Shimmed pockets!!!

Q

Quesports

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
With all the talk about tight pockets I want to hear about everyones thoughts about shimmed pockets. I have never played on a table with shimmed pockets that seemed to play correctly. There seems to be no end of problems with them. I have seen shims that were made of plastic and of course rubber, some that were off angle, others that were just plain wrong in every aspect. On one table recntly several pockets seemed OK but one pocket consistently spit balls back out no matter what you did. I found I had to slow roll all the balls in that pocket. Interestingly the room owner was very proud to tell me that the first four tables are tighter because they are shimmed. Ater a while I showed him just how poorly they played compared to his unshimmed tables. He would have been better off leaving them all unshimmed but that is just my opinion. What is everyone elses opinion? I think they are just to inconsistent..
Dan
 
In almost all cases I have to agree with you. Alot of people are proud of their "tight" tables but if you have to slow roll everything then I say they play like crap.
 
I agree

99% of the shimmed tables i have played on play like crap. The new pool hall I have been going to has only one Diamond Pro and he recently had it shimmed. Each pocket plays different. i also know that those old Diamonds played great just the way they were built.
 
Every table that I have seen with shimmed pockets looked bad. A couple of the tables were done by a mechanic that everyone praises as the best. Wouldn't let him put the cover on my table after seeing his work.

I think some just like to brag that they have shimmed pockets and don't realize that the table plays hard only because it is not right.
 
I agree with what others have said. Most shimmed tables play awful. Wrong angles, too many shims stacked, bouncy pockets, different angles where pockets play differently.

Making a pocket smaller can be done right, look at RKC's work. But that's the exception, not the rule in table mechanics. Few are elite and do high end work like that and get the table right. Most just set up unplayable tables.
 
Even aside from the inconsistency, I don't like shimmed pockets. The nipples get too big and the facings look bad.

Personally I don't think pool is more fun when you make the shotmaking harder. We'd all like to think that you play on tight pockets, robbing yourself of a few runouts and fun shots now... but later on, it'll all pay off and you'll have a lot more fun when you're the best, most accurate shooter on the planet.

But in reality, whatever you gain in skill... probably doesn't outweigh the decreased fun you had watching perfectly good shots get spit out.

Pool is plenty challenging enough for me as it is, I don't need to artificially add more difficulty. If I want to increase my shot making skill, I'll simply aim to split the pocket dead in the center, and every time the ball fails to go as clean as I wanted, I'll scold myself and try harder next time.
 
CreeDo said:
Even aside from the inconsistency, I don't like shimmed pockets. The nipples get too big and the facings look bad.

Personally I don't think pool is more fun when you make the shotmaking harder. We'd all like to think that you play on tight pockets, robbing yourself of a few runouts and fun shots now... but later on, it'll all pay off and you'll have a lot more fun when you're the best, most accurate shooter on the planet.

But in reality, whatever you gain in skill... probably doesn't outweigh the decreased fun you had watching perfectly good shots get spit out.

Pool is plenty challenging enough for me as it is, I don't need to artificially add more difficulty. If I want to increase my shot making skill, I'll simply aim to split the pocket dead in the center, and every time the ball fails to go as clean as I wanted, I'll scold myself and try harder next time.
Click to expand...


Careful there CreeDo! You're opening yourself up to harsh criticism and the potential of being labeled a banger by those who promote tiny pockets as part of their effort to uphold their cyber-ego spiel. :p:rolleyes::grin:
 
Thanks..

Thanks for the replies I am taking a copy of this to one of the rooms I go to and hope to convince the owner to get the shims out and leave the tables as they are. I was kinda hoping that Glen would reply and lend some of his knowledge on the subject..
Dan
 
Bola: haha thanks. Yeah I remember arguing this a while ago, it's one of those every-two-months debates you'll find on here, like arguments about jump cues and ld shafts. I don't mind tables that are naturally tight though, like a diamond... people should just buy that table in the first place if they like smaller pockets. I just wouldn't go out of my way to spend time and money to "fix" a pocket that isn't broken. Especially as the owner of a pool room, where 80-90% of my customers cannot run 3 balls.

cuesports, good luck. If it's gonna cost him time and money, I expect the answer to be no, but post back here if he accomodates you. It might restore my faith in humanity after seeing a room with pink duck tape used to patch the cloth.
 
Its the shims that are the problems. U need longer rails not just shims to tighten the pockets up. My brunswick metro came with 4.5 in pockets from the factory and every pocket plays the same. If I hit it good itll go; I can hit the ball at warp speed and if its a dead center pocket hit then itll go.Oscar dominguez swears by tight pockets the table he has at home are 4 inch pockets. He's on the mosconi cup so who am I to argue.

And the local poolhall here has 4 double shimmed 9 footes that also play fine. The rails are crap but the pockets have never been a problem.
 
Shimming pockets is definitely not the ideal way to make them smaller, but, as someone who has a shimmed table, I can also say that not all shimmed tables play terribly. I fully intend to have RKC or someone do the work correctly (extending subrails, new cushions, etc.) at some point, but when I had my table recovered last year, I wasn't prepared to spend the extra $500-$1000 that work would have cost.

I wanted new cloth (860), but I didn't want my practice table to play super soft (is it even possible to miss a ball on 5" pockets with new 860?), so I decided to have my table shimmed as an inexpensive interim solution. I have to say that the result is a practice table that plays very much like I want it to, if not quite ideal. The pockets are now in the 4.5" neighborhood, and they play snug but fair, especially now that the cloth has some wear on it. Shots with speed have to be hit real good, but even very firmly struck balls will drop if they are hit well.

The biggest negatives I have found with the shimmed pockets are:

a) you can't bank off of the shimmed portion of the rail. there is about a 1/2" section next to the pockets that will do screwy stuff if you try to bank off of it. this can be problematic if you intend to play 1p or banks on the table, but doesn't come up much in the other games.

b) kicking off of the pocket facing is far less consistent with shims. occasionally shots will come up where kicking off of a pocket facing is a viable option. you will have to re-evaluate these shots after installing shims.

c) balls that rattle the pocket sometimes do strange things. sometimes you will get a "thunk" sound and the ball will sit there in the jaws rather than go away from the pocket as you would expect.

Aside from these quirky things, my table plays nice. I have played on shimmed GC's that played awful, and I have played on "Ernesto-mized" GC's that played great despite having sadistic pockets. My table is in the middle somewhere, and I don't regret having it shimmed. I do, however, look forward to the day when I have the subrails extended and the pockets sized properly.

Aaron
 
One room I know of has a table that is shimmed down. Here's the story. The players (day time people, they play for free) b****ed and moaned to the owner to get one of the tables shimmed tight, so the room can have a serious table for money games and for them during the day etcetera. Owner was against this for a long time. Finally, their b****ing overcame him and he had it done to shut them up.

Result? During the day, that table isn't nearly as popular or played on as one would expect. It's usually vacant. The very same people that wanted it, don't seem to want to play on it very much. You'd think it would be in use all day because it's the only tight table there for the "players"...Shows me they're more talk than walk. Be careful what you ask for, you might just get it. And sometimes the mind is hungrier than the mouth. Especially when these "players" are, in my opinion, closer to bangers than players.

At night time, when the tables are actually making money the table rarely gets rented. During the day, those guys play free and they also never spend a dime in the place. It gets rented only by bangers at night who are just given that table because all the other tables are rented. It doesn't get rented by league players, it doesn't get rented by anyone playing for money at night. They choose the regular cut tables instead.

I'm not the owner, but by my observation and estimation, that table generates less money than it could. I believe there are plenty of people who would rather wait for another table to open up than rent that tight table. I've seen this happen. I see them up at the counter ask for a table, they get the reply that the tight table is all that's available and you see the instant bummed look on their face and hear the groan they make.


Moral of the story? Cater to those who pay the bills, not those who loiter.


In my other post (this post: http://forums.azbilliards.com/showpost.php?p=2348255&postcount=107) in the other thread about shimmed pockets, I talked about what makes for good playing conditions for those who can't run 2-3 balls.

But I feel I was a little too centered on the typical banger, because the reality is, a lot of league players on up to even B level like regular sized pockets just fine. The better the player, the greater the percentage that enjoy the tighter pockets, but it's not universal meaning higher skill automatically equates to an automatic demand for tighter pockets.


I think that (especially on these forums) people feel the need to say they like the smallest pockets because they don't want to be looked down upon as a banger or someone that doesn't like challenging conditions. It's opposite of the "mine's bigger than yours" ...in pool it's "mine's smaller than yours" :wink:


Me personally, I like the Diamond Pro-Cut pockets. I wouldn't go any smaller than that though because it gets silly. Changes the game when you make the pockets too small. If that's the goal, why not go all the way and play Russian billiards where the pocket is just barely bigger than a single ball?

For a non-pro cut pocket, 4.75" seems to be a good balance and happy medium. Tight to stop the most egregious bad shots from going in, but not too tight to frustrate people. However, if all I had was 5" pockets to play on, that's fine too. Just hold yourself to a higher standard. If you play on 5" buckets, then you should run more racks or run more balls right? You can gauge your skill on either. Let's say you use that Fargo game as a measure. Your score should be higher on 5" pockets than on Pro-Cut pockets. Or in straight pool, you should generate higher average runs. Just because the pocket is bigger doesn't mean you have to hit the pocket facing on a straight in shot to make a ball. Hit the middle of the hole.

What's PAR for the course, depends on the course.
 
shimmed pockets suck in every case period.

if you want a tighter table then do it right and extend the rails, thats the ONLY way to do it correctly. in all other cases there are stories about "its almost as good", If I couldnt afford to have my pockets shimmed I would play with bigger pockets-there is nothing wrong with that. I dont like 4" pockets. I like bigger pockets anyways 4 5/8" is small as I like pockets, unless its a one hole table, then 4" is good.
 
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i prefer my home (practice) table to be shimmed. i like practicing on small pockets. i think there is a small amount of drop off in how well the table plays, but it is well worth it when i go out to play and the pockets look huge.
 
Fatboy said:
shimmed pockets suck in every case period.

if you want a tighter table then do it right and extend the rails, thats the ONLY way to do it correctly..
Click to expand...

Thats my point exactly. Its the shims not the size that make it play like crap. Do it right and itll play right.



and as for the bangers they shouldnt be on a nine footer anyways. Thats what barboxes and 8' and oversized 8's are for. If your gonna cater to the bangers then u might as well put in a barbox with 5.5 inch pockets and round off the slates at the pockets edge. Then EVERYTING will go. and all the bangers will love u.
 
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