How To Cut A Clean Edge On An Oak Floor
The rich contours of natural wood edges give tables, benches, and other projects a sculptural quality, almost as much art as furniture. Thankfully, anyone can build such stunning projects because doing so requires simply basic techniques and tools.
Another great thing about edifice these types of organic projects: There'due south really no right or wrong mode to do information technology. No 2 slabs will be exactly alike, making each projection unique. But let the natural shapes, and the tips here, pb you through design and edifice.
Tips for sawing your own natural-border slabs
What to look for
*Logs felled during spring and summer surrender their bark easier once dry, and have more than unusual coloring due to college moisture content.
*Search out logs with multiple knots, burls, limbs, and other unique characteristics.
*To create even more than character in your wood, allow the logs to lie on the ground or in a stack for a twelvemonth or two uncovered. Exposure to weather increases the chances of getting spalted streaks and colour variations. (Red, soft maple, birch, box elder, and almost softwoods break down quicker, so limit their exposure to a year.)
Cutting the logs
*Bark contains grit that dulls blades quickly, so remove equally much equally possible before firing up the manufactory. Start with a sharp blade, and keep extras on mitt.
*Cut slabs a minimum of 2" thick to minimize warping. Saw thicker slabs for specific purposes or projects. If you want to use the warp-prone pith (the log's center), cut it every bit a 4–five"-thick slab, equally shown at right. If the slab warps or splits later, remove the pith and make two slabs with single natural edges—swell for shelves and mantels—or glue them together to form a wider slab with ii natural edges.
Drying the slabs
*Air-drying maintains the best color of your wood; kiln-drying, although quicker, tends to fifty-fifty out subtle differences in forest tones.
*After cutting, don't leave the slabs stacked for more than a twenty-four hours or two without stickering (adding spacers to promote air circulation).
*Identify tedious-drying thicker slabs at the bottom of the stack then down the route yous can access the thinner, drier slabs without dismantling the whole stack.
First, take hold of a slab
You can obtain slabs in several ways; here'southward a list, beginning with your almost affordable options:
*Saw 'em yourself. For details on this rewarding only labor-intensive option, see "Tips for sawing your own natural-border slabs" listed higher up.
*Have a local mill saw 'em for you. A lot of sawyers won't mind a custom-cutting job. Simply bring them your log or take a mobile manufacturing plant come up to you. (For operators of Wood-Mizer brand portable bandsaw mills in your surface area, call 800-553-0182; or go to forestryforum.com to locate a local sawyer.) Just remember, you lot'll need to air-dry the slabs nearly 1 yr per inch of thickness or have them kiln-dried.
*Purchase 'em cut and dried. You might exist difficult-pressed to find a local retailer selling slabs with two natural edges, so look to the Cyberspace. In Sources, at the bottom of the story, you'll find sites selling natural-edge slabs, even in tabular array-size planks; exotic wood species; and highly figured grain patterns, such every bit burls. When your woods arrives, permit information technology acclimate to your shop'south humidity for a calendar week or 2 earlier doing any machining.
Let the slab drive the design
With the slab in hand, you probably have a full general idea of what you want to build (large table, small-scale table, long bench, short bench, for case). Now consider the following in guild to lucifer the unique characteristics of the slab to your personal tastes:
*The confront of a table, demote, or headboard might look skillful with a lilliputian waviness; simply a desktop must be flat. (We'll evidence you how to flatten a slab later on in this commodity.)
*Unless y'all're working with a full cross-department burl, most slabs will take been cut off at the ends by a chainsaw. Those ends usually look best when sawn smooth and perpendicular to the confront. If you want to sculpt the ends like to the natural edges, utilise carving tools or an angle grinder (using fibroid, beveled abrasive wheels) followed by sanding flap wheels.
*Determine parts that must be certain dimensions—such as tabular array height or seat width—and blueprint the other parts in proportion to those dimensions. For case, on the coffee-tabular array higher up, nosotros had to cutting downwardly the 51⁄2 '-long slab to iv' to make it proportional to the natural shape and dimensions of our apple base of operations.
Time to remove the bawl
Even though you might like the look of the bark, it tends to fall off afterwards. Also, there could be eye-catching surprises lurking beneath the bark, such as the worm tracks shown at pinnacle right. Begin past removing a 6–8" section of bawl, starting at an end. The cambium layer, the gristly "mucilage" that connects the bark to the forest, tin add depth and character to the edge if you leave it. (It won't come loose later.) Scraping away that layer creates a slippery-smooth edge with more rounded features.
Y'all don't need to sand the edges smooth at this point. And if you get out the cambium, you'll do little to no sanding to maintain the texture.
To dislodge the bulk of the bark, gently push button a rounded chisel beneath the bawl. To prevent gouges, work along the slab border rather than across it.
When we peeled the bark from this cherry slab we discovered a complex network of worm tracks, a feature worth highlighting.
With the bark removed, employ a small nylon or wire brush to gently scrub away loose or stringy cambium-layer fibers.
Use a rotary tool and tiny sanding flap wheels (found at the Sources listed on the next page) to clean and smoothen intricate details.
Flatten the slab faces
If you bought the slab precut, it might come with the faces already planed or sanded. Otherwise, flatten both faces with a plunge router and jig. Begin by building the jig beneath, sized to fit your slab. Nosotros built ours 42" wide to accommodate a redwood burl, also equally most time to come slabs.
Cut natural-border project parts to rough finished length so yous're non flattening more stock than necessary. With the jig resting on sawhorses, place the slab where it will be easiest for you to attain with the router. Level the slab with wedges and "trap" information technology with screw-on cleats, as shown above.
Install a broad, flat-cutting chip, such as Freud'southward i1⁄2 "-wide mortising fleck (#sixteen-128), in your router. With the router resting on the carriage, find the highest spot on the slab and gear up the cutting depth to remove 1⁄8 " at that spot. Now plunge and rout beyond the slab, alternately holding the router against the carriage sides. Slide the carriage forth the rails and echo the length of the slab. Continue in 1⁄8 "-deeper increments until flat.
Turn the slab over, secure it with the cleats—no wedges this time—and flatten the other confront equally you lot did the first. Leave the slab as thick equally possible to forbid warping. Power-sand both faces with 60- or 80-dust abrasive until the router marks disappear, simply don't terminate-sand withal.
Focus on the flaws
Now you begin to see what the slab will expect like when finished. Evaluate it for splits or other defects and determine how yous desire to treat them. Because splits could continue to open up, deal with them first to stabilize the slab, using butterfly keys as shown beneath.
Lay your keys across the divide and trace around them firmly onto the slab with a craft knife or marker knife.
Later on freehand routing shut to the scribed lines, use a sharp chisel to clean up the sidewalls and corners. Epoxy the keys in place.
Once the epoxy has cured, utilize a block plane or ability sander to trim the keys flush to the slab surface. Then sand smooth.
Space keys along the crack'due south length in proportion to the slab size. Install keys on both faces to further protect confronting futurity splits; they don't need to align with each other. Typically, brand your keys from ane⁄two "-thick stock—we like species that contrast with the slab, only there's no correct or wrong choice. Rout mortises and glue them in place with two-part epoxy, which fills in tiny voids improve than yellow glue.
Adjacent, clean out loose bark inclusions (small pockets of bark within the wood's interior) and either fill them with epoxy (colored or clear, only avoid epoxy that dries to a milky colour) or leave them empty. Tight bawl inclusions will likely remain intact. Glue torn or loose fibers or splinters back in place and sand the repair to blend in.
Now for the joinery
To connect the slab to its base of operations, we recommend figure-8 fasteners, shown below, over integral joinery (mortise and tenon or dovetails, for example) because they're easy to install, they allow the wood to shrink and aggrandize without splitting, and they work with almost any project. They likewise allow you to use terminate to all or most projection parts earlier assembling. You should make shallow mortises (the thickness of the fasteners) in either the slab or the base of operations so the fasteners sit flush with that piece. (Utilize longer screws than those that come with the fasteners—ideally, you want to apply at to the lowest degree 1"-long screws.) If yous prefer to cut integral joints, such as mortises-and-tenons or dovetails, be sure to allow for seasonal wood motility.
Sanding and finishing
Before assembly, ease sharp edges with a rasp, file, or sandpaper. Mitt-airplane or sand smooth the slab's height face up; if sanding only, beginning with 120 dust and continue with 150, 180, 220, and 320, if needed. Sand the natural edges with 120, 180, and 220-grit flap wheels until y'all're satisfied.
Apply your terminate of choice. We like clear-oil finishes considering they accentuate the wood's figure and grain. Follow up with several protective tiptop coats of polyurethane, lacquer, or shellac.
Sources
- Natural-edge wood slabs:
- Berkshire Products, Massachusetts, (domestic, exotic, and figured species), 413229-7919,
- berkshireproducts.com.
- Hearne Hardwoods, Pennsylvania, (domestic and exotic species), 888814-0007, hearnehardwoods.com.
- Ohio Woodlands, Ohio, (primarily domestic species),
- 330-506-9012, ohiowoodlands.com.
- Primo Wood Slabs, Tennessee, (primarily domestic
- species), 423-272-6003, primowoodslabs.com.
- Redwood.burl.com, California, (redwood slabs and burls), 707826-9663, redwoodburl.com.
- Sanding flap wheels:
- Klingspor's Woodworking Shop, 800228-0000,
- woodworkingshop.com.
- Lee Valley, 800871-8158, leevalley.com.
- Dremel, 800437-3635, dremel.com.
- Figure-8 fasteners:
- Role #21650, Rockler Woodworking &
- Hardware, 800-279-4441, rockler. com.
- Freud mortising router fleck (#16-128):
- Part #837557, Woodcraft, 800225-1153,
- woodcraft.com.
Source: https://www.woodmagazine.com/how-to-work-with-natural-edge-slabs
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