The last bit of machining was to create the two lower shelves. The minister wanted to keep the “maple” look for the shelves but hard maple is a little expensive so we went with soft maple.

Planed everything to ¾” and used biscuits to help with alignment during glue up. I made these shelves full width during the glue-ups

A card scraper brought everything smooth.

I sized the shelves using the same procedures as the top. Cut to length and width with the skill saw and a guide; then used the router, flush trim bit and a guide to finish off the saw marks.

The guide is held in place with double sided tape and screws. The screw holes are located in the area that will be removed where the shelf wraps around the legs. I also ran the chamfer detail around the perimeter of both shelves.

Marked and cut the corners

Finished shelves

One more dry fit to make certain everything fits

Set the top in place to locate and thread the lag bolt holes.

While I had the top in position, I did its’ final sanding and oiling. The top is sanded through 320 grit. I used two applications of mineral oil; allowing each to soak in about a day. Then, I used one application of hot “Bumble Bee Wax”- a blend of mineral oil and bee’s wax. Once that cooled, I buffed it out with an old towel.

A final dis-assembly; the maple shelves sanded through 320 grit; the poplar pieces sanded through 180 grit. All of the hardware was pre-drilled and pre-threaded using bee’s wax to lubricate the holes.

The minister set a time and date to pick up the table and transport it to the church. It has to make the journey from south central PA to Ithaca NY. The day before he arrived, Mimi and I carried everything- except the top- to the carport and I did the final assembly. Due to the dimensions, the shelves had to be set in place during the assembly/glue up. That really added to the weight!

The minister arrived right on time and we loaded the base and top into his van. The church members are going to do the final assembly and finishing on site.

It was a long process and I was relieved that he was satisfied with the work. Even though we communicated via email and pictures, it is difficult to know what something is really like.

Several days later, I received this picture

I think the church members did an outstanding job painting and finishing the table. It looks right at home there in the kitchen.

If you made it this far, thanks for following along. Also, thanks to John Moody for the advice on the butcher block top.

As “Norm” used to say- “We’re gaining on it now.”

Time for the first dry fit to make sure all the mortice and tenons fit together.

Had to futz with a few of the tenons but overall everything went together nicely. You can see why I’m limited to the size of my projects. This is the only assembly space available- add clamps around a piece and things really get tight.

There were still a few more things left to do with the apron and shelf supports. I wanted to carry the chamfer detail along the bottom of each piece. Router table took care of that.

The shelves need to be secured to the frame. I decided to use wooden “clips” and a dado in the stretchers

The “clips” are cut from an “L” shaped piece of poplar

I made a long blank for the clips and then just cut off about 1 ½” piece. I drilled an oversized screw hole through the thicker section (oversized to allow for expansion/contraction). The thinner part slips into the dado on the back of the stretchers and screws thread into the underside of the shelf.

The astute observer will notice the mistake in the pictured blank. The wood grain is running parallel to the blank length. The little tabs (fitted into the dados) will snap off as soon as any pressure is applied. Not sure where my mind was when I cut this, anyway, I made new ones with the grain running perpendicular to the blank length (just forgot to take a picture).

The final bit of frame construction was to create a way to mount the butcher block top. The frame (with 2 shelves) will weigh in at close to 100 pounds. If the completed table is moved, lifting it by the top, quite a bit of stress will be applied to the connection between the top and frame. It took me a while to come up with an idea that solved the problem.

I added three cross supports that were dovetailed into the side aprons.

The dovetailed supports were let into the apron using blind dovetail techniques. I used a trim router to hog out the majority of the materials.

Then I chiseled out the remaining material.

The dovetail shape, in addition to glue and screws at each dovetail location, will provide enough support to keep the top from breaking free of the frame.

Finally, l  drilled oversized holes thru the cross supports to receive 1/4" lag bolts to connect the frame to the top.

Now to tear it all apart to work on the shelves!

With the legs finished, it was time to create the aprons, shelf supports, and stretchers. These were all made from 1” thick poplar. The apron was 5” wide and the remaining pieces were 3” wide. The tenons were all done on the table saw. First establishing the shoulders-

I have an old Delta tenoning jig that makes quick work of making the tenon cheek cuts. However, the length of the long aprons and shelf supports exceeded the distance between my table saw and the ceiling. Looks like a job for the dado blade.

I used the same setup here, as I did for the shoulder cuts, the rip fence with a “depth stop” and the miter gauge. My table saw is a right tilt model (old Bridgewood) but due to space limitations I had to move the rip fence to the “other side” of the blade to be able to make these cuts.

After a couple of adjustments, the tenon thickness was what I was looking for.

Now just run all of the pieces for the tenon thickness

A blade height adjustment to establish the tenon width.

That’ll do

Finally, run the pieces, again, to finish the tenons.

The work space in my shop is so small that I needed to build this project in stages. With the top finished, it was time to move on to the legs of the base. The entire base frame is made from poplar and the minister is going to paint it white. His specs were for full 4” x 4” legs. I suppose I could have gotten 16/4 poplar boards but those pieces would have been so large and heavy that I don’t think I could have manhandled them through the milling processes. I started with 5/4 boards and milled enough stock for a 4 x 4 glue up. I finished out the planing/ripping the boards a little over sized in thickness and width to allow for shifts in the glue up process.

Gluing up the blanks was straight forward

Space and number of clamps dictated gluing one leg assembly at a time.

Once all of the legs dried, the jointer and planer brought the blanks square and to the correct dimensions.

Cutting the legs to length was up next. I opted to use the table saw for this operation. I have a chop saw but it is one of the very early models with a 7.5” blade- it wasn’t going to make the cut in one pass. The table saw wouldn’t make the cut in one pass either but I felt I’d have a little more control using it.

I set up my cross cut sled and squared one end of each leg. Next, I added an extend stop block set for the leg length. One pass, roll the blank over, second pass- done.

At this point, it was time to layout and cut the mortices in the legs. To make certain the mortices were properly oriented, I labeled everything.

Some practice slots with the hollow chisel morticer.

Twenty-four mortices later.

The minister added the chamfer detail around the top so I thought it would look OK to continue that detail throughout the build. I would have added the chamfer around the leg feet anyway to prevent tear out if the table was slid across the floor.

Some sanding left but the legs are finished.

This build was not going to be particularly difficult. My biggest concern was the maple top. I’ve built smaller edge grain tops before so the process was not unfamiliar; however, the staggered shorter length field pieces had me scratching my head about clamping and gluing. Also, I needed to consider the size of the top versus the capabilities of my shop equipment. My Dewalt 735 planer maxes out at around 13” wide and my little shop made drum sander can only handle very small work.

John Moody suggested making the top in several sections and then assembling those sections into the final width. He also suggested using biscuits to aid in aligning the pieces during glue up. Sounded good to me so that’s what I did.

I started with 8/4 rough, hard maple. Milled it down into the strips I’d need to build the top. I was really worried about the amount of waste there might. Sometimes thick pieces have a lot of internal stress and can end up looking like a piper cub propeller after they are cut. I got really lucky and almost all of the pieces were nice and straight.

I spent several hours sorting, moving and labeling the pieces so there would be less of a chance of a mistake during glue up (not that completely eliminated snafus). I also marked all of the biscuit locations. As John suggested, the biscuits really helped align and keep the strips in place while clamping each section. I also used biscuits on the end joints where the shorter field pieces were joined.

Maybe overkill on the clamps but I didn’t want to take any chances. For the field pieces that were made up from shorter lengths, I clamped the pieces end to end.

Instead of trying to completely assemble each section at once, I opted to glue on and clamp one strip at a time until the section was finished. It took longer but I had more time to make sure everything was lining up. Working by yourself forces you to think the entire assembly process through thoroughly and sometimes even do a “practice run”.

Eventually, I ended up here-

All the labels and notes are clearly visible and I transferred some of the markings to the edges/back for reference during the final glue up. It seems like every time I clamp up an assembly like, I end up with a little irregularity on the edges. A quick pass through the jointer trued the edges and then it was on to the planer.

2

Next, the sections were glued together and sized for length. I used a straight edge and skill saw to trim the top to length. I guess I could have used the belt sander to smooth out the sections but I’ve really become a fan of the card scraper. One of our newer member- Todd Clippinger- has a really nice and quick procedure for sharpening card scrapers so you spend more time finishing then trying to produce that elusive “hook”.

Originally, the edges of the top were to be square. The minister thought a chamfered edge would look nicer. A simple design change. Router and chamfer bit took care of it.

A little more sanding (through 320 grit) and the top is done (except for the oil/wax). It weighed in at around 90 pounds.

(borrowing a title concept from Rocky and Bullwinkle)

Part 1:

I think my sister believes my past transgression’s slate can be, at least in part, wiped clean by building furniture for the church she attends. The latest installment is a kitchen island/work table for the church’s kitchen.

The pastor emailed me a picture of a table he thought would work but wanted something larger and with slightly different construction techniques.

Using Sketchup and the free Sketchup viewer, we worked through the major details of the build and ended up with this concept-

He chose to use poplar for the frame (which would be painted), soft maple for the two shelves (polyed) and hard maple for the top (oil/bee’s wax). The overall dimensions were 72” long x 30” wide x 36” tall. The top was to be made as a butcher block style using edge grain (rather than end grain) and 1.5” thick. He also wanted the top pieces to be random lengths scattered through the field. We originally thought about 1” “wide” field pieces but then went with approximately 1.5” wide pieces. That reduced the overall number of strips across the top. The legs were a full 4” square glue ups. All of the frame joints are mortice and tenons. The only hardware used was to secure the top to the frame (lag bolts/washers) and the shelves to the stretchers (wood screws/washers).

As the build progressed, it became obvious this could be another china cupboard fiasco. The final assembly would have to take place outside of the basement shop.

So… if you are up to it, follow along…