That’s exactly where it’s going. The fireplace. I bundle up the really thin stuff for fire starter. 
Paul

I am crazy I suppose, cause I see stir sticks.  Granted that is alot more than any project or years worth of projects yields.  

17 minutes ago, Gunny said:

I am crazy I suppose, cause I see stir sticks.  Granted that is alot more than any project or years worth of projects yields.  

Shims and pen blanks.  LOL

Well we picked up all the stir sticks and bundled them up. Today was spent gluing up more of the light frames and the wife started getting the lights attached. Tomorrow should be the end of making light frames. 
Paul

Today was the finish line for making the LED light frames. That was a long haul. My wife is making progress on applying the lights and for me it’s on to the walnut ceiling tiles. They will all be routered out with the Shaper Origin to create a pattern for the light to shine through.  
Paul

Well fun time is over. Had a great trip but it’s back to the job at hand. I am almost finished with putting up the light frames and then I will start wiring them up. I also glued up two sample ceiling tiles. I decided to sandwich a piece of walnut between two pieces of soft maple and now I will resaw down the middle of the walnut and book match them. I need a fairly thin layer of walnut. The plan is they will have a pattern routered all the way through in places to allow for light to come through and in other places we will router through just the walnut to expose the white maple underneath. 
Paul

I spent yesterday milling up a lot of soft maple for the ceiling tile substrate and today will start milling up the black walnut and start the gluing process. Is going to be a few days of gluing up the blanks. 
Paul

I did get two blanks done so I can start experimenting with the routering process. 
Paul

 With all the parts you're making Paul the curiosity level is starting to peak . 

What did you use to clamp the veneer?

I don’t actually clamp the veneer per se. I sandwich a 3/4” piece of walnut between two pieces of 3/4” soft maple and after drying slice the piece down the middle of the walnut to produce two book matched pieces which are then glued together. The grain of the maple backing is running at right angles to the walnut for stability. The advantage of doing it this way is that it is much faster but also more stable. When you veneer onto a solid backing using water based glue it will warp or dish the piece. If you clamp it together in this way and then let it dry for two or three days, and then resaw it there is little or no warpage. The only other way would be to use resin based glue and there are too many pieces and it would take forever and also be very hard on the clamps. Normally I would use poplar as the backing just for economy sake but in this case I needed the white substrate under the walnut. The design has places where the tile is through routered for light transmission and other areas where it will only be routered down through the veneer to show the contrasting maple. 
Paul

Edited January 31, 20215 yr by Masonsailor

We finished the first ceiling tile today. We wasted two making design changes but the final design seems to work. 
Paul

That is very striking.

Finished up gluing all 124 of the blanks for the ceiling tiles. Now they need to sit for a week or two to let the moisture from the glue dissipate before they are resawn and then the halves glued together. I also milled up all the stiffeners for the dividing trim which goes between each tile. I used up every scrap I had left over from all the milling of everything else. Now I need to mill up the walnut trim which will be pin nailed to those stiffeners to create the dividers. They are only 5/16” thick so I decided to glue up the 4/4 walnut into blocks which will allow me to slice off the 1 1/4” X 13” X 5/16” strips on the right side of the blade instead of against the fence. 
Paul

Today was a productive day in the shop. I managed to get all 124 blanks jointered and ripped which makes the them ready to resaw and then book match them to create the ceiling tiles.  Also made headway on the trim that divides the tiles. I decided the easiest way to make the 5/16” thick strips that make up the dividers was to glue up blocks of walnut and then rip them on the table saw. I put a waste block on the end of each one to minimize the waste on the walnut. 
Paul

This has been quite the project.  Lots of details.  Really enjoying how you explain all the steps as you are going along.

This is without a doubt the most complicated project I have ever done solo. In past years I have done complicated projects but I always had at least my brother and usually a crew of three or four helping me. It’s taking forever but as my wife says it keeps me off the streets. 
Paul

The last few weeks this project seems to be crawling but there is always that point where the detail work goes slow. The ceiling tiles are going to be the part that takes forever. I’m lucky to get three or four done in a day. One row is now in the drying room and another will be ready before the previous row is done. Next week it will be time to pull the wiring part of the project together. In order to get the tiles completely sealed we had to resort to dipping them in a tank of Watco. We are hoping that will stabilize them in the long haul against warpage. 
Paul

Beautiful work, Paul!

Incredible.