hello, everyone. this is my second visit and my first post! my name is marns007 and i have a problem. i am a new woodworker and i have submitted designs for a commission that was approved. and now i am realizing that there are some major flaws in my design.
i am trying to build a tabletop that has a repeating geometric pattern. it should appear to be 2″ thick (sideview) although i only plan to use 2″ stock for the four pieces around the edge. it is all figured and birdseye maple, by the way. the center of the table will be constructed with 4/4 stock and i intend(ed) to joint each piece simply with biscuits and titebond pro.
in my excitement, i completely forgot to consider how many of these joints would consist of long grain to end grain. (imagine there are four 4″ squares in each corner. between each of these squares is a 28″ board (also 4″ wide). then inside this square (four 4″ squares in corners) are boards 20″ long. etc., down to the middle which is all 4″ squares.)
am i crazy to attempt this? i believe i might be. it seems like an accident waiting to happen–unless there is enough consistency in the design that movement will occur at similar rates along these two basic orientations.
i was originally advised (by a mentor) to glue the 4/4 stock directly to plywood. but this seems even more risky to me (sorry, mentor)—i worry that a top made this way might curl up like a potato chip.
i arrived at this geometric pattern because i thought it’d be neat if, no matter how you looked at the table, you’d see horizontal, vertical, and diagonal lines. i didn’t want a top on a square table to orient you in only one direction. (that is, all the boards running parallel to one another, with the exception of the four outermost boards).
regardless of how i may change the pattern, i still need this 2″ stock around all of the edges….so somewhere there is going to be some long grain meeting some side grain. and i want to make a table that will outlast the people that bought it.
please, all of you junkies out there, rain your wisdom down upon me. i need it.
thanks,
marns007
Replies
David Marks on Wood Works did a chess board using veneers on small laminates; you could inlay such a construction into a substrate. Or you could build your pattern marquetry style, and apply it as a veneer to a stable substrate (here's an example).
For stability I think you're going to want to work with some sort of substrate that's not glued in the pattern of your design, assuming your table is destined to function as a table and bear weight.
In brief, stop now before it's too late. Do it with veneer or change the design for solid wood. Apologies to the client but better now than deal with the catastrophe later.
DR
I'd definitely go with veneer. If I'm understanding correctly, it sounds like many of your long/endgrain joints will be 4" wide, which is not an insignificant amount of movement. At least, the edges will probably become uneven over time. Maybe the experts and/or more adventurous spirits around here may disagree with me.
The design sounds very neat. Can you make some kind of ascii art to illustrate?
sorry i don't know how to draw it out in a way that i could send it.
but basically, it's an outer square, within which is a smaller square, inside that a smaller one. but, in each corner (of each repeating square) is a 4" square, which complicates things a little bit. (originally this was supposed to be 40" square, but we squeezed it down to 36", so in the very middle are 9 adjacent 4" squares).
i mistakenly wrote 'long grain to end grain' when i should've written 'side grain to end grain.' i think you probably figured that out.
no board is wider than 4"--so movement/dimensional change shouldn't be huge. i'm still wondering if there is any way to do this, perhaps with mortise and tenon joints (quite a lot of them), where i could avoid glueing them all and just peg some of them.
even if i run all the 4/4 boards parallel to one another for all side-grain to side-grain joints, i still have the problem of how to joint these boards to two of the outer framing boards (the 2" stock), which again will be a side grain to end grain joint. should i breadboard them?
thanks for your response(s).
marns007
no board is wider than 4"--so movement/dimensional change shouldn't be huge
If you take a 30" board and rip it into 4" boards, then glue it up, no magic has occurred. You'll still get the same amount of movement across the grain.
It'll be worse if you have some boards' grain oriented differently. Wood expands across the grain, very little along the grain. So if you glue one square to another with grain oriented ninety degrees from each other, your glue joint is destined for failure.
You will always have movement and if I have worked it out correctly you will have 8plus pieces of timber joining if you have movement of half a mil on all of them that is 4mm movement.
I would complete the project after telling the client about the problems out of 3mm veneer on a mdf or plywood substrate.
Fire your mentor, s/he does not know what they are talking about when they said to glue the wood onto plywood.
Your design would be interesting in veneer. In 4/4, it would be a disaster.
If you are a new woodworker, one thing to know is that making nice, straight edges that leave an imperceptible glue line is not as easy as you might think, either in solid wood or in veneer. You will need to take care and use sharp, well-tuned tools to do a professional quality job.
That said, go for it and good luck. We all start at the beginning and learn by experience (and sometimes, through other's experience and Knots).
Veneer is the only way to go. I recommend that you use what some have called "real veneer" meaning it is approximately 1/16" thick, rather than 1/64" or less. It could be bonded to MDF--or plywood, but not fir construction plywood. This could be framed with solid wood mitered around the MDF to give your 2" apparent thickness. The MDF could sit in a rabbet of the border so the boarder need not have much apparent thickness. For that matter, the rabbet could even be a bevel so the border would meet at the edge of the top, though the joinery would have to be very precise for this to work well. Also remember that if you use veneer, you must veneer the underside of the MDF, and you must finish the underside as well.
everybody: thank you for your advice. an even bigger thank you to the people who were positive and tried to offer solutions. i understand now why i never see solid wood furniture with patterns like this! i was trying to push the envelope in a way that i realize it just can't go (not with solid wood, at least). if i were interested in using veneers right now i would try it....but that's a little ways down the road for me.
my answer to the question, do i have a background in design? no! i have a background in waiting tables! hahaha. i have no interest in designing unbuildable furniture....i believe this was my first and last foray into that field.
Don't give up so easily, Marns007. A long time ago I built some furniture that was designed by an Architect. The furniture was going in a resort hotel. The owners of the place were using recycled southern yellow pine beams, cut oyster style, for the floors. The archy wanted the tables to have the same end grain effect on the tops. The prototypes just didn't work for all the reasons stated by others. We ended up using plywood squares in a checker board fashion, to mimic the look. The end grain effect was just too expensive to do an oyster veneer on hundreds of pieces of furniture. This could work with your design. Almost every design has to be reworked a time or two. If it was easy the first time, everyone would be a designer. We wouldn't have many of the great works in architecture and design if the naysayers were listened to.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
hammer1 can you elaborate for me? i'm not sure what you mean by oyster style cut, and i can't picture the end grain effect of which you speak.
Marns007, I remember reading your original post about mixing long grain with short grain on a plywood backing. This reminded me of a similar circumstance I faced years ago. Anyone with some experience knows that affixing solid wood to plywood is asking for trouble. That's exactly what the architect wanted to do. We told him it would not work but he insisted that we make a prototype. The prototype proved that we were not lying. The architect wanted to preserve his design which was similar to what you described. We gave him the same options that other posters have suggested for you. Instead of using solid wood, use veneers to accomplish the design. Oyster style veneers are cut from the end grain of solid wood, the same way you would slice a thin cut off a salami. I'm not suggesting that you do this, it was only an option for this particular design. The floors were made from thick slices, 1 1/2", off old beams, stood on end, like a butcher block. The architect wanted us to take those same pieces in 3/4" thickness and fix them to a piece of plywood for tables. In essence the design was similar to yours, except the squares were all equal. There were only two options to offer the architect. One was to use oyster cut veneer instead of thick solid pieces. The other was to forget about the end grain and just go with plywood squares with face grain. Due to the expense of veneering many tables, the architect decided that the face grain plywood would be the best option. This could easily work with your design. Plywood is available in many different types and species. We used "plain sliced" for that job. Plain sliced is like thin boards glued together, the surface looks like ordinary boards glued side by side. Common plywood is"rotary cut", which means it is peeled in a circular fashion off a log, it doesn't look like boards. You could use plain sliced plywood cut in whatever square or rectangular pieces you choose. The hard part is cutting the pieces exactly 90°. These pieces could be fixed to a base of plywood and you won't have the movement problems, that you would have with solid wood. Obviously, you would want a solid wood band around the perimeter of the table to hide the edges of the plywood. This might compromise your design to an extent, the same way using face grain compromised that architects design.You won't find plain sliced plywood at your typical lumber yard or big box store. You will need to find a supplier to the cabinetmaking trade in your area. It will look like you used solid wood boards.Oyster veneers have a unique look. They are quite delicate and difficult to work with. Many older pieces are missing sections or have radial checks because it is end grain. I think someone posted a picture in the gallery, a short time ago, of an oyster veneered piece. There is a guy near here that hand paints ordinary pine boxes to look like oyster veneer. He does an amazing job, but he won't share his secrets. The technique is also used with materials like malachite.I still have a reject table top from that job that has been in the scrap pile for a long time. If it wasn't full of staples, I would have cut it up long ago. 30 yrs. in the nether regions of the shop and it's still together. A bit moldy from sitting on the concrete floor but the joints are still tight.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
hammer1 thanks again. a lot of info here, i need more time to think through. appreciate your time and the photo (it still looks great).
will keep you posted when i decide what to do.
till soon
marns007
FYI, here's an illustration of a piece veneered in oysterwork.
Clay
Sounds like you are going to run a frame around the perimeter of the table as well. Veneer is the only safe way to make such a table.
Interesting...a new woodworker and you have a commision. What's your background. Design? Worked with a lot of designers who came up with neat unbuildable furniture. At least unbuildable as they envisioned.
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