Topic: Table types

[Francesco]

Hi can someone please help in telling me all the pinable tables?

[snake eyes]

I think you can pretty much pin a ball on any descent table, Tornado being my first choice, Shelti as an alt. Depends on the action of play you are looking for. Rico seems not to have any trouble pinning his euro front toe on a Tornado table.

[SumnerH]

Hi can someone please help in telling me all the pinable tables?

Major tables, from most to least grip/pinnability:
Jupiter/Topper
Eurosoccer
Bonzini/Rene Pierre
Lowen
Lemacher/Tournament Soccer/Shelti
Tornado
Garlando/FABI
FAS
Roberto Sport
Futbolin/Bifuca
Sportcraft

Or by regional table style, most to least pinnable
Belgium/Benelux countries
France
Germany
United States
Austria/UK
Italy
Spain

The ability to shoot good slide shots (pull/push) is somewhat inversely correlated to this but not strictly--normally it's tougher to shoot slide shots on the grippier tables, but, say, Eurosoccer allows slide shots more easily than Bonzini.

[Alan Cribbs]

Sumner,

You are right to a degree, but the EuroSoccer has more play in the rod and bearing unit causing the rod to float around a bit. It appears to inhibit a good pull shooter. The difficulty in shooting a pull on a Bonzini it the technique needed to be able to set-up the ball in a reasonable time. The weight differential between man and ball is a problem.

Have you ever played on a Eurosoccer?

[SumnerH]

Sumner,

You are right to a degree, but the EuroSoccer has more play in the rod and bearing unit causing the rod to float around a bit. It appears to inhibit a good pull shooter. The difficulty in shooting a pull on a Bonzini it the technique needed to be able to set-up the ball in a reasonable time. The weight differential between man and ball is a problem.

Have you ever played on a Eurosoccer?

I've played on Eurosoccer a couple times when they had it set up at the majors, and on Bonzini around here (with Jim Waterman, Pat Ryan, Chris Wesley, and others) when they used to have a table set up in Annapolis.

It's certainly not impossible to shoot a pull on Bonzini, Pat manages to shoot it nicely.  But it's harder than on Tornado by a long shot, and personally I had a lot easier time of it on Eurosoccer than on Bonzini.