DGT Centaur Wooden Pieces

Inspired by the YouTube Video by Clifton Franklund I ordered the Bronze Felt he recommended. Unfortunately, it was a bust, it didn't work. Maybe the manufacturer changed the material, IDK.

I followed the advice on this forum and switched gears. I had some Aluminum Foil tape handy, it worked! I played a full game last night with complete success.

Here's what you'll need:

• Wooden Chess Pieces: I used Staunton No. 5 pieces from Amazon. I provide technical details in a separate comment (below) for your own search.
• Aluminum Foil Tape: I used Suretape from Home Depot but any should work
• Scissors: Small sharp scissors to trim the tape
• You may need the following if your chess pieces have felt and weights:
  • N95 mask (very important)
  • Medium grit sand paper to remove the felt you cannot remove by hand
  • Glue to fix any loose weights
  • Wood filler to fill any voids around the weight. NOTE: Some wood filler contains silicate, please take the appropriate safety precautions when sanding! 
  • Medium grit sand paper to sand the pieces back to a smooth flush base

While the process was time consuming it wasn't that difficult.

Technical Specifications

Fantastic tip thank you so much ! the part i found tricky was trimming with scissors, so i changed to a blade which worked very well and so much easier. 

EZY1981, what wood pieces did you use? I would have preferred to skip the wood filling phase of my project :-)

Would these work on another DGT board?  I was trying to search for a way to convert a regular set for my Bluetooth board. 

I ordered a new set of wooden pieces to modify for use with the centaur. They should come in within a few days. I really hate the white pieces on the white squares, it's just not comfortable. 

I'm gonna keep the felt on and stick the self-adhesive aluminium foil straight on the felt, let's see if that works. I hope I can maintain the cushioning feeling  and sound when putting down a piece while still functioning with the Centaur. If it doesn't work I can always choose to remove the felt.  

had an ex demo set of these - https://www.officialstaunton.com/collections/chess-pieces/products/chess-pieces-5

I finished my project. I've used: 

- Weighted wooden Staunton 5 pieces

- Self adhesive aluminium radiator foil 2.5 cm wide

- A cutting machine my girlfriend uses for her own hobby projects

- A cutting die with a diameter of 2 cm.

I didn't want to remove the felt as I wanted to preserve the cushioning feel you get with felt when placing a piece on a square. Instead I put the aluminium foil straight on the felt. It worked beautifully and is also much easier then the proces of removing the felt. I retained the softer felt feel even on the pawns and the centaur works perfectly. The foil seems to be securely attached to the felt. I think it will hold for a long time but I'll make sure to have some replacement foil ready in case some might loosen over time. I think the new wooden pieces are a huge improvement in looks but also in playing comfort. I really hated the lack of contrast between the white squares and the white pieces. 

Excellent work !!

Nice! The wood pieces give the board an entirely different look. BTW, you can buy peel and stick aluminum circles on Amazon if you want to save some time. 

Excellent! 

That's looking great.