Granite Table Top

[David Carpenter]

I have a piece of granite roughly 10' long by 3' wide. It is 1 1/4 inches thick and has unpolished edges. I want to use it to make a dining table. Since the standard table width is 42", I plan to add a 3" wood trim around the entire slab. My question is: How should I attach the wood trim to the granite? I was thinking of cutting grooves in the granite edges and the wood trim edges and using epoxy to join the pieces. But, I've haven't any experience using epoxy. Does anyone have any suggestions regarding the best practice for joining wood to granite? Yes, the table will be heavy.

[Josh Youngman]

ive used construction adhesive to bond wood to granite.

[Jamie Buxton]

Epoxy bonds strongly to wood and to granite. You can just glue the wood to the stone. I'd make the wood L-shaped in cross section, so that some of it goes below the stone. That gives you more glue area, and helps register the wood to the stone while you're doing the glue-up.

[Randal Stevenson]

I would design the wood edging as a frame, with a lip. If you ever move, you can move and replace the slab seperately as needed (heavy and could be dropped).

[David Carpenter]

Thanks for the ideas. The lip or L-shape is a good suggestion, so I would need 8/4 stock.

Jamie, when you say I could glue the wood to the granite, do you mean with epoxy or is there another glue that would be suitable?

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Adhesives: like they said.

[Jamie Buxton]

Thanks for the ideas. The lip or L-shape is a good suggestion, so I would need 8/4 stock.

Jamie, when you say I could glue the wood to the granite, do you mean with epoxy or is there another glue that would be suitable?

Yes. Polyurethane (one brand is Gorilla) would work too, but it foams ups as it cures, and the squeeze-out gets all over everything.

[Eric DeSilva]

Not to be pendantic, but a 10' x 3' x 1.25" slab of granite has to weigh 500-600#. If you built the frame with a lip, as others have suggested, might you just rely on gravity to keep it in place?

I would build the legs strong and definitely have them under the granite, as opposed to supporting the frame.

[Doug Hobkirk]

A thick wood edge will make the granite appear thicker. You also could edge it with contrasting granite! Good luck moving your slab whatever you do - a dozen friends?

[David Carpenter]

Eric
You are correct re: the weight of the slab. I plan to have legs under each of the four corners and two supporting the center. I wasn't planning on having the lipped edging as part of the support. I want to glue it the the granite edge to prevent dirt and debris from finding a home there.

[David Carpenter]

Doug,
I don't have a dozen friends, but I do have money to hire movers!!

[keith micinski]

If you are only going to have a leg on the corners isn't that to far of a span for the stone to span with out any support. Why don't you put the supports all the way underneath like an apron.

[Eric DeSilva]

I want to glue it the the granite edge to prevent dirt and debris from finding a home there.

Aaah. Lightbulb goes off.

The guys that installed the granite countertops in my study yesterday used a epoxy. They said, in short, granite loves epoxy.

3+' x 10+' seats, what, like a dozen diners very comfortably, 16 in a pinch? That is a beeeg table.

[Kyle Stiefel]

David,

Something you might want to think about is that the granite itself is somewhat fragile without a substrate below it. If the granite has some veins going through it for instance and your kids are dancing on top of it when you are out of town, there is the possibility of fracturing down one fo the veins or even catastrophic failure. So another possibility would be to put some ply underneath the granite bedding it with some thinset mortar and epoxy your frame on.

Just some food for thought.

Kyle