Board Update...

Between thought and expression, there lies a lifetime.

I'd pictured myself, lovingly burnishing a deep grained piece of wood, hand carved from a Balinese cypress, which had itself been watered by the tears of unicorns who then brought it to me, on a platinum mithril platter, (with a side order of onion rings)

How I would labour! How I would pay attention to every detail to create, nay gestate, a thing of surpassing loveliness.

But Bren is an asker of awkward questions.

To my, "I can make a groove in the surround and slide the board surface into it", she responds with "What will you make the groove with?"

This is a fair question. We live in a caravan. I don't have a little shed down the bottom of the garden with a workbench and a set of basic woodworking tools.

So my grand design quickly became something much more pragmatically utilitarian.

Two cork noticeboards from Staples.

Some Pro's...

• Already have their surrounds. 
• Total price, about £18. 
• Can be fastened together by a strip of fabric, glued to the back with PVA. 
• Design can be laid directly onto surface
• Being cork, will absorb energy of thrown dice - quieter and with less dice overboard.
• It will be far far easier to construct.

Some Con's...

• It will be a lot less sturdy than  what I originally planned.
• It does not have built in storage for pieces and dice.
• The low surround is not high enough to prevent dice leaving the playing area.
• The overall quality is poor. The wooden surround is rough and needs finishing with a coat of varnish.

It's also a lot more spacious than I planned for, but tolerably so.

Biggest pro of all... It's a lot more achievable, with a lot less farting around.

The board design can be painted or dyed, then covered with a layer of varnish or diluted wood glue. Or just left as it is.

A hole in each corner, and a measured strip of fabric, and 4 simple posts will be just as effective as a proper wooden surround.

A couple of years ago, I bought a cheap fake leather set. It's adequate, but no more than adequate for club play. For the same price, and a bit of work, I get a much more pleasingly tactile set, that I have had the pleasure of building for myself.


driving lessons in North Wirral? learn to drive in Hoylake? driving instructor in Birkenhead?

building a board

I'm making my own backgammon board.

Step one... get the pieces.

step two... build a board that fits them.

I'd never really consider myself to be a craftsman, but I'd like to have a go, and hopefully, make a decent fist of this.



Each point (the triangles) will be 50mm wide at it's base, and 200mm long. There are 24 points, 6 in each quarter of the board. So the interior dimensions of each half of the board will be 300mm from edge to bar, and either 450 or 500mm top to bottom depending on how spacious I want to make it.

The surround will be 30mm thick, giving a 60mm wide bar. space needs to be given to store pieces and dice etc. This will be 50mm for the pieces, and 30mm each side, giving an overall space of 110mm. The overall dimensions of the board will therefore be 440mm x 450 or 500mm folded, and 880mm x 450 or 500mm when open.

Materials?

Well the main board would be probably just simple plywood or MDF. This would be covered in a felt baize, or leather,  or some other fabric, or even some kind of latex spray. One guy at the Liverpool events has a board made of painted and varnished chipboard, and the dice bounce off all over the place, so it needs to be softened somehow.

I'm thinking of using driftwood to create the surround, but a nice posh wood like mahogany or walnut would be cool. Perspex would be unique too, although it might be difficult to work with without it getting scratched.

Fittings such as hinges and latches would be brass, although pretty much anything would do. The whole thing would be covered in leather or vinyl or even something more sturdily industrial like aluminium.

So that's the plan.

I need to figure out how to connect the ply of the board to it's surround. Presumably a groove in the surround that the board fits into. The board would therefore need to be slightly bigger (a few millimetres in each direction). Alternatively, the surround could be slightly stepped, and the board would sit on top of the slightly wider bit. The surround has corners that will have to be dovetailed or mortice and tenonned (if that's a word) or just glued I suppose. Depending on materials used on the playing surface, I may have to stitch fabric, or parquet thin slivers of different coloured woods,  or precisely glue precisely shaped bits of felt or other fabric.

driving lessons in North Wirral? learn to drive in Hoylake? driving instructor in Birkenhead?

Liverpool Open - Day 2...

Well folks, I swept the board. I trounced every player that came before me today, and won both the main event and the one point side tourney.

£350 better off, thank you very much.

But sadly, only in my dreams.

I got off to a bad start, and things went downhill from there.

In the main tourney, I was drawn against Sean. He's a top player (ranked 32 at dailygammon)Sean beat me, 9 - 0. I scarecely managed to get a piece off the board. I was roundly trounced. Sean went on to be the losing finalist in the main tournament. I went on into the consolation tourney, the Liver Cup.

I played one of the locals, Angie. We know and like each other, and the match was much more light hearted than the previous tense one. First to 7 points, and I got myself into a strong position straight away. We'd passed each other. No further interaction was possible. It was a straight race to the finish, which I was leading, and the doubling cube was turned to 4. Then Angie rolled two consecutive double 6's. This turned the game right around and put her well ahead in the match. I don't remember the exact score but I think she won either 7-4 or 7-5.

Bugger.

I was now out of the main and the consolation. But I was still in the 1 point side tournament, and was automatically entered into the last chance tourney.

I played the next round of the 1 point tourney next. A close match against a guy called John. He won in the end and went on to win the 1 pointer. And fifty quid.

So that was almost that. Played three, lost three. And just the last chance tourney to play.

I was up against Noel. A cheerful Irishman, now living in the Isle of Man. I'd already met him the day before in the 1 point tourney and beaten him, but now we had a 5 point match to play.

At last the dice were with me, and I beat him 5-0.

My next opponent was David, but he was nowhere to be found, either inside or outside the building.

I went out into the garden and read Catch 22 in the sunshine.

Eventually David appeared and we played our match. And again, I got the upper hand. This one went to the wire though.

So then came Martin. Martin is a blunt, slightly caustic person. I can imagine him being a lawyer or something. He's obviously clever, and he's a pretty good backgammon player too.

Our match hinged on one roll. He had a piece on the bar, but I'd been forced to leave a blot - a single piece on a point. Martin doubled. I took the cube. He had to roll a 5. This meant he had a 1 in 3 chance of hitting me. 6 numbers, 2 dice...

Martin rolled a 5 and eventually won.

And that was that. My Liverpool Open had come and gone and I was heading back through the Mersey tunnel with empty pockets.

Great fun though. I won;t be getting hugely into live tournament play. It's an expensive hobby if you're not one of the very best players, but I will be entering the Liverpool Open again next year I hope.

A lot of photos were taken during the tourney. When they get posted, I shall grab some of them and post them here.

driving lessons in Wallasey?