Pool Ball Collecting.

[mrpoopytime]

At the moment I have 4 full sets of balls: Aramith premium (which is my normal playing set), the Gumballs and then two unidentified sets.

I'm guessing these unidentified sets were from the 1950s-1980s, possibly Aramith. At some point I'm going to have to go back and dig through all of the posts in this thread to identify them. One of these sets came with my 1950s 9 foot Brunswick Anniversary table and the other was found in a Burt Billiard balls wooden box, but given the more contemporary look and feel, I'm 99.9% sure they are not Burt balls.

I haven't really focused on any particular style at the moment as chalk collecting has been more of my thing right now, but if I see some interesting balls at a good price I'll jump on them. I do suspect I'll collect more vintage balls than modern, given the vintage Mid Century Modern aesthetic I've got going on in the rest of my house.

But of course I've got an order in for a set of Dynasphere Tungstens. However given the surprisingly low price and lack of any movement on that order, I'm guessing that listing was a mistake and I'm expecting it to be canceled at any time now.

And then in the other direction, I'm expecting a an add-on set of clay baseball billiard balls to arrive in the next couple of weeks!

 

[Rubik's Cube]

Bravo, sir!

Thank you for sharing a little about your hobbies and growing ball collection, dear chap. If I spy anything that might be of interest I'll be sure to let you know.

Best wishes.

 

[mrpoopytime]

Here's a little shot of part of my collection, several boxes of chalk and some single balls on a MCM mirror shadowbox.

Hopefully I'll be able to add a custom set of balls designed by you to my collection! If I read the price and order size right, $25,000 for a run of 250 sets is only $100 a set. Given the current prices of balls, $100 seems like a bargain. We just need to find like another 200 buyers, right? :wink:

 

[Rubik's Cube]

Beautiful display, Mr P.

That blue joker ball is a rare beast... you have an extremely desirable ball there, dear fellow.

Regards the Pool Roulette project, sir: $25,000 for 250 sets from Aramith is my best guess based on past ventures by other folks, but I won’t know the exact costs until an actual quote is obtained and I’m not at that stage yet.

All options are still on the table, but my original idea was to attract twenty-five investors (myself included) to each put in $1,000 and subsequently receive ten sets when the balls were made. Investors would then be free to do whatever they wished with their ten sets. Personally, I would keep two boxes for my own collection; sell five sets at about $250 each to recoup my investment with a modest profit; and reserve the remaining three sets as an appreciating asset for a few years when examples will become rare.

Quite possibly a pipe dream, sir, but one can always hope. At present, there are five of us who are keen to move forward with the project.

Many thanks for your interest.

 

[K2Kraze]

Hello, mrpoopytime - great to see a new, friendly fan here in the PBC thread, sharing your treasures and nice pics. Thank you as well for chiming in about the mysterious multi-colored gumball sets snaffled up by a few of us thread collectors A special thanks for mentioning your set of gumballs and a possible lead for new information on their unknown origins.

I also noticed the rare blue poker ball upon your display case shelf and wonder the story behind that acquisition

My observations with the boxed set of sixteen this weekend leads me to think these may very well be from the Hyatt Billiard Ball Company based on one prominent quality that is easily discerned from the photos .... and that is the quality of each ball - the luster and depth of each and every ball is without fault. Each of the sixteen is within a few thousandths of an inch to an exact 2.24” while the weights do vary from a low of 155.4 grams to 169.1 grams, which translates to a half-ounce. The vast majority of them tipped the scale right near a perfect 166 grams. That said, the overall weight tolerance is way outside of any Hyatt offerings that I’ve seen over the years, but IF these are indeed sample balls to showcase colors and manufacturing capabilities for promotional or custom sets, then perhaps exact weights amongst the set wasn’t a crucial factor at the time.

Speaking of weights and tolerances, if one were not the wiser of a group of cueists ogling over the shimmering gumballs upon the baize, you’d never know that either factor affects play. I brought them to the table, using all 16 and cleared a few racks of Offensive 14.1 to see if was indeed the shooter or the balls....

They all went into pockets without a whimper or a glitch.....if they were of exact, matching weights and diameters - all the while using the light-weight cue ball at a measly 156 grams. They played as beautiful as they look and feel. Not a mar or impact mark to be seen.

Hyatts? It’s still a mystery.



~ K.

 

[bfriesth]

At the moment I have 4 full sets of balls: Aramith premium (which is my normal playing set), the Gumballs and then two unidentified sets.

I'm guessing these unidentified sets were from the 1950s-1980s, possibly Aramith. At some point I'm going to have to go back and dig through all of the posts in this thread to identify them. One of these sets came with my 1950s 9 foot Brunswick Anniversary table and the other was found in a Burt Billiard balls wooden box, but given the more contemporary look and feel, I'm 99.9% sure they are not Burt balls.

I haven't really focused on any particular style at the moment as chalk collecting has been more of my thing right now, but if I see some interesting balls at a good price I'll jump on them. I do suspect I'll collect more vintage balls than modern, given the vintage Mid Century Modern aesthetic I've got going on in the rest of my house.

But of course I've got an order in for a set of Dynasphere Tungstens. However given the surprisingly low price and lack of any movement on that order, I'm guessing that listing was a mistake and I'm expecting it to be canceled at any time now.

And then in the other direction, I'm expecting a an add-on set of clay baseball billiard balls to arrive in the next couple of weeks!

Welcome to the group mrpoopytime ! Thanks for sharing.

 

[bfriesth]

Elephant Stars and Stripes

I received this set of Elephant Stars and Stripes this weekend and added it to my patriotic display. I imagine one of you collectors could enlighten me as to the approximate age of this set???

 

[Rubik's Cube]

Yet another great addition to the fabulous Friesth collection, dear fellow.

I’ll have a look at my notes later and report back with whatever historical information I can find about the set, sir.

 

[mrpoopytime]

Unfortunately my lead on the gumballs has come to a dead end. The auction house received it from another individual who received them from an estate and none of them have any additional information.

The story about the joker ball isn't terribly exciting. I happened to be searching various sites for interesting chalk when I came across a seller of various single balls. All of the balls were not anything to write home about, except for that joker ball. I've been interested in acquiring a poker pool set, so I knew I had to have it! That being said, I was not aware of what the rest of the set looked like (I do now) and would not have expected the interested that you all are showing now! It does have some sentimental value to me, as it is the first ball I bought solely for the purposes of collecting.

 

[mrpoopytime]

bfriesth, this may have been addressed in an earlier post but did you make those shelves yourself? I'm starting to get into woodworking and I've been thinking about making some ball shelves and ball boxes. If you have some plans for those shelves I'd love to see them!

 

[bfriesth]

Good morning, Mr M.

It’s always great to hear from you, dear fellow.

The chances of commissioning a custom set of balls like Brent’s Norwegians or my Pool Roulette is possible, sir, but admittedly very slim. If one wants quality (and who doesn’t) the top manufacturers like Aramith or Vigma require minimum orders of 200 or more units, so costs often prove too high for a private customer.

It most case it is a pipe dream, old chap, but we can always hope!

RC, I was pondering the Roulette and Norwegian custom sets last night. Your design on the Roulettes are fantastic and fun. Roulette has worldwide appeal where as the appeal for the Norwegian set might be much more limited. I think you could find your 20 or 25 investors at $1000 each (I can commit to that here) but I think that I might have to find a specific retailer of distributor to carry the bulk of the investment for the flags.

Just my thought for the day.

 

[Rubik's Cube]

Hello, Mr B.

Alas, you’re probably right that the Norwegians might have rather a limited appeal, dear chap... but I bet they would be popular in Norway!

Perhaps we should design a mixed set... half Norwegian, half American?

 

[Rubik's Cube]

Perhaps you could explore the possibility of some sort of partnership with a Norwegian billiard retailer or distributor, sir?

I’m thinking if you could land a guaranteed wholesale order it would offer great security. I used to sell 200 plus sets per year easily, and I was only a small business.

 

[bfriesth]

Ahh....I see a road trip to Scandinavia in my future.

 

[bfriesth]

bfriesth, this may have been addressed in an earlier post but did you make those shelves yourself? I'm starting to get into woodworking and I've been thinking about making some ball shelves and ball boxes. If you have some plans for those shelves I'd love to see them!

I'm happy to share some details of my display project with the hope that I don't bore some of our other AZBers. If you have any addition question I am can share more on AZB or you can PM me any time.

Concept: I wanted to come up with a display that would feature the pool ball set rather than the shelf itself. Rubik's Cube and K2K helped me with some initial ideas. (see post #1326). Because I wanted to make so many shelves I preferred to find a design that I could make myself to be cost efficient. Mind you, my woodworking/carpentry resume consist of an A grade in my Junior High shop class. So I have just enough amateur tools and knowledge to be dangerous. Here is what happened:

- I experimented with standard dimension 1"x3" pine boards from Home Depot. Actual dimension 2.5"x.75". This seamed to be perfect to hold a set of 2.25" balls.

- I could not figure out how to cut a rounded groove in the board(like you would see in any antique pool ball wall rack) so I cut a simple 1/16th" grove using dado blade (Home Depot) and my crappy home table saw.

- I cut these to a 37" length to account for 16 balls spaced 1/8th inch apart.

- I attached them to the wall using two L brackets (I was able to find stud walls in my case.

- The pine prototypes seemed to work well so I found a high end hardwood retailer in Denver that sold 1"x3" dimension walnut which I wanted to match my new AES table.

- I started with 24 shelves, cut to 37" lengths, 1/16th" dado groove and hung them on the wall. This worked well and the balls stayed on the shelf but still rolled slightly from side to side. To perfect the display I removed all the shelves, borrowed a neighbor's drill press, and created a 1/2" dimple in the shelve for each of the 16 balls. This worked great. I can roughly place a set of balls on the shelf and then go back and more precisely place each ball on one of the dimples for a perfect display.

I subsequently got my wife's permission to install another column of eight shelves so I have a total of 32.

Photos are attached. Happy to help any way I can..

 

[mrpoopytime]

I'm happy to share some details of my display project with the hope that I don't bore some of our other AZBers. If you have any addition question I am can share more on AZB or you can PM me any time.

Thanks! That was quite informative. I do wonder though if it could be made simpler by skipping the dado groove and just using the drill pressed dimples.

Also, that's a lovely collection! I'm also jealous of all that wall space. A good portion of my room is taken up by windows (which are certainly nice in their own way) so I've been thinking about ways to display balls vertically, between the windows.

 

[bfriesth]

Absolutely, I think just the dimples would work well and save time. Vertical ball display would be very interesting and look great. I would have to ponder that for awhile for some ideas. Do you already have a design in mind?

 

[Rubik's Cube]

Hello, gentlemen.

Just a very quick comment about vertical displays for what it’s worth. I’ve often thought about this concept as I believe it would look fantastic. I checked online and large glass tubes are available. I envisaged some sort of internal frame encased in a glass cylinder that one could lift on and off for access to the balls.

Crazy idea, I know.

 

[mrpoopytime]

I had considered some sort of wire frame, similar to a ball return or what I've seen on some snooker table pockets. I like the glass tube idea as well. The problem I see with these vertical designs is that they make it more difficult to access the balls if you want to play with them.

 

[ChuckJones1987]

Many thanks to everyone showcasing all the various pool balls out there. As a relatively new collector, I would be lost on my hunt for unique pool balls without the information shared here. You guys are awesome.

Here's a no number ball set I stumbled upon a couple weeks ago. I am unable to find any information at all on this. Does anyone own a set? Super Aramith Pro EX.