Best Visual Compensation For Extremely Obvious Mistake

[Howard Rosenberg]

Hi all -
I'm (still) building a patio table made out of ipe.
Part of the assembly involves what seems like MILLIONS of mating rabbets (yes, I know) that are lapped.
To visually even out machining or wood thickness variances, I've chamfered all adjacent surfaces.
However, I caught one of the edges of the rabbets on the tablesaw blade when I was defining the rabbet. The result wasn't pretty.
I'd originally thought the chamfer would get most of the un-evenness but that isn't the case.
What I guess I'm asking is, would this EXTREMELY OBVIOUS error be best at the centre of the table (the table! yikes! why couldn't it have been one of the benches?) or at the outside edge?
Which area do you think will grab people's attention LEAST?
Thanks for all advice.
Howard

[Donnie Raines]

I would go for the center. I would assume that you will have some items(be it a plates or a serving tray of some type) that would cover this oops up. If you put it to the outside, people will either see it or will run their hand over it and say. "gee...look at this sorry excuse for a chamfer...does this guy really know what he is doing? I wonder if these benches are going to break in half while I am sitting on them....?"....
....Ok that was bit harsh...but I think you know what I am after here.... :D ;)

[Byron Trantham]

Depending on how to close the mistake is to center, you might cut a hole with a hole saw to remove the mistake and make a "plug" [out of IPE] to cover the hole. The plug can be cut with a circle cutter on your drill press. Attach a "top" to the plug so it won't fall through. Why the hole and plug? Heck, it's for the umbrella I intend to buy! :D

[Tom Sontag]

I am not certain I understand exactly what happened, but couldn't you just shave off the bad edge and recut the rabbet? If you really want all your table boards to be the same width or can't hide it on the underside, I would replace the board. People will see this and it is your reputation.

[Michael Sloan]

Hi Howard,

I am (also) still working on my IPE table.

I am, thankfully, done with my joinery, and have the top fully assembled. I made a similar mistake on one of my slats. I cut out the damaged edge, and put in a "dutchman", using a piece of scrap IPE from the same board so the grain would match pretty closely. I then remachined the end of the slat to the correct size. I would have made a new slat, except I didn't have any large enough pieces of left over wood with a similar grain pattern. Can't say that the repair is totally invisible, but I doubt that it will be visible in the pictures that will (eventually) get posted here. If you then put the repair to the center of the table, probably no one other than you would ever notice.

Are you planning on finishing the table? or leaving it natural? If you are going to finish it, what are you planning on using? (I have not yet decided on the finish, although I am leaning toward leaving it natural).

Mike

[Howard Rosenberg]

I think I'll go for the centre - it can always be cobered with plates etc.
As far as the ipe is concerned, I'll not be putting a finish on it - I'll leave it natural.
Are you planning on epoxying the bottoms of the legs to diminish wicking and checking? The snow gets pretty high here in Toronto...
All the best.
Howard

[Ed Hardin]

A dutchman is the way to go IMHO.

[Michael Sloan]

I don't have any end-grain touching the ground, but if I did, I would definitely coat the ends with epoxy to prevent water absorbtion. I am debating whether to coat my long grain ground contact pieces, and I probably will.