Thinking about making a wordworking table.

[trilect]

I'm new to woodworking and I'm getting my tools together and such. I bought some plans for a nice woodworking table. The recommended material is hard maple.

What I was wondering is this, I have loads of red oak and white oak trunks down on my property from last years storm. I was thinking about rough sawing some 2.5 inch thick boards from the logs and cutting them into say 2x2x6' boards on my radial arm saw, then glue these together for my table top. I don't have a joiner or any planes yet, but my radial arm can do a nice almost polished cut face.

Is this method and wood type acceptable for use in a woodworking table?

thanks

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[PaulH]

A good thought, but possibly more trouble than it's worth.

Any wood that you have on your property is probably a bit wet. If it's not completely dry, then it will twist, warp, and crack over time as it dries out. You could put it in a low-humidity environment for a year or so, but that may be too long of a wait.

The other problem is that you want a dead-flat surface. If you rough saw them, there is no guarentee that they'll all be the same. You need to face joint them then put them through a planer so that they're all of equal thickness. Also when you glue the boards together, you will want to use biscuits or dowels to ensure that the alignment is correct.

[fyffe555]

I went through this a while back and would suggest a few things to think about;

Spend the money on good tools and wait on getting/building a good (read expensive) bench until you figure out how big and how you like it arranged.

The hard maple benches are often works of art and made by a woodworker for them selves with several years (decades) of experience - Hard maple is expensive too - and personally I think you need a really good work table to be able to build one!

If you have white and red oak laying then send some to me! If it's not already cut and stickered you need to do so and dry it for at least a year before use otherwise it will move. Some have succcess with solar kilns to dry it too.

Wet oak makes really good turning material if you intend getting a lathe.

The kit benches using hardwoods or Hard maple are all made for midgets.

The benches I'm most comfortable with in the garage are a 2x4 stud framed with a flat solid door for a top, and a red oak framed with 3 x 3/4 MDF (!) sheets for a top with oak banding and a removable/replaceable working suface with masonite and 1/2 ply. Big, cheap, flat, heavy and stable. My first bench was a simple top of 2x4's bolted through and planed flat.

A good saw and blade will produce adequate to good glue lines. RAS might be trickier than a TS though... depends on your level of 'good'.

hth

Andrew

[Dave's_Not_Here]

Trilect...
It depends on a lot of variables.
There are woodworking benches for hand tools vs. an all-around bench/table top for assembly, etc. with minimal hand tool use. If you want a wood top bench for general woodworking purposes, a butcher block top is hard to beat. Depending on where you are located, you can find 2" maple tops for a "reasonable" price. You can mount it to any solid framework for support and it will take a lot of abuse. I know that Grizzly sells them and a company (Balley?) has left overs available from time to time. Many woodworking suppliers have tops available to purchase. You have to add any vise or other tools to the top.

If you are hand cutting dovetails, hand planing, etc., then a woodworking bench is more appropriate. They are an involved process to build and expensive to purchase.

As for making one from your own Oak, it takes at LEAST one (1) year per inch of thickness for green wood to reach euqulibrium in the moisture content based on the relative humidity in your area (generally in the 12-14% range). From there you have to "force" the moisture out of the wood to get to the RH in your shop area (generally in the 6-8% range).

To accomplish this, you can air dry (covered, stickered, ventilated) to 12-14% (use a good moisture meter to measure) and then move the wood into your shop to finish the process (protect any metal tools from rusting). You can Kiln dry the wood, which speeds up the process, but requires equipment, you can outsource the kiln drying to someone in your area if they are available and willing, you can sell the Oak to a woodworker and buy a great solid Maple laminated top....

Using the Oak green is an invitation to disaster and a lot of work that will leave you frustrated after the bench contorts itself like it was posessed from a VooDoo ritual....

... furniture builder and CNC Wannabie...

[trilect]

actually selling my oak and buying ready to use lumber sounds pretty good. I found a man down the road from me that will bandsaw cut my trees for 20 cents a board foot. Only problem is everyone near me uses him and I don't have much of a market.

I do need a table to work on to start out, I'll probably use the door idea mentioned.

I'll still probably air dry some of my wood for future projects, the I made an attic in my shop for the purpose, it gets up toward 100 degrees on a sunny day at 75 degrees outside so it should easily reach 200 degrees in the summer.

Currently I have around 10 acres of woods with everything from wild cherry, sycamore, redoak, sassafras, beechnut, hickory, black walnut, ash and red cedar. I hope I can use some of this in the future.

Thanks for all the information everyone. You've given me much food for thought.

Sam Gordon
Custer, Kentucky

P.S. What does stickered mean?

[ger21]

I'll still probably air dry some of my wood for future projects, the I made an attic in my shop for the purpose, it gets up toward 100 degrees on a sunny day at 75 degrees outside so it should easily reach 200 degrees in the summer.

Don't put it in the attic until it's been dried outside for about a year. As has already been mentioned, it should be stickered and covered, and well ventilated until the majority of the moisture is gone. If you put green wood in a hot attic, you'll end up with split, warped and twisted firewood.

[Dave's_Not_Here]

Stickered: Place 3/4" x 3/4" x (however wide your pile is) dry sticks across the width of your piled lumber every 18" - 24". Each successive layer MUST have the stickers lined up with the previous layer(s).

NEVER mix different thickness of lumber within a given layer (don't put 4/4 with 8/4 lumber in the same layer.)

When air drying, ALWAYS keep your lumber from direct moisture and direct sunlight.

ALWAYS put something HEAVY on top of your stack to offset any lumber cupping, etc. that WILL occur in the top layer(s) that have the least amount of weight.

ALWAYS seal the ends of your logs BEFORE milling in to dimensioned lumber. Easier than trying to coat the ends of boards. Use Anchorseal or some other form of moisture barrier that will allow for gradual moisture loss (NOT rapid, which will ruin your lumber) If Anchorseal is not available of costly, a couple of coats of latex paint will do a reasonable job.

ALWAYS avoid extreme heat. 200 degrees is extreme. It will caseharden your wood and make it useless as well as very dangerous to cut with a tablesaw. If you never cut into a casehardened board, believe me, you don't want to. Casehardening comes from the outer layer of the lumber drying before the inside. Moisture is trapped inside and stress is built up in the lumber. When you cut it open with the tablesaw and the stress is relieved, the cut closes back up around the blade and nasty, scary things happen....

A good moisture meter is imperative....

Moisture released into your attic can cause serious mold issues, so think real hard about drying in a residential attic.

A solar kiln can be built "relatively" inexpensively. If you are going to harvest and use your own lumber, looking into this is a good idea. I have several links I can send you.

A good resource is Woodweb.com.

Be safe....

[Deacon44]

Sounds like you wanted to build the table top...which is cool....but I have to tell you the best woodworking bench I've had ( and I've had several due to being in the military and moving around every 3 years) is an old "schoolhouse" door that a friend of mine gave me...thing is 2" thick and solid as a rock...and the cost...gotta love it...free...now that i've had it for awhile i tend to see alot of these old solid wood doors everywhere....flea markets, thrift shops and construction sites and they can usually be picked up really really cheap or sometimes even free! Even use the hole for the door knob to route some of my cords out of the way....just made a sturdy frame out of 4x4's and 2x4's and this thing takes alot of abuse....nothing else to do to it once you got is on a base...edges are already finished and if you get the older doors then it's usually solid...no veneer on it...I wouldnt trade this workbench for world...i've hauled this one around for over 6 years now..it's even made a trip to japan with me!...Just a suggestion if you dont really want to spend a whole lot of time on a workbench...

[trilect]

It is kinda funny but really I can't do much of anything without a table, I really can't even build my own table top without a table. I'm going to try the door table route and if I can't find a proper door, I'll do the 3 sheets of mdf with a cover of masonite or something else.

If there is anyone in close to irvington needing a piece or two of some sort of wood for turning drop me a message.

[Halfnutz]

Yeah, Fire Doors, they are real common and perfect for table tops. I get the hollow core and use them for portable use, theyre ony 20-25 bucks at home deot if you cant find one. Then cover with MDF. My favorite is my table saw runoff table which is covered with 1 inch melamine clad MDF. It slides nice, but I wouldnt make a bench with it. Try finding an old fire door like Deacon said.

[trilect]

After looking around a bit, I found some solid core doors, but they are all panel type doors for 35 bucks used. I was thinking about buying one of these mounting it flat on legs and using some sort of self leveling compound to fill in those panel depressions then mounting 1/8" or 1/4" flat surface on top of that.

Think that will work?

[InspirationTool]

I'm a fan of the butcher block top. I got mine from McMaster.

Here is my webpage about my bench:

http://www.jeffalbro.net/woodworking/workbench/

It did cost alot of money, and took alot of time... but I'm very happy with the results. You could use a thinner maple top and pine instead of mahogany and end up with a more economical, but just as useful bench.

-Jeff

[trilect]

Very nice looking table, I'm pretty strapped for cash at the moment though.

[ViperTX]

trilect...don't know how much space you have....but if space is limited consider making something that you can quickly dismantle and lean against the wall...

[trilect]

Space is a bit tight, 12' x 16' but I think I'll be able to leave a 30 x 60 table in the center of the floor. I might put casters on it or something so I can push it against a wall if need be.