TR King Clay Poker Chips Review

panthershutch15 · #1 (**permalink**) 05-01-2005, 08:32 PM

Manufacturer: TR King
Retailer(s): TR King, Dice702.com
Average Price: Average Price: .50-.95 cents per chip
Material: Compression Molded Clay
Member Review by: panthershutch15

Price

Below are the various prices for TR King chips as of 4/19/05.

(Prices are per chip.)

Casbah Club chips- .50-.75 cents
Custom hot stamped chips(no edgespots)- .50 cents (100 minimum)
Casino inlaid chips (2 colors on printed inlay) - .80 cents (5000 minimum)
Stock casino inlaid chips- .95 cents
Casino numbered chips- .95 cents
Spotted hotstamped casino chips- .95 cents (200 minimum)

Feel

These chips feel fantastic and are honestly just a notch behind a good casino Paulson chip in my opinion. TR King makes great chips. It's hard to describe the "soft" feeling of a clay chip, but I feel that it is just behind a Paulson chip, and just above an ASM chip in terms of feel. The mold has a slightly glossy look and feel to it, somewhat like a coating, which may be a problem to some people.

The inlay chips from TR King have a textured surface, not a slippery surface like the James Bond Paulson's or the Las Vegas composites for example. The inlay is flush with the mold and all of my samples are in very good alignment, which is a common complaint with several chip manufacturers. Many other manufacturers are inconsistent in terms of the label being centered on the chip and the label itself being a perfect circle. This does not appear to be in issue with TR King. Digging my fingers at the chip itself and the inlay does no damage. The inlay itself is slightly smaller than the inlay of chips from manufacturers such as ASM or Paulson, but this should not be a problem for most chip consumers.

TR King manufactures chips that are slightly smaller in diameter than chips from other manufacturers. This is very difficult to notice if you are only handling TR King chips, but the difference is obvious when handling TR King chips along with different chips from another manufacturer. This may be a problem if the consumer is planning on mixing their set of TR Kings with other sets at their game or tournament.

Stacking

These chips stack very well. I stack my chips 20-30 high during my games and a bump of the table will not budge the stack. If a stack does fall over, they seem to somehow stick to each other and can be easily restacked without having to gather all of the loose chips that flew across the table. TR King manufactures a chip that is one of the best on the market in terms of stackability.

Sound

These chips also sound great. There is nothing like the sound of a clay chip. When dropped with a Paulson used casino chip, it is very hard to tell the difference and I almost believe that the TR King chip have a nicer thud when it hits the surface or poker table than that of a Paulson chip. In a test with the a King's Crown chip and a James Bond '05 Paulson, the TR King has a stronger sounding thud, less high pitched than the Paulson chip.

Looks

Casbah Club's: Have a classy, stylish logo hotstamped onto both sides of the chip. I am a big fan of the design of the logo, but I don't really like hotstamping. Also, I don't really like the name "Casbah Club". However, the hotstamping on this chip is far better than any hotstamped chip I have handled and will definately not wear off any time soon. Scratching pretty hard with my fingernails did no damage whatsoever and I don't see the stamping fading or chipping any time soon with pretty regular use.
The chips have the standard crown mold that TR King manufactures, which is a classy mold that most people tend to like.

Blanks and custom hot-stamped: Many choices of colors and the hotstamping is very well done. The hotstamping should not wear with extensive use, but the hotstamping does not seem as permanent as the hotstamping on the Casbah Club chips manufactured by TR King.

King's Crown: This is a very nice, simple design that features inlays with different denominations, edgespots, and again the infamous crown mold. This is a classy design and is favorite TR King chip that is available to the home market.

Stock Casino Numbered: Similar to the King's Crown chip, but I find this chip to be very ugly. The inlay is just a white inlay with a huge denomination printed on it.

The edgespots on TR King chips are unique from the edgespots of other manufacturers. The edgespots are very thin and do not stretch very far across the face of the chip. This may look weird to some people, but I believe that TR King does a fantastic job with dual edgespots, which look very comparable to other chips manufacturers such as Paulson, ASM, etc.

Security/Originality

Any person can order these chips from TR King directly and have them within days. This means that they are not very secure and anyone could purchase these and smuggle them into your game.

An option to make your home game chips more secure would be to put in a custom order for your chips directly through TR King. You can pick any design you would like to have on a printed inlay, and also you may choose the colors of the chip and the colors of the edgespots. Be ready to order 5000, as that is the minimum order.

The Casbah Club chips are probably the hardest stock TR King chip to find, but TR King will re-make these for a price of around .50-.60 cents each.

Durability

TR Kings are the most durable clay chip in my opinion. They are very dense and are VERY well manufactured chips. The colors of the chips do not really smudge onto the other chips, and I believe it is impossible to break these things. Again, fingernail gouging is no match for these chips. These will DEFINATELY last a lifetime, probably more.

Reviewers Comments

I owned a set of TR King Casbah Club chips for about 4 months before dumping them off on ebay to buy some Paulson's. Everybody in my home game loved them, and If you can get them for a good price, I wouldn't hesitate. Nobody in my game even knows what a Paulson is, but they were in envy of my TR King chips when I owned them and loved to play with them. These really are great chips. Out of all of my chip samples, TR King chips are VERY close to the top!! So, If you see a set on ebay that is calling your name, get them, you will enjoy!! Or, just give Dennis at TR King a call and ask about all of your options. It is worth mentioning that he is great to work with and provides outstanding customer service.

Chip Pictures

Pictures below taken from the TR King website.

Casbah Club

dboy1970 · #2 (**permalink**) 01-29-2007, 01:07 PM

TR KIng Oasis Club
Purchased used for about 77 cents a chip

I purchased 220 of these chips to use as a tournament set for 8 people. Not sure on the weight of these but they feel about the same as my Paulson NPS chips. I do like the feel of these more.

Pros:

Chips have a nice feel to them they shuffle well and stack well. I will go out on a limb and say they feel better than my Paulsons.
IMO they have the best sound of any chip nothing quite like them especially the gray chips in my set that is a bit heavier than the Yellow.
stack very well asd the crown mold seems to create a suction that helps the chips stick together when stacking.
the custom stamp was nice and original

Cons:

lack of availabilty--TR Kings is no longer in business- the chips are not readily available other than the Deadwood chips at apachepoker.com
Due to these coming from a custom set i only had gray and yellow chips a little plain in looks but still more everthing else about these chips made up for the looks.
solid colored chips tend to pick up more dirt and debris--or at least it is more noticable.