The story of a log, a slab and a table

[Bmac]

As with most stories you hope for a good ending. Well I haven't reached the end of this story yet so my hope is that I will get to a good ending, but there is a distinct possibility it could go bad.

I'll start this story back in Dec 2017, I met this tree, a funky walnut at the family farm. As most of you know I mill most of my own lumber and hauling around a chainsaw mill is my main milling technique. I'm pretty adventurous in what I'll mill. Sometimes doing that means a fabulous board and sometimes that means more firewood. I air dry all the wood I mill, and I like to mill thick, this gives me some wiggle room with less than perfect wood. The slow air drying process does mean I'll get some warping, but I think the internal stresses don't build up in the wood like you get with kiln dried. 

So here's the log opened up, you can see the funky curve and I know there is going to be some internal stresses in the wood no matter what I do, but I'm hoping a slow 3 years of air drying will help those. The figure and color here is just stunning and the minute I saw this I wasn't sure what I'd use it for but I knew I would find a project.

So fast forward to now. I'm looking to make an end table to go along with the Z-chairs I just built. The top of the table is the starting point, I'm not sure about the legs yet, I'll let the top dictate those. I want an oval shape or oblong shape to the top so when I was looking thru my stock I remembered this board. That's one great thing about milling your own wood, you get kind of attached to those unique boards and you keep think mental inventory of your slabs. 

Now I need to try and tame this slab, it's 9/4 thick to start. It does have some warpage as expected, a few cracks, and it's rather weathered from 3 years of living in a stack of lumber stored on my property. Did a little sanding to get an idea of figure:

First thing I need is a straight edge and want to clean up some useless knotty wood, so here are a few initial cut lines I'll do on the bandsaw;

Still have some warping;

My next cut line, this will get my width to 13", what I need for the planer;

This end has a significant crack;

This crack is also associated with that significant warp at the far end of the board;

So this cut line eliminates most of the crack and the warped corner;

Still got some work to do and I need a flat surface. Took the guard of the 8" jointer and headed there with this piece;

Got a nice 8" flat section and using double sided tape I affixed 2 strips of wood;

Now to the planer and I couldn't of been happier. Here's the figure and payoff from all of the milling;

So the plan from here is to resaw into two 1" boards and glue up both pieces on the flat line I established. This gives a generalized flow of the grain that will be in harmony with the oval/oblong shape of the table top. It will also have a middle section of sapwood, that may look really cool or perhaps not so cool. I'm banking on it looking cool, but I'll only know after I resaw.

I'll revisit this story after I resaw, that operation will tell me a lot, you never know what you'll find inside a board, whether it will warp and need to be reflattened or if the book match just doesn't look good. 

Hoping for a good ending.

 

[RichardA]

I like a good ending, especially when the good guys win.

[Chet]

1 hour ago, Bmac said:

It will also have a middle section of sapwood, that may look really cool

When I saw the picture above I was hoping the sapwood would play a roll in the project.  Often people are too quick to eliminate sapwood.

[Coop]

That’s going to be sweet. I’m like Chet, I think more so than not, that sapwood has it’s place. 

[Chestnut]

3 hours ago, Chet said:

Often people are too quick to eliminate sapwood.

I think walnut sapwood looks a lot better when it isn't steamed. It also has to be done in a harmonious way.

I'm interested in how this one will turn out. More often than not when i get figured wood like this that might misbehave I'm inclined to make shop veneer and mount it on a panel, or drawer front.

[Coop]

I just finished this shelf for our tile guy. The outside first cut from a walnut log and the sapwood is certainly an accent. Actually more than the pic shows. If it’s unclear, the first pic is of the shelf in it’s to be , mounted position and the second is the underside of the shelf, the outside of the log. 

[treeslayer]

great work you two,  @Coop, how is the shelf attached? made some floating shelves a while back and always looking for new ideas, thanks

[Coop]

I was going to use the floating shelf pin bracket like Kev used but the shelf is only 6 1/4” deep at the widest part and the pins are 6” long with a recess of 1/4” for the bar on the bracket. I didn’t have anymore walnut so I took a piece of teak that I had laying around and screwed it to the back of the slab/shelf. Then took a rasp to shape it to the bottom of the slab. He can then use screws thru the teak to attach it to his wall. Sorry @Bmacfor the highjack. 

[wtnhighlander]

@Bmac, after you showed the milled stock and described your planned lay-up for the resawn boards, all I can see is a CBS logo! Have any wenge that you can inlay for the iris? 

[Bmac]

@Coop, no worries about thinking you were highjacking, I liked the conversation. The sapwood on that board looks real nice and compliments the shelf well. 

@wtnhighlander, I can totally see your point, it very well may look like that, and I have no wenge for an inlay. I am planning for the table top to be around 20" at it's widest point, so I have 6" to remove still (with the board being 13" prior to resaw), so I'm not totally locked in with what you are seeing now. 

I'm going to find out this morning. I have a little time before work and I'm hoping to get it resawn then. Pics will be coming. 

[Bmac]

The story of the board continues. I start work at 8am some days, 7 am others. On my 8am days I can usually get a little time in the shop before heading to work, and today is one of those days. So after my cup of coffee out I went to do the resaw operation. My 14" Laguna bandsaw is going to be worked out with this so I thought I'd take a quick look to see if there is any obvious waste I could cut off. 

In this pic you can see first I need new blades in my planer. Second you can see some sapwood that has some insect damage. I commonly see this with my air dried lumber if the bark is left on through the drying process and I only see it in the sapwood. This is typical damage from what I refer to as bark beetles. Once the moisture goes down to 8-10% they no longer are a problem. Also, they do not invade the heartwood, they typically just feed on the starch rich sapwood. So here are a few cut lines;

A few more cut lines to get some knotty cracked wood out of the way;

Here's a shot of the board opposite side of the sapwood I plan to use, you can see from the previous pics I'm taking some of these defects out prior to the resaw also;

After resawing, here's one orientation, this is both outside faces matched up, interesting but not quite what I'm looking for;

And the pay off, I'm thinking winner winner, chicken dinner! This is the bookmatched iside faces of the board;

So you can see the really nice flow of the grain to highlight an oval/oblong shaped table. This is really what I was hoping for. Boards stayed nice and flat so far.... moisture content a little higher inside the board so I'll let it acclimate. I'm at about 7/8ths thick so I have some wiggle room to go to 3/4rds thick if I get any movement. 

A happy ending looks promising unless the main character decides to misbehave while it is acclimating.

[Mark J]

How much of the heartwood periphery are you going to loose when you go to a 20" width?

[Woodenskye]

Great story so far.  I like both of the options you presented.  The center of the first option really caught my eye, but may be better suited as wall art than a table.  

[RichardA]

That book match is so sexy.

[Bmac]

21 minutes ago, Mark J said:

How much of the heartwood periphery are you going to loose when you go to a 20" width?

After final trimming before resawing I'll lose a couple inches of outside heartwood. 

10 minutes ago, RichardA said:

That book match is so sexy.

Man you had to go there, that is really funny though!

[Gary Beasley]

The Eye of Sauron in wood!

[treeslayer]

All I can say is WOW that’s beautiful 

[RichardA]

3 hours ago, Bmac said:

After final trimming before resawing I'll lose a couple inches of outside heartwood. 

Man you had to go there, that is really funny though!

I admit to being a dirty old man, but that image is downright drop dead!

[Bmac]

48 minutes ago, RichardA said:

I admit to being a dirty old man, but that image is downright drop dead!

You are right but that visual is going mess this up for me now.

I guess it gives a new meaning to wood porn.

This story has taken a different direction for sure.

[Mark J]

Have you considered what it would look like with the sapwood in the periphery?

[Coop]

I think the pattern is very pleasing to the eye. And you can eliminate the cost of a coffee table book who’s definition I found to be: “ An oversized book whose purpose is to display on a table intended for use in an area in which one entertains guests and from which it can serve to inspire conversation or pass the time!  

[RichardA]

5 hours ago, Bmac said:

You are right but that visual is going mess this up for me now.

I guess it gives a new meaning to wood porn.

This story has taken a different direction for sure.

At the very least, it's not yet XXX rated. But still looks like a book I want to read.

[Bmac]

10 hours ago, Mark J said:

Have you considered what it would look like with the sapwood in the periphery?

Can't do that, my straight edge for joining the pieces will make the table way short.

 

After @RichardA's observation, a very acute one at that, I'm still going with the bookmatched boards. This table will compliment the Z chairs, so I've decided to call this the V table. Won't need any coffee table books on it for conversation starters, which was also a very acute observation by @Coop.

I guess I have a name for the story now....

[RichardA]

The "V" table.  I like that, since it does give that impression.  Which in itself is something beautiful to behold.

[Bmac]

The story continues with a quick update and a redirection. First the redirection, this table is being made to go with the Z chairs I just completed. Well I got them back from the upholstery shop and after putting them in the room where they will live I found the size of table I was envisioning to put between the two chairs was too large. I was originally thinking I'd go with a table 20"x 24-28". I really thought I had the space since they were being placed in a spot that held a full sized couch previously. Well after placing the chairs and measuring I'm going to have to down size the table to a small 12"x12" table. Since I got this great book matched panel that is 24" wide and 30" long, I'm not going to cut this up. So the redirection is instead of this becoming an end table this will become a coffee table. 

So the progress, glued up the panel, you can see I cut some areas in perimeter to aid with the clamping;

You can also see I'm starting to develop a shape/outline;

Final pic for this post, made some legs from the waste of the original slab that the table top came from. Used the curved grain to my advantage while developing the legs. Here the legs are as I'm starting to figure out the best arrangement for a table shaped like this;