For those of you who are interested, here's my guide to how to go about buying a pool table. As ever, I'm mainly a reporter here: I listen to and read experts but I'm not an expert myself. Note that this Guide is for the U.S. If you live outside the U.S. I can't be of much help.
Three general rules
Rule no. 1: It ain't easy to buy a pool table. Or at least for me it hasn't been. Pool tables are easy to make and difficult to make well, and most any company can do it. History is littered with ambitious souls who embarked on their own quixotic project to built the perfect beast, so there are hundreds and hundreds of makes and literally thousands of models, and sometimes even experts can't identify exactly what they are dealing with. (A recent thread title on a billiards forum: "Yet another help identify this table request.") There are good brands with unknown names and bad brands with names that used to be famous, tables with misleading names ("American Heritage" tables were made in China for example) and tables with no nameplates at all. Price isn't necessarily a reliable guide—you can spend very little money on fantastically solid and well-built tables (or even get one for free, and yes, I know of specific real examples) and you can spend a breathtaking amount on cheap imports that have been marked up 700% or more (ditto). Yet pool tables are expensive. Even good ones are difficult to set up well. And most every buyer wants to get off cheap, which places intense downward pressure on the marketplace. It's a recipe for general shoddiness, inadequacy, and widespread "barely good enough" manufacturing...and, sure enough.
Rule no. 2: The most important thing for your prospective happiness is not the table but who's going to set the table up for you.
There are three types of such people:
Pool table installers: Usually employees of gameroom dealerships, these can range from inexperienced teenagers who couldn't nail three boards together to grizzled old guys who've been schlepping slate for years. Many of them don't really know much beyond the rudiments of how new tables are supposed to go together. Others are better. Which are you going to get? No way to tell.
Pool table movers: These are usually independent businessmen who own a small company (usually with its name emblazoned on the side of a van or small box truck) that can be hired to knock down, move, and set up any kind of pool table. They might be used by dealers but are normally not paid by them. Who pays them? You do. This is who you will hire to get a used table from wherever you found it to where you want it to go. Movers are usually far more experienced than the typical installer, much more able to deal with old or odd brands, and capable of handling a much wider range of typical problems. Note that the cost of a mover can be a significant percentage of the cost of buying a used table, and sometimes can cost even more than the table itself costs.
Pool table mechanics: Mechanics do moving and installation of course, but they go beyond that—they are experts in the subtleties of playability, table modifications, repairs, and—often but not always—antique restorations. They can "cure" an old table of successive layers of damage inflicted by time, inept moves, ignorant installers, or poor original quality. They understand pocket geometry; they can fabricate missing parts. They know not only what generation a Gold Crown is but whether it's a Frankentable (made up from parts that originally didn't belong together, for instance when ex-poolroom tables are stored together and the parts get mixed up), how much life your rails have left in them, et cetera, et cetera. Many of them will travel around the country for clients. The best ones are in very heavy demand and you might have to stand in line for months or years for their services. The guy who set up my second pool table back in Wisconsin is a second-generation mechanic; he was re-covering rails for his dad when he was eight years old. I found him through an independent broker of Diamond pool tables. (Diamond is the Ferrari of pool tables. More on this later.)
Well, actually the above list is not quite complete—there's a fourth type of setup person, and that is...you. Do-it-yourselfers. In general, pool table setup is best left to experts, unless you're a gimlet-eyed appraiser of your own craft skills and know for a cold fact that you excel in this arena. It's been my observation that some do-it-yourself craftspeople can be more like golfers who cheat—they have an inflated sense of their own expertise and abilities. It's not like you can't do it, but it's a specialized skill. Experience helps.
Here's a sequence that shows you a sample of what an experienced mechanic can do (just one of many, many possible problems they solve). Is a do-it-yourselfer going to know how to do such a thing, coming to the job cold?
My advice regarding Rule 2: First, settle for a mere installer only if you are buying a brand new, mainstream product from an established gameroom dealer. By "mainstream" I mean something they're familiar with that they sell often, rather than a one-off that they hardly ever see or sell. You still might have headaches. Don't expect much of installers; most are not experts. Therefore, you have to take an active interest in how your table works, as it's being assembled and once it's in. Hover like a vulture even if it makes them uncomfortable. It's better to assume they are idiots and be pleasantly surprised than it is to assume they are competent and have headaches later that cast a pall over every shot on your prized purchase. Have your own mechanic's level handy and check the level yourself; roll balls slowly next to each rail and across the table, watching closely for any rolloff; hit balls hard into the corner pockets from along the adjoining rail and see that a true shot falls rather than rattles; and run your hands over the whole table to make sure there's nothing left under the "felt" (it's not felt, it's cloth). The installers from Master Z's in Waukesha, Wisconsin, left a piece of schmutz under the cloth of my first table that was so big it made a ball rolling over it hop up off the table, and I am sadly neither kidding nor exaggerating.
Regarding movers, do your due diligence. Some are great and will make you happy; others are fly-by-night and are looking for a quick buck because it's a better job than heaving garbage cans (it's kinda like the same range as you find with interstate moving companies—some are gold-plated, some are scurvy pirates, and some are in between). Talk to them first, find out how long they've been in business, ask for references or peruse the references on their websites, tell them exactly what you want to have happen and ask them if they're familiar with such a job. A hint: the more questions they ask you, the better you should like it.
Third, use a real mechanic if you can afford it...
...And if you can find one. Who are these people and how do you find them? Well, if you're dealing with one of the Big Five companies (see below), ask the companies who they like in your area. Ask on AZBilliards.com. Ask restoration experts who deal in antique tables. Find forums with other owners of your brand of table and ask them. There's no list of master mechanics that I know of, no functional association, no clearinghouse such as Angie's List.
There's only one source of information you might avoid: other mechanics! All of them seem to share the opinion that they themselves are the only ones who do good work. All right, now I am kinda kidding here.
But to reiterate: Your setup person is going to account for half your satisfaction with your purchase. I learned this lesson vividly because my first pool table was set up by blatantly incompetent installers who had to return again and again to "cure" the problems they kept leaving behind, and my second table was set up by an expert mechanic with a lifetime of experience who was an excellent craftsman and knew exactly what he was doing. It's better to have a great setup person on a so-so used table than a sketchy setup person on an originally high-quality table. Do not treat this part of your purchase lightly. It's not an afterthought.
Rule no. 3: Most normal humans buy a pool table only once. It's expensive and a giant pain in the ass to trade one for another, so pool tables tend to haunt you: it might stay where you put it through successive generations or across different homeowners, or it might travel with you throughout moves in your own life until you die. (Tip: many people selling old pool tables for cheap are looking for somebody else to get the dang thing out of their basement and out of their hair!) Get the wrong one and you could have the world's most expensive laundry-folding table shoved into a corner of your basement for the next quarter century. Get the right one right from the start and then keep it forever and you'll be happiest, even if you have to save up for longer or spend more.
Of course, many people can't do that and I understand.
Antique tables
Everybody who owns a 19th century to a 1920s antique table, in whatever condition, fantasizes that they have a valuable treasure on their hands, and regardless of how threadbare or useless it is they will slap it on eBay for umpteen thousand dollars. If not more, bah-dum-pah. Hint: look under the "Sold Items" checkbox on eBay, not the current listings. See what things actually sold and for what price. Un-restored antique tables are like family bibles—everybody thinks theirs is valuable because it's old and it's fancy, even if it's shabby or hurt. But there's not much demand for old family bibles and there is not much of a market for un-restored antique pool tables either.
The reason New England is (or was) lousy with antiques is that it used to be the most populous area of the U.S. when the U.S. was smaller—that is, there used to be a lot of people there, and they left their belongings behind. It's similar with pool tables. It was a hugely popular sport in the 19th century. Pool tables were a significant status symbol. And woodworkers and great woodworking were exponentially more common then. So there are actually lots of antique pool tables around. There's no way to generalize how they will actually play—almost all of them are different, and mostly it will depend on who restored it.
Benedict "Butterly" on mahogany, restored by Bankshot. Price?
If you have to ask you can't afford it.
If you want a restored antique, on the other hand, we're into a different universe. You can get everything from a gorgeous "resto-mod" (the term is a portmanteau of restored and modified) vintage Brunswick from Sloezen Billiards to a fastidiously restored, period-correct Benedict with elaborate marquetry restored on demand by Bankshot Antique Pool Tables in Albany, New York. "On demand" means you pick an un-restored old wreck from their extensive inventory and they'll restore it for you to order. It will be transformed (see the examples on their website). Expect to spend $5,000 to $50,000 to restore the best 1800s pool tables, double that in New York City. That's what all those "Before" old tables on eBay require!
And by the way, antique pool tables aren't necessarily the best build quality, either. Many have a type of construction that uses what are called T-rails, which bolt on through the side and straight into the slate, into nuts or lugs implanted in the slate—and the slate is undersized by today's best practices, extending only to just under the cushions. This is an elaborate and difficult method of attaching the rails...and also not a very good method! At least you can tell when this has been done, because the table will have bolt-holes in its side that are covered up by decorative rosettes:
An absolutely awesome old Union League offered by Blatt Billiards in New York City. See those round rosettes on the side rails? Those are bolt-hole covers, revealing that the table uses T-rails.
Unfortunately, other less-than-desirable methods of rail attachment that are more modern are completely hidden when the innocent would-be purchaser examines a fully assembled pool table. In fact, a lot of what makes one pool table superior and another inferior can't easily be seen from the outside, which is one seriously excellent reason to go with a reliable known brand. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
The two styles
There are two kinds of people in the world, goes the old joke: those who divide everything into two kinds and those who don't. Well, the former will tell you that there are two kinds of pool tables: furniture and commercial. Furniture tables are decorative, usually made of wood, and intended to blend with home decor and be good to look at in the living room, like furniture. Commercial tables are more utilitarian, might be plain and homely-looking, and are usually made of functional materials such as laminates that stand up to wear.
Of course, the distinction breaks down when you look a little deeper into each category. Tournament tables are the high end of the "commercial" category, and the Diamond Professional (that's the model name—Diamond does not have a way with nomenclature!), a supposedly utilitarian commercial table, is beautiful—simple and clean. Yet the most common type of commercial table by far is the ubiquitous "bar box" coin-op table you see in bars, bowling alleys, American Legion Posts, Moose Clubs, and VFWs. Functional they are, but pretty they are not.
My old Diamond Professional, which I lost in a move
The quintessential "bar box"
And there is almost infinite variation in "furniture" styling, including industrial styles and a whole category called "rustic" (or "Western") intended to blend well with the decor of modern log homes.
The Rexx Red, an industrial furniture-style table made of steel
A rustic/Western style table. Aspen Rustic says, "there will be no two alike, ever!"
Bar boxes are usually smaller than seven feet (70 to 78 inches long by half that in width—all pool tables are supposed to be twice as long as they are wide, regardless of what those dimensions are), and are so called because they don't knock down—they're transported as one complete "box" to which you attach legs on location, and level merely by raising or lowering the foot of each leg. Most bar boxes are now made by Valley-Dynamo in Texas, a merger of the two former main competitors Valley and Dynamo. Bar-box-style tables can be purchased as home tables without the payment and ball-release mechanisms, but they're not popular as such. And not recommended—they're surprisingly expensive, and most of what you'd be paying for is their friendliness to quick and easy transportability, and the ball release, and the cue ball separator (how they get the cue ball to be returnable after scratching while at the same time "capturing" all the object balls, pending the user's next payment).
Hatch Billiards embodies the true spirit of "furniture style." Master woodworker Howard Hatch works with clients to create one-of-a-kind masterpieces, reasonably priced for this kind of work at $10,000–$20,000. Not surprisingly, he's also an artisanal furniture maker.
Furniture styles can range from plain veneered pressboard on simple low-cost imports to elaborately carved exotic woods, imitations of historical styles, ultramodern geometrical forms, zany steampunk concoctions (Google "Hurricane Billiards"), tables made from real car bodies...pretty much anything you can imagine has been done. And then some. But let's get back to reality.
There are other "two kinds" divisions, but I'll mention only one now: American vs. imported. Then we'll get to The Big Five.
American vs. imported
The saddest tale in this entire topic is that the U.S. market has been increasingly flooded by cheap imported tables over the past two or three decades, and the imports have choked domestic manufacture like an invasive species. If they haven't killed brands outright (or enticed them over to the dark side) then at least they've forced American manufacturers to cheapen their entry-level products in a vain attempt to stay competitive. Most of the imports come from China, and most are of indifferent to poor quality. That is when they aren't atrocious. They do well because they can be cheaper than U.S.-made tables, but they're also sometimes marked up to an almost shocking extent. In general you'd do well to avoid imports, but it's not always easy to do, because many importers are eager to cover up their products' origins.
There are however still some domestic makers of pool tables—fine hardwood tables made by Americans in factories on American soil. Most of these remaining domestic tables are of more solid design, use high-quality materials, and have much better quality control and customer service than most of the imports. They'll play better and last longer.
Who are they?
The 'Big Five'
The "Big Five" true Made-in-the-USA pool table makers, in alphabetical order, are:
- Connelly (Richland Hills, Texas, a suburb of Fort Worth)
- Diamond (Jeffersonville, Indiana, which is part of the Louisville, Kentucky metropolitan area)
- Golden West (Portland, Oregon)
- Olhausen (Portland, Tennessee, also right on the border of Kentucky, up Route 65 from Nashville), and
- A.E. Schmidt (downtown St. Louis, Missouri)
Connelly is on its second owners—it's now the home table brand of Valley-Dynamo (original founder Craig Connelly now runs a dealership of various kinds of tables and gameroom furnishings in Arizona called Craig Billiards); Diamond is still run by its founder; Golden West relocated to Oregon from Los Angeles California in the late '90s, but is still owned and run by the founder, along with his son; Olhausen is still run by the brothers who founded it; and A.E. Schmidt of St. Louis (the initials stand for "Anna Elizabeth," wife of the founder way back when) is by far the oldest continuously operating American pool table maker, with fifth-generation(!) Schmidts working at the factory today. I haven't double-checked the information in this paragraph with primary sources, but I think all this is right.
Are there other U.S. makers? Sure. We've mentioned a few already. Some make "rustic" tables in that log-cabin aesthetic, some restore antiques, some make high-dollar designer tables in low numbers for fine residences. And for our neighbors north of the border there's a lovely Canadian brand, Canada Billiard & Bowling, made in a lavish facility in Laval, Quebec, near Montreal. However, despite the proximity, CBB tables are neither common nor easy to get in the United States.
The "big" in Big Five might be a little optimistic in some cases...the pool table business as a whole is a pretty small industry. But those five are currently the mainstream "everyman" brands of production pool tables produced in the U.S.A. by the hundreds or thousands for ordinary Americans.
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That's enough of this for today. In Part II of this post (better give me a few weeks) I'll wrap up with my capsule reviews of each of the Big Five, talk about the advantages and pitfalls of buying used, make a few specific recommendations—and try to tackle the elephant in the room, Brunswick.
Mike
Original contents copyright 2020 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:
Victor Bloomfield: "I was about to complain about this off-topic post, but then I read it. It's a lot better than the average contemporary camera or lens review—an insight into an unexpectedly interesting but totally unfamiliar world. Looking forward to Part II."
John Camp: "Re 'It was a hugely popular sport in the 19th century. Pool tables were a significant status symbol.' Still are, I guess. We sold our last house through Sotheby's real estate company, which sounds fancy, but it's really just another real estate company; but they publish a magazine of high-end for-sale houses around the country, and we somehow got on the list to get the magazine. A lot of the houses will show you a peek of a room with a pool table in it. I noticed this a few months ago, and after it caught my attention, I started looking for them, and seeing them."
David Littlejohn: "I was reading an article several years ago about buying a used piano. The author warned the reader to avoid PSOs, piano shaped objects, which look like pianos but are not capable of functioning as actual musical instruments. Maybe there’s a pool table equivalent."
Mike replies: Wow, that's great. I'm going to steal that. So true.
jp41: "Mike, your previous OT article on closed-cell polyurethane spray foam sent me down a rabbit hole and I spent many hours of my vacation watching YouTube videos on Matt Risinger and Joe Lstiburek. I'm trying to resist doing this again with pool tables. I do know now that if I ever decided to buy a pool table, I'd be seeking out a Diamond Professional. I agree, this model is beautiful."
Jeff1000: "I was on the edge of my seat reading this. Even though I'll never buy a pool table its very rewarding to learn something new. Who knows when this might come in handy. Nice job writing this piece because I know I really enjoyed reading it. Thanks."
Mike replies: Thank you for saying so! I have to admit I agonized over whether to publish this. I'm always worried that people will be disapproving, or think that I no longer like photography, or just be bored. But I tend to get so drenched in interest over whatever tugs at me at any given moment that it's tough to tear myself away from it.
Paul in AZ: "This was the most enjoyable read on this site in my memory. Not that I have a table or will ever have one. My only prolonged contact with pool was decades ago—some barroom pool shooting for beers when I was young, stupid and drunk too often. I am looking forward to chapter two."
Jnny: "I inherited a cheapo table from a neighbor. I knew it wasn't slate, but I was amazed what I found when I scrapped it. The playing surface was a 1-and-1/4-inch thick wood composite. But the fargin bastiges at the factory had applied a slate-appearing sticker to the bottom side of the composite. I'm guessing it was to fool any poor sucker or rube who crawled under the table to give it a gander."
Mike replies: Pretty sneaky! I've heard of that. But never seen it. Buyer beware.
We're lucky in Melbourne Oz to have several longstanding local billiards table manufacturers - e.g. Alcocks and Harry Evans & Sons - with no shortage of expertise and advice, if you can afford it. Melbourne has also retained several of the world's great 19th Century billiard's rooms - see https://alcocks.com.au/great-australian-billiard-rooms for some pics (plus some of how the other half live). How anyone plays on the full-size tables is beyond me - I can hardly see to the other side of them, let alone place a ball accurately over that distance.
Posted by: Bear. | Sunday, 13 December 2020 at 05:51 PM
Wow. It is always fascinating to see an "insider's" view of a specialized world. I recently became interested, for instance, in watch repair and when you scratch the surface, there is as much arcane specialization in the world of, say, American mid-century automatic dress watches, as there is in any other field. Your article begins to peel back the cover on another world. I suspect there will be some who write in with the criticism that this sort of cross-pollination between photography and [other] is inherently uninteresting. In response, I would say that many of the same mental/emotional "muscles" are being used regardless of the subject matter, be it photography or something else (stereos, billiards, etc.). It calls to mind, without the originally disparaging connotations, the Japanese term "otaku" as that term applies to anime and manga. There is an appreciation in the term for, or at least an acknowledgement of, the fractal nature of specialized knowledge.
And I can say, without more than the most casual interest in billiards, that those 19th century pool tables on one of the sites to which you linked leave me gob-smacked with the artistry of their manufacture. In fact, I can't think of a single object in our home (other than maybe a Leica or two) that has been put together which a similar level of care.
Posted by: Benjamin Marks | Monday, 14 December 2020 at 10:38 AM
It might be equally useful to write an essay titled, "How to SELL a Pool Table".
Posted by: Kenneth Tanaka | Monday, 14 December 2020 at 02:16 PM
TOP doesn't need a new Logo (or re-initial)
T he O nline P ooltabler blog............... ;-)
Got a nice (erm, not ring) 'clack' to it.
Posted by: James | Monday, 14 December 2020 at 02:42 PM
I bought my table, brand new in 1980. It is an Olhausen on the lower end of the price range. A 7 foot job because of space limitations. Fair construction materials. Still "runs" fine 40 years later. I have moved it 3 times by myself and it takes me about 3 days to get everything smooth, level and flat and the cloth just right in tension. I learned by experience but it really isn't that hard. Being an engineer helps and there are some good videos.
Posted by: Malcolm Leader | Monday, 14 December 2020 at 03:48 PM
Thanks I sure do enjoy these off topic threads.
Posted by: marko | Monday, 14 December 2020 at 06:57 PM
I inherited a cheapo table from a neighbor. I knew it wasn't slate, but I was amazed what I found when I scrapped it. The playing surface was a 1 and 1/4 inch thick wood composite. But the fargin bastiges at the factory had applied a slate-appearing sticker to the bottom side of the composite. I'm guessing it was to fool any poor sucker or rube who crawled under the table to give it a gander.
Posted by: Jnny | Monday, 14 December 2020 at 06:59 PM
Mike,
I greatly enjoyed this tutorial which brought back pleasant (but painful) memories. When I was little my grandparents (former farmers and Midwestern tavern owners, which seems an odd combination in retrospect) had a "bar box" style pool table in their basement. Probably a leftover from before they sold the tavern and retired. When we were still far too short to properly use pool cues, my brother and I invented a game that resembled air hockey, but on the pool table. We would face off, each with a ball in our hand, and smash another ball back and forth. If you hit a corner pocket you scored. If you hit a finger, or pinched some skin, you got very, very sad.
Note: I do not recommend that you attempt this game on your new pool table if you value your friends or your fingers!
Posted by: ASW | Tuesday, 15 December 2020 at 10:14 AM
I'm with the other posters: I don't care a lick about pool (I'm terrible at it and will never buy a table), but I loved this article. Good writers can write interesting articles about topics that I don't find particularly interesting, and you are a good writer.
Posted by: Nick | Tuesday, 15 December 2020 at 01:34 PM
I know slate can be tricky to work with so I was going to ask you if glass is ever used instead. Then I thought “don’t be a lazy bar steward, Google for it” so I did and found may references to the benefits of glass versus slate ... nearly all of them related to Turkey calls for hunting, who knew :).
Posted by: Richard Parkin | Tuesday, 15 December 2020 at 03:57 PM
Are space age carbon fibre composites making any inroads or is it slate all the way?
Posted by: Robert Roaldi | Tuesday, 15 December 2020 at 05:33 PM
Referencing bear’s comment on full size tables, in the late 60’s at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, the student union had 3 full sized tables, one with no pockets for English Billiards, the other two for Snooker (pool was pretty much unknown in Australia at the time, outside of pub bars). The tables were vast, and a real skill was the management of the cue support extensions, “spiders” and the likes, which were so long that the vibration as they flexed was a determining factor in the accuracy of the stroke!
In the 90’s, I bought a collapsible (!!!) pool-sized table, levelled with beer coasters under the legs, lots of family fun, but sold that house, and “downsizing” apartments are not scaled for this sort of fun 😢
Posted by: Gavin Paterson | Wednesday, 16 December 2020 at 12:26 AM
The March/April 1989 issue of Fine Woodworking had a nice article on building your own pool table.
If you could live without carved lions and the like it appears a quality table would not be beyond the reach of a moderately skilled woodworker with a bench, chop saw, a table saw and a basic selection of small tools.
You could put up a temporary shop in your new building, build a table in place and then sell off the tools.
How's that for a bad suggestion?
Actually the FW piece did have a really nice discussion on the anatomy of a proper table. I learned a lot from the article but was not inspired to go shopping for big chunks of slate.
Years later FW also did a nice piece on turning your own cue.
Posted by: Mike Plews | Wednesday, 16 December 2020 at 11:41 AM
American thing is funny. Do not doubt you that American pool tables are better, but I have owned rather too many examples of another traditionally-American-made object: electric guitars (mostly archtop guitars). American guitar makers have declined because of competition from far eastern makers (also guitars are less fashionable than they once were). Many far eastern instruments were not good (but much much cheaper than American ones), but terrible truth that some were very good indeed: probably from the late 1970s to the late 1980s or later than that the best not-bespoke guitars in the world were made in Japan. Americans carried on making instruments with terrible quality control at silly prices, but in 1980 if you wanted a Les Paul and did not mind that it said 'Yamaha' on the headstock you should buy an SG2000 not whatever terrible thing Gibson would sell you at three times the price.
Well, since then things have got better for American makers: still very expensive but their products are better now as they finally learned about quality control from the Japanese. As example I have 1980s (same age as me nearly) Gibson ES 175 which is a horrible guitar though I love her dearly and 2006 Heritage H575 which is made in the factory in Kalamazoo where all the good Gibsons were made and is incomparably better guitar than the Gibson.
Pool table probably are different because shipping a pool table is probably very dear.
Posted by: Zyni Moë | Sunday, 20 December 2020 at 01:44 PM