Chesscafe.com Discount Set

Thanks for the pics. The Knight looks very nice!

9kick9, make sure you post up your opinion once you receive your set!

I think I did already in another thread. Its a very good set. I had a problem with the weights on a few pieces making them look warped. They sent me replacement pieces free & a paid box to ship the bad pieces back to them. I am 100% happy with their sets.

You're right. I thought you were the one who just had ordered one based on my post, but it was Escapest_pawn. Sorry for the confusion.

Mine's getting here on Tuesday, I'll be sure to leave comments as well.  I'm pretty excited, all I have to compare it to is basic german knight sets from HoS and chesscafe though.  I've never had a nice/lacquered set.

Excellent!

Well, it arrived tonight and I played an inaugural game versus Shredder on it.  Shredder played the Benko gambit which is my nemesis but I guess that's beside the point.

When I first opened it, I was afraid of the color matching too close to my boards.  I use walnut boards and in the past have used rosewood pieces, and I was a little worried about the sheesham not having enough contrast against the dark squares to cause an eye strain / piece identification issue.  However, after playing, this is a non issue.

Outstanding set.  All of my pieces were in good shape and with no defects.  Great weighting.  Good craftsmanship.

The lacquer is such that the pieces are clearly lacquered, but not overglossy.

Easily worth 3x the cost.  The nicest set that I have other than this is HoS International (German knight), and this easily beats it.

Great to hear!

Yeah, thanks for the tip!

Mine just arrived this afternoon.  Shipping often takes longer in or out of Montana.

It is immediately correct, no cracked or warped pieces.  Nice substantial weight.  Excellent.

I feel one of the more important considerations in ordering  anything is the ethics of the seller.

His refunding postage and replacing defective pieces (per posts here) speak well for his ethics.  I feel we should make a point of trying to support his company beyond buying deeply discounted sets with minimal if any profit.  I am going to make an effort to leave a positive review on his site, and contact the company and mention that the concensus here is that his photography is inadequate, and link him to this thread etc.

If 2 other people do about the same, it is sure to get his attention.

PS to above.

Chesscafe.com seems to lack a feedback page, and/or a user product review feature.

I did manage to click on the "contact us" feature and sent a message with a link to this thread.

I have set up my set on a hardwood board with 2 inch squares.  It works.

Nice to hear your happy with the pieces! They replaced damaged pieces for me free of charge. I am sure the Indian seller he deals with will take care of the bad pieces shipped back to him.

I've had this set for three weeks now and really love playing with it. However, I have noticed two small cracks appear (that were not there when the set was delivered). One at the base of one of the white pawns, and one at the base of one of the white knights. Sadly, I think it is due to the humidity levels in my house rather than the quality of the pieces. Oh well, the set was only $30 and now it has some character.

Hrm, mine haven't cracked yet.  It's very high humidity here in Memphis, so not something I really worry about.  I'll keep looking closely, though.

It really is a fantastic set to play and go over games with.

Kponds... I don't think you have anything to fear from the pieces cracking. Ace is in Illinois so, cracked pieces there is very unusual. Cracked pieces usually happens in the dry Southwest part of the country.

They have a set for $12 there that is pretty great, too.  Someone here recommended it, and I bought it.  Got it on Friday.  Here is what it looks like:

Note: Set is wooden, 3.75" king, nicely weighted and felted, a few extremely minor imperfections, but nothing visually distracting at all. Also, board not included. 

Discount price at $12 is very tough to beat.  They have a non-ebonized black piece set for like $1 more or something, too.  I'm very happy with this set, especially for that price.  I like it better than the $50 set I bought a few years ago from USCF sales.

Yep... Thats the International set used by Magnus Carlsen on down! Chesspics com has really great pics of this set in action by various GM's.

I have purchase 4 of those sets in the red rosewood finish and can't say enough good things about them. As 9kick9 says, clone of the DGT tournament set used everywhere. 

I have given 2 sets away as gifts, one is now my everyday set, and the 4th supplied me with double queens and will be spare pieces for when I or one of my sons loses or breaks a piece. One set arrived with a chipped pawn and Chess Cafe replaced it immediately and at no cost to me. 

Do you know what kind of wood is this?

Available in Ebonized, Golden Sheesham and Rosewood.  The sale appears to be over now. Those sets cost upwards of $30 now.

Ah, this Rosewood version is still under $13 apparently:

http://shop.chesscafe.com/International-Series-Rosewood-EQP0905.htm