomplish this. Maybe I just invented another method, yes I think I did. Well the idea is there, would be happy to do it but I am working on billiard blocks right now. This would be a fun project I think and then you could get better angles on the pockets also.
Click to expand...

That's already been thought of....a long time ago...LOL, and that way also requires that the angles of the pockets to be changed, because the Valley pockets are already at 4 1/2" the way they are.

Glen
 
Can I pay to have them covered before shipping and I won't use PayPal, will you be taking credit cards soon? Or can I send a money order? Johnnyt
 
realkingcobra said:
That's already been thought of....a long time ago...LOL, and that way also requires that the angles of the pockets to be changed, because the Valley pockets are already at 4 1/2" the way they are.

Glen
Click to expand...


Yeap it wouldn't surprise me. Who came up with that? Are there any examples anywhere?????? I didn't realize there was such a demand for these things, interesting. No offense but the angles look weird, I think its worth modifying to improve those. Of course if its in a bar than it makes sense and cents to have angles like that but not for pool players. I now have my next project after billiard blocks.
 
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Johnnyt said:
Can I pay to have them covered before shipping and I won't use PayPal, will you be taking credit cards soon? Or can I send a money order? Johnnyt
Click to expand...
With your outdoor situation I doubt the RBack rails or even the ones we did with Artemis
are going to make a significant difference. JMO.
 
Replacement pockets for a 7-foot Valley

Are there any web sites that sell real Valley pocket liners. All I have found is the rubber and plastic replacements? I bought them and they don't fit well at all. Johnnyt
 
Johnnyt said:
Are there any web sites that sell real Valley pocket liners. All I have found is the rubber and plastic replacements? I bought them and they don't fit well at all. Johnnyt
Click to expand...
Man, you're just never satisfied, LOL
Call Brady Distributing at (407) 872-1667 - maybe they can help.

Most retailers do not stock OEM liners since 1. Valley parts are expensive and
2. pocket liners are pretty generic and with a little trimming, if needed,
can be made to fit perfectly.
 
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Dartman said:
Man, you're just never satisfied, LOL
Call Brady Distributing at (407) 872-1667 - maybe they can help.

Most retailers do not stock OEM liners since 1. Valley parts are expensive and
2. pocket liners are pretty generic and with a little trimming, if needed,
can be made to fit perfectly.
Click to expand...

Thank you Dartman. Johnnyt
 
Valley tighter pockets

OTLB said:
I am no expert on bar tables but I suggest the following: If you want tight pockets on any bar table and a deeper shelf I would make those little bolt on rails thicker so they went into the play area more. Perhaps not too much because it would look funny but up to 3\8 or even half of an inch wouldn't look bad. Now you have room to make tighter pockets and have a deeper shelf. Doesn't seem that hard to me. Yes you would also have to replace the bolts and the playing surface would be reduced slightly. You could purchase rails and just glue on a boardplate to accomplish this. Maybe I just invented another method, yes I think I did. Well the idea is there, would be happy to do it but I am working on billiard blocks right now. This would be a fun project I think and then you could get better angles on the pockets also.
Click to expand...
I think the best way to tighten a Valley pool table. would be to add phenolic to to slate shelf, where the balls drop.Then when you get it where you want it, use bondo the finish it off. A valley is made to swallow the ball. This would not affect the playing field and would be the best way. A eighth inch longer cut on both sides of the rail with a small subrail would help. Thanks, Ron
 
Back when I was building coin-operated pool tables, I messed around with a Valley 8ft once, by switching the slate in the table with either a Irving K or a Quality that had deep pocket shelfs. The first thing I noticed, was that if you pocketed a ball on the Valley table with any kind of speed, the ball bounced right back onto the playing surface. There's a reason most of the coin-op tables have short slate shelves. Because of the cabinet design of almost all coin tables, you just don't have much room in the pocket design to go back very far in in the depth of the actual pocket castings...and still be able to bolt the pocket castings to the side panels of the box. This is the same reason that almost all coin tables have smaller side pockets than corner pockets, if you try and make the side pocket a 1/2" bigger than the corner pocket, you'll be cutting the side pocket right through the top rail and side panel to do it. Brunswick made a good attempt to get the pockets right on their GC2000 coin table, but the table was a failer right from the start, because within the first 6 months the blue dot cue ball separator quit working, so you had to switch over to the over sized cue ball in order to keep playing the table.

As the leader of the industry of coin-op tables has been the Valley company, most all coin-op manufactures modeled their tables in line with the Valley design, especially after Valley's patent ran out on the magnetic cue ball.

Coin tables are for the most part, designed to make the games go fast, this is why if you look at all the coin-op tables still around today, you'll see the back of the pocket is wider than the mouth, this is to help catch the balls being pocketed, instead of rejecting them.

From my experience in the coin industry, most all coin manufactures had one or two good ideas designed into their tables that kind of set them apart from the rest of the competition, but not enough good ideas to push them out front as the in demand tables. The Valley designed tables forged ahead because they gave their support to the vending industry and not the open market, by pricing the tables wholesale and retail cost so close together that no one could make a living selling Valley tables to end users, so...the vendors for the most part took over the market by supplying bars and pubs with leased tables.

In Washington state, since it wasn't vendor controlled, every coin manufacture there was built and sold 8ft tables there, I call it the dumping ground...LOL most of these tables didn't last very long, but bar owners were hungry to own their own tables and were willing to buy just about anything there was for sale...at a cheap price, and where theres a buyer, believe me...there's a ton of sellers!!!

(1) American Shuffel board
(2) ATI
(3) Valley
(4) Dynamo
(5) Delta
(6) USB
(7) Quality
(8) Lola
(9) Western
(10) Irving K
(11) Great American
(12) Eagle
(13) Brunswick (3 different kinds)
(14) Delmo
(15) United
(16) Fisher
(17) Global
(18) Sheltie
(19) King Cobra
(20) Diamond

I'm still missing some somewhere...LOL I just can't remember them all any more.

Glen
 
slate shelf

OTLB said:
Look forward to some pics, might there be a problem lifting the slate later?
Click to expand...
Not if you do not over do it. I am not saying it will make a big improvement. I am saying that you would, notice a difference.
 
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