Hi Matt,
I’ve have two 2 1/2″ thick Red Elm slabs, 19″W x 75″L with one natural edge. I want to join them to make an executive size Desk (table) with the outer natural edge exposed. They are plained, but have a twist of about 1-1.25″ over the length. Other than that, they are flat. Normal flattening techniques will leave too little stock remaining.
What if I “score” the underside (like bending plywood but not to the very edge) to a depth of 2″? Will this give enough flexibility to flatten the top? I could make the aprons very heavy to help hold them in place, of course allowing for cross grain movement.
What do you think? Any other ideas?
Bob
Replies
Hi Bob,
I think you've got a problem on your hands and the scoring idea doesn't sound like the best solution, although I've never encountered such an idea so I may be wrong. I'm afraid that would compromise the strength of the tabletop and not really solve the root problem, which is that the wood is unstable.
The first thing that comes to mind is to cross cut the slabs into smaller segments and then flatten the smaller pieces individually. Even cutting each down to two 37-1/2 in. long slabs will greatly reduce the amount of twist that you will have to joint and plane away.
If you go this approach, you then face a design challenge: how do you reassemble the parts to form the tabletop. This seems like a better problem to work out than how to flatten a huge slab without using conventional methods.
In related news: check out this article. It might come in handy.
Matt Berger
P.S. Can anyone else in the forum suggest a solution?
Thanks for your input,
Bob
Bob,
I took your question around to a few of our editors and authors to see if anyone had encountered something like this before.
One editor replied: go buy another slab.
However, one author said he faced a similar problem with a large slab table he had. Over the years, the tabletop twisted. His solution was similar to what you suggested.
He routed out most of the thickness of the slab from underneath, leaving the full thickness only around the edges. He coaxed it back to flat and then laminated a sheet of MDF inside the routed out section.
I would still be concerned about wood movement differences between the slab and the new MDF core, but I thought I'd pass it on nonetheless.
- Matt
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