Stainless Inlay

[Steve White]

am looking for creative solutions to a recurring problem. i need to inlay a 3/8" x 1/16" piece of brushed stainless at the wood to veneer joint of a banded conference table. the field is medium figured curly maple veneer laid on 1-1/4" mdf, the banding is 3-1/2" x 1-3/4" maple solid. the finish is precat laquer. i would like to have the surface of the stainles as snug and as flush as possible. have discussed procedures with some of my local woodworking buddies, but none of us has a plan we really feel comfortable with. soooo... any help would be greatly appreciated. thank you!

steve

[Jamie Buxton]

I've often done something similar. On tables with a veneer field and a lumber edge, I use a wood contrasting stripe at the edge of the field. I glue up the field and the edging, and then use a router guided off the outside edge of the lumber to cut a channel for the stripe. I run a glue bead (PVA) in the channel, and tap in the stripe. Generally the fit between the channel and the stripe is good enough that no clamping is required. With a wood stripe, I generally set the channel depth a hair less than the wood thickness, and then scrape or sand the stripe flush. That's all pretty easy, and lots of woodworkers do it.

To use metal for the stripe, I'd do the same process, but make the channel depth the same depth as the metal thickness. I'd glue in the metal with epoxy, because it bonds to both wood and metal. I'd expect to do the final sanding of the wood and the metal after the metal is installed. That is, the final sheen on the metal will be the result of your sanding. After final sanding, the lacquer would cover both the wood and the metal.

[Brett Baldwin]

I don't have a good solution for you as far as attaching goes but I was thinking that you might want the metal to be slightly below the surface so that the tendency to have something catch on it (or be picked at) would be minimized.

[Russ Filtz]

I don't have a good solution for you as far as attaching goes but I was thinking that you might want the metal to be slightly below the surface so that the tendency to have something catch on it (or be picked at) would be minimized.

I would think if the metal is lower you'd have a better chance of the veneer getting chipped at the edges. I vote for as flush as possible, or slightly raised!

[Brett Baldwin]

Good point Russ, I hadn't read carefully enough. I retract the previous suggestion.

[Lee DeRaud]

Based on my experience of spending waaaay too many hours sitting in boring meetings at such a conference table, having the metal inlay anything except perfectly flush is a Really Bad Idea. The problem is, it won't stay flush, at least not on the solid-edging side. And the metal banding can do an rather good imitation of a cabinet scraper under the wrong circumstances. :eek:

[Ed Kowaski]

I'd ditch the stainless for aluminum. Tough stuff that even many metal working shops won't touch. Sand and finish as Jamie posted above. I like the harder aluminum like T6061.

[Gary Keedwell]

I'd ditch the stainless for aluminum. Tough stuff that even many metal working shops won't touch. Sand and finish as Jamie posted above. I like the harder aluminum like T6061."

Ed, are you saying aluminum is tougher than stainless steel?

Gary K.

[Ed Kowaski]

Gary aluminum is pretty easy to work. With some care and attention it can be machined with common woodworking tools including high speed tooling like table saws and routers. The bandsaw with a skip tool or hook tooth blade that most of us use will do a fine job on aluminum, even cabinet scrapers and the like cut aluminum. Very soft aluminum can be a problem to machine cleanly, the harder grades are lovely to work.

Stainless steel is so hard it is pure misery to work. ;)

[Erik C. Hammarlund]

From the boating world, I'm pretty sure I've seen t-shaped stainless somewhere. If you face the "t" downwards, it could be glued in, which would provide an ultra secure hold for the visible strip. You could also probably acheive this with an L-shaped or U-shaped extrusion of either stainless or aluminum. Or aluminium if you're a Brit.

Another alternative might be something similar to jib car T-track in shape (though not as thick). Installed with the "t" down it would rest in a groove in the wood, and be held easily that way. Installed with the "t" up, it would provide an edge under which to set a rabbet of the veneer or wood (if it was thick enough) to prevent it from lifting.