Some platter inspiration & advice needed

[Matt Ranum]

I think I need some inspiration. I want to turn a platter or 2 but I have to do from 4/4 or 5/4 Walnut & Maple. My boards are 8"-12" wide and all rough cut. Am I better off to make small narrow pieces and glue together to make some sort of a pattern to get the width I want or just edge glue a couple boards together to get the width I want? Which would look better? I'm thinking of 12"-14" wide, I'm good till about 16" on the machine.

I thought about a Maple edge on the solid Walnut base. Come to think about it I do have a few boards with some nice curly figure in it in both varieties of wood.

I don't have a chuck so I have to use glue blocks and face plates. I have a 3" and a 6".

Any advice is welcome and pictures would be a plus too. :D

[Steve Mawson]

I believe you could be better off with some narrower pieces glued up. If you were to make a platter from wide boards there would be a good chance that they would warp and not be flat which is kind of necessary for a platter. Show us what you end up with.

[Matt Ranum]

Thats what one of my concerns was. Would it have a tendency not to stay flat and want to curl.