Topic: Bob Hayes Sports Systems Tornado

[semerson]

Hello,
I'm trying to learn a little bit about the table I recently bought.  It's not a coin-op.  It has a ball return on each end.  Single goalie with corner ramps.  It has a red plaque mounted on one end that says "Bob Hayes Sports Systems...Patents Pending...Dallas Texas".  The side walls are 1-3/8" thick and the bearings mount to the side walls from the field side of the table and mount with 3 screws.

I would like to replace some or all of the bearings on this table.  A couple of rods have a little too much play in the bearings.

Someone replaced the original men.  It plays surprisingly fast although the ramps do slow things down a bit.  I like it; it reminds me of the tables I played on in college.  Don't need no stinking 3 men in the back .  The two balls that came with it are very hard and very fast...we call them ice balls.  I bought a few softer "gummy" balls and even though it slowed down the game, there is much more control.  It's fun to mix both balls into a game.

Anyway...Any suggestions on where I can get the original bearings for this thing?  I bought one set on feebay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-FOOSBALL-SOCCER-TABLE-ROD-BEARINGS-FULL-SET-OF-2-/221187189868?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item337fc8ac6c just to see if they would work and they are not the same.  They may work just fine, but a test fit over the open end of one the rods seemed a little loose.  I will have to disassemble a rod and install the bearings to be sure, but before I do that and possibly buy some more, I wanted to ask here and see if anyone had any information about another source for the bearings.  Perhaps some high-quality, retrofit bearings?








Thanks for any help,

Shane

[alaskan thunder]

Cool table. Do you have a close up of the bearings? From the outside they look like the snap-in bearings but from the inside they look like the split ones.

[semerson]

Cool table. Do you have a close up of the bearings? From the outside they look like the snap-in bearings but from the inside they look like the split ones.

Not split bearings and not snap-ins...they mount from the table side only and have 3 screws.


There is a deference between the set I bought (referenced above) and the originals.  The originals have that groove around the hole that the rod passes through.  It's seems like the groove is there to collect the junk that scrapes off of the rod.  The set I bought doesn't have that groove, and, like I said, seem to be a little loose (too large of an O.D. for the bar).