Chess Weights

I was just wondering if I can buy weights for my own chess pieces and somehow put them into a spare chess set that I have. I got this idea from a friend who got his weighted chess pieces from his coach who made them himself. 

I have heard that you need to buy some lead and then cut in and then glue it in so does anybody know where I can buy that or have a tutorial about how to do it. 

When I was a kid I get a plastic set that was empty inside, to made it gain weith I filled it up with clay and marbles.

The idea is to have something inside and something heavier at the base.

If I was to do it againg must certanly will use rocks instead marbles. If I want to go fancy will use magnets and have a magnetic set. Electronic stores carry this magnets things.

The proyect you describe sounds like you want to buy a lead plate and cut the circular coins costume zise to the pices, if this is what you mean then you need some tooling too.

 How about ball bearings? Heavier than rocks.

thanks guys, i thought this would be a pretty quick project, but it turns out i need to buy a lead plate and then cut it and ft in into the piece by drilling a hole into it. My dad has a drill so i can probably drill the holes at the bottom, but I don't really know if I can get some easy solution for the cutting lead and gluing it on...

The good thig is that lead plates are pretty cheap on amazon (a site that i trust very much) so I can buy those and then I should figure out a way to cut them up. 

I will keep you guys posted and thanks again for the help!

P.S. Do you think that super glue might work to keep the lead inside the pieces?

 True, I was thinking in terms of cheaper cost, so rocks are cheaper than ball bearings. still with bearings the pices can spin and that is some really interesting feature to consider, becouse money is not all. 

Now that we are geting all this fancy, what do you think about some flashing ligths with some sounds?

For example when the pawn moves make this sound.

The pieces spinning would make the game a lot more interesting. :)

Try fishing weights & either Play Dough or Gorilla Glue. 

That ould be very interesting, I never actually thought of that but the thing is that you have to place the felt thing at the bottom to actually keep the weight in place. 

And about the sound and the flashing lights do you think that MIGHT be a problem at tournaments? Just wondering....

Jus Kidding if I happen to do that then this will be a fun set to play with my friends and home or something, not a tourney-going set even though I actually wanted one of those.

Also, does anybody know the weight of the pieces in a regular weighted set becuase I don;t want my pieces to be too light or too heavy, just good enough?

Thanks for the help guys!

And i don't know how play dough might hold onto the weight but Gorilla Glue is a good idea.. maybe i'll try a putty of some kind that might also add some weight

I've used epoxy to re-glue weights that have come loose in my plastic set.  Also, it might be good to bear in mind that when pieces have wide bases, it helps to stabilize them during frantic play.  So, if you go through all the trouble to do this procedure, it might be do it on a set that already has wide bases.  However, when it's all said and done, it's probably more economical simply to buy a set that's already weighted, since you'll have to cut and glue weights for 32 pieces (which will probably get tiresome after about 6 of them). 

 I think the felt thing is to lower the noice, not to keep the weith in place.

If you are really considering to make a set that make sounds consider leaving the battery at the bottom of the peace, so it is easy to change and easy to silence.

So far as I know there is not regulations on the actual weith of the pices, And I don't think there is going to be any, some tournaments use wood some use plastic (wheithed)... I think there is some sweet spot on how it fells when piked up, but this is a matter of personal preference.

On other posts:

The playdougth idea is for plastic sets, for what you have being saying I suspect you have a wood set.in this case you will have to drill a hole and so.

If It was me who was going to do this proyect. that is drill holes on wooden pices and then put the weith on them I must probably would go with screws with short legs and big heads, like this one:

actually I have a plastic set, but it still has that little piece of felt there at the bottom. My preference is also plastic for unknown reasons.

And I think that I'll drop the idea of a chess set with sounds and flashing lights just because I don;t want to spend money on those things...

Do not use lead to give chess sets weight, you will get lead poisoning as both wood and plastic are porous.  Also felt pads are not strong enough to hold weights in, eventually the weights will come through the bottom as anyone who had an old Druke triple weighted chess set can tell you.  Plaster of Paris works pretty well to seal the weights, or as a weight itself.

Fishing weights is a good idea. A similar idea might be the lead weights used in pine wood derby cars. Those can be found at most hobby shops.

Also, I don't think the aforementioned lead poisoning applies too readily to solid lead like this. If it does, numerous people (notably fishermen and boy scouts) may have some cause for concern...

okay, i think fishing weights are good for what I am doing. Sorry I couldn't post during the week becuse I had lots of work to do but I might consider the options.

just an afterthought, do you think just buying a weighted plastic set from any chess website would be cheaper and much less of a hassle than buying weights for the pieces then drilling holes and then putting them in and securing them?

It would certainly be much less hassle & possibly even cheaper.

Plus you can probably find a size and design you like more than the one you have hanging around at the moment.