Good Morning Friends,

How would you like to see figured wood on all four sides of the legs you are making for the piece you are working on?

It can be done and here is the method I use; First make a leg or legs out of most any stock with or without figure and then rip thin strips of figured wood and glue them to all four sides of the legs and there you have it. After you have the strips glued on and sanded it is hard to tell they are glued on and it makes people scratch their heads and ask, " how did you get figure on all four sides?"

 

Your answer is, "quite well I would say."

Nice tip Ralph!!!!

Good Morning Mike,

I am not the first to do this trick for it was Gustav Stickley who first made the legs in this fashion. I have used it where ever I want the front legs to stand out from the rest of the piece. Note that when you rip the thin strips they all must be from the same board. This assures the figure will look the same on all four sides.

Hey Ralph, are the pieces 45'd to give it a one piece appearance? or do you butt joint the strips around the substrate?

Ralph Allen Jones said:

Good Morning Mike,

I am not the first to do this trick for it was Gustav Stickley who first made the legs in this fashion. I have used it where ever I want the front legs to stand out from the rest of the piece. Note that when you rip the thin strips they all must be from the same board. This assures the figure will look the same on all four sides.

Good Morning John,

That would be determined on how thick you rip the thin strips. If they for instance are only 1.16" thich they can be over lapped and the corner would hardly be noticed but, if you rip them 1/8" thick or thicker yes, you would 45 them.

Using my thin strip jig one can rip them very easy at 1/16". Here is a picture of my thin strip jig;

 To accommodate wider pieces the hold downs would naturally be higher and ripping 1/16" thick strips is as easy as pie.