Go your own way

The most important thing to remember is that it’s yours. If you want a short, stubby ankle-biter, that’s fine. A tall, elegant table that’s no good for anyone under five foot? That’s fine too. Big lead, small lead — up to you. That said, a standard lead is 355mm × 355mm, and it will always be the easiest and least expensive to replace when the need arises.

If you want conservative numbers to start from: 38mm brass toads at 5mm thick, a 40mm hole, and a 355mm × 355mm lead. (Or an inch and a half by 200 thousandths for the toads, with a 14-inch square lead drilled at 1 9/16″, if you think in imperial — I’m fully conversant in either.)

Starting from scratch and keeping it basic? Aim for a four-legged affair — 600mm for the back two legs and 550mm for the front (conveniently, that all comes out of a single 2.4m length of timber), plus some bracing. For the return, a chute can be drainpipe with an inverted cup-shaped drawer handle as a stop — or use an old drawer lined with carpet, felt or leather, which protects both the drawer and the toads. A few screws, a few offcuts of ply, a quick coat of paint and you’re done.

Sturdy really matters. Get this wrong and the table will still be reverberating when the next toad is thrown, sending toads flying everywhere. And think about where it will live — uneven floor? Adjustable feet (or a few beer mats).

The hole size matters a lot, too. With 38mm toads and a 40mm hole in the lead, aim for 45–50mm as the hole in the table beneath — any bigger will accelerate the demise of your lead.

• Is the table fixed, or likely to get shoved about? Think handles, no sharp edges, no protruding screws.
• Sharp edges scratch floors — little felt feet are great indoors on dry floors.
• Square heavy boxes with fixed leads are hard to move.
• Pine, softwood, red grandis and ply all split and self-destruct where toads hit them — splinters in your fingers make play tricky.
• Paint is likely to get chipped.
• Drawers become difficult to use if Harvey's Best gets the better of you.
• Some features are noisier than others. Noisy is useful on a league table to reduce miscalls — not so good when the kids have gone to bed.
• Wet mops damage and stain untreated materials.
• Toads tables are often used as temporary seats in pubs — is your creation strong enough to cope?
• A front lip will stop the lead slipping forward with use. A front lip will also get damaged quickly.
• The wall behind the table will get battered, chances are — and the floor around it peppered by toads.
• A lead with no room to grow (yes, they usually get bigger with use) will dome or salad-bowl quickly. Screwed down, it tends to dome; free-floating, it's more likely to salad-bowl.

There’s no such thing as a bad table — just some are better than others. I hope yours turns out to be one of the best. Good luck, and send me a snap when you’re done; I’d love to see what you come up with. If you don’t fancy doing everything yourself, I sell some of the constituent parts — backboard, chute, oche — just ask.

Leads have character. They can be encouraged to dome, volcano or salad-bowl depending on how they’re affixed — or not. The thickness of a hand-poured lead varies, usually ±3mm; it’s all part of learning and overcoming each table’s idiosyncrasies. If you play all day every day (and yes, people do), or it has pride of place in a busy pub, the 25kg lead is the one. For a table that moves regularly — or a match lead that isn’t used all day — the lighter 18kg or 20kg is the way, though lighter leads develop character quicker. They can also take a 39mm hole for those keen to hone their aim — not recommended on a 25kg lead, which would need constant fettling.

If your lead is morphing into a volcano or a salad bowl mid-life, there are things you can do — namely, drop it on the floor. Salad-bowled? Take it outside to a flat, solid surface and drop it face down from waist height (mind your feet). Volcanoed? Same again, playing side up, possibly with some jumping up and down. After a few drops the lead may have grown or the hole deformed — don’t panic; a sharp knife used carefully with a hole fettler will resize things. Hole fettlers are available (stock varies, usually pocket-sized) — but you must check with the table owner before you fettle a hole. The Lewes league forbids fettling once the season starts, unless all the toads won’t go down the hole at the start of the evening.

On lead itself: please satisfy yourself about the risks before you buy — see www.gov.ukand search “lead”. If you decide it’s not for you, don’t worry: I offer a sheet-copper ‘lead’ that’s 100% lead-free. It won’t play exactly the same, but after extensive testing it’s felt by most players to be the best alternative found to date.

Be it Damascus steel, solid brass, copper, aluminium, a piece of old furniture, a school desk, a chunk of tree or even cricket bats — I’ve turned them all into toads tables. Pricing depends on material cost and the work involved, and it can often be the most cost-effective way to own a table. Just send a sketch or a picture and we can go from there.

Got an event, or starting a league and want a trophy? Not a problem — there’s not much I can’t make. Send a sketch or some ideas.

Table hire? Not my bag! But head to gameoftoads.com where Jonny will look after you expertly — be it a wedding, a party, a tournament or a corporate event, he can tailor things to suit.