Ever wondered why pool tables are incredibly heavy?
That’s (partly) because they’re built with one of the heaviest and most durable
naturally-occurring materials on the planet: slate. Yes, underneath that
greenish cloth on the best pool tables is a rock that you’ll also find in
walkways and roofs.
The idea of using slate as a pool table surface
mainly comes from tradition, though it is easy to see why the earliest pool
table makers chose this material. Unlike many types of rocks, slate is actually
composed of hundreds of sediment layers, making it incredibly durable yet
relatively easy to polish at the same time. Most pool tables use a 0.75-inch
thick slab of slate, while the pricier ones used in professional pool
tournaments have 1-inch thick slate surfaces.
Some pool tables use a single piece of slate, while
others have a three-piece bonded slate surface. The latter is arguably the best
because a bonded surface makes the table more resistant against warping.
However, since slate is rather expensive and
difficult to obtain, some pool makers have begun using other materials like
synthetic slate, honeycomb plastics, and medium density fiberboards. While
they’re invariably cheaper, these non-slate materials don’t provide the same
performance and durability as genuine slate surfaces.
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