Plant stand

[Fred W. Hargis Jr]

Last Christmas our daughter gave Marie an "expensive house plant" (?). Anyway, I was directed at that time to make a plant stand for it and just now got it finished. It's not a big deal, but I made out of a wood I had never used before: red elm. I saw a table some years ago in one of the mags that had a floating top, that top was made of red elm. I looked at the pics and though I would really like to try some. So last year I picked some up when I saw it at one of my suppliers  it's apparently not that common, so I grabbed it while I could. Anyway, this is my first (and last time) working with it. It's a softer wood with a Janka hardness of 860, and while I knew elm had interlocking grain I was unaware of the headaches it caused when milling it. This stuff was almost impervious to being smoothed. Hand Planes, scrapers, and my jointer all failed at smoothing the edge grain...the only thing that worked was sanding...lots and lots of hand sanding. That said, I am pleased with the color and some of the grain. But the grain had a lot of variation in it that might have been due to how it was cut. This was all flat sawn, but even with a flat sawn log you get some rift sawn and quarter sawn pieces...and that may be what I have.  The wood itself looked a little drab after I sanded it and I wanted to bring out a little more color. So I tried garnet shellac and BLO on a test piece, they both did a good job of giving the color I wanted, but the garnet shellac was just (to my eyes) a little better. So the stand got a coat of garnet for color, and then top coated with Minwax Fast Dry Oil Varnish (an alkyd resin varnish). So while this came out ok, I will now cross red elm off my list. I still have some of it left,  may make tissue boxes out of  it to give to the thrift store. Anyway, here's what it looks like, a picture of the overall stand, and a picture of the top (sorry for the glare). The first pic shows what looks like the true color, not sure why the top came out with a color shift. Notice how different the grain on the base is versus the top.

 

Edited October 23, 2024 by Fred W. Hargis Jr

[lew]

That is gorgeous, Fred! 

 

I've turned elm but never tried to do any flatwork with it. A long time ago, someone told me that elm was often used for chair seats because of the interlocking grain. Mot sure why that was important.

[DeVere]

Turned out very nice Fred! Well done. 

[Gunny]

Awesome 

[Grandpadave52]

Most Excellent Fred. I really like the finish color. The grain variation is interesting especially between the top and base. Gives it unique contrast.

 

As for your leftover pieces, do you have enough to glue up maybe for a bowl blank or????

 

Thanks for sharing.

[Fred W. Hargis Jr]

28 minutes ago, Grandpadave52 said:

Most Excellent Fred. I really like the finish color. The grain variation is interesting especially between the top and base. Gives it unique contrast.

 

As for your leftover pieces, do you have enough to glue up maybe for a bowl blank or????

 

Thanks for sharing.

Didn't think of that (the bowl blank), I'll have to see...maybe I could try a segmented bowl with pieces of it in it.

[Gunny]

Wine goblet blank glued up with other wood would be cool.

[Handfoolery]

Very nice!

[Larry Buskirk]

Very nice Fred!

[Danl]

Nice  work Fred.  Thanks for the info with working with elm.  I thought I wanted to work with elm some day.  Maybe not now that I know more, thanks to you.  Thanks for sharing.

Danl

[kmealy]

Elm was also used for wooden wheel hubs because of its resistance to splitting.

 

When I was young, we had an elm tree that succumbed to Dutch elm disease and had to be taken down.  I was too young to split for the coal furnace (don't even remember if that was done or  my dad gave up).  But I do remember having to work with him on the "misery whip", a two-man crosscut saw.  I'm also sure it was not very sharp.

[Cal]

Beautiful plant stand Fred

[Gordon]

Great job, nice design.  

[KevTN]

Great stand. I never thought of Elm to work with. Interesting about the interlocking grain. I had never heard of that. I think it turned great!

[DuckSoup]

 That turned out great Fred! I like the simplicity of it, clean lines.