Anyway, the goal-blocker was invented by John Stucky of Colorado. For years it was called the "John Stucky goal-blocker" (not by him, he's too humble, a rarity indeed among AH players). Prior to that, the first person I remember blocking the goal for practice purposes was Rolf Moore of Houston. In the mid '70's he crammed soft foam into the Brunswick goal end, allowing him to practice shots and have the puck bounce back. I did the same on my Brunswick table, and Phil Arnold too, I believe. The problems with the "foam technique" were many: lack of portability, cramming all that foam in the goal end, pieces of foam breaking off, and worst, the puck would often bounce up and off the table.
Stucky's first goal blocker, from the early '80's I believe, was made of wood, styrofoam, and duct tape. A flat, thin piece of wood about as wide as the goal and higher than the top of the goal; a small length of stryrofoam glued to the back, cut so it could wedge into the goal; and duct tape around the whole thing, to keep it together and keep the wood from getting chewed up by the puck.
This worked OK but the puck was sort of dead as it came off the wood, hence not allowing for practice of rapid-fire shots or volleying. Also, the tape and wood would only last so long against the onslaught of the red Lexan.
The next innovation in goal-blockers came from... who else... John Stucky. In 1990 he brought a contraption to the California nationals. It was made of thick aluminum, bent at right angles twice so it could fit perfectly over the Dynamo goal, effectively blocking the front with solid aluminum. On the back were two threaded holes through which wing nuts were used to clamp the goal-blocker to the goal. This design was further refined by Kara Klyn, who manufactured a small number of goal blockers and sold them to players. I believe these were made from solid aluminum channel which was cut or routed out to the proper fit. Kara, please add to this story.
Unfortunately, the California-made goal blockers were only available for a short time. Kara could not get any more done, and to my knowledge, no one has produced any since. Most of the goal-blockers you see at a Nationals date back to that time. If anyone is building, or capable of building, Kara-quality goal blockers, please let everyone know.
Mark RobbinsI actually never saw John's latest creation to the AH world of blockers. It was David Pratt (91-92 AH player and a great fooser from California) who came up with the design which inspired those that I sold.
He took a solid 12"x6"x2" block of solid aluminum and had a machinist route it out to just over 1/4" thick. He then had the aluminum anadized (process for making it more durable) and tapped three holes in the back to tighten it to the table. The whole process for this blocker was over $100, perhaps even over $200 simply because of the material and the labor to machine such a mass of metal. However, his design created a puck reaction almost exactly to that of the table sides.
Dave was gracious enough to loan me his blocker so that I could take measurements and relay them to my dad who is a machinist.
At the time, the State of California was installing road side emergency telephones using 6"x6" square aluminum tubing for the poles. All the extra material from the project ended up in a junk yard (lucky for the AH world), and these proved to be much more cost efficient with a materials + manufacturing cost of $70-$80 (I forget the exact cost). We also did not anadize them, and after the years of observation, the blockers are holding up just fine, threads and all.
I would be more than happy to provide a sketch with measurements to those who would like to have one manufactured.
Kara Klyne