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Walt Caza
05-19-2008, 11:18 AM
Good Day to the Creek,
I had a bit of room at the end of my couch, so I whipped up an Arts & Crafts kinda end table.
It is held together with 40 traditional mortise and tenons.
I hand tuned each so that they would slip in with just a light tap, and not fall out if inverted.
I had been wanting to try 3pc legs as an experiment.
I had planned for 5 slats, but my stock allowed for 6 out. I was meaning
to use the best 5, but had a change of heart and played all 6.

I wanted to go with a shelf sunken on all 4 sides, which I liked in my last
posted project. The shelf floats on cleats, which I may trim in wet summer,
before screwing down into predrilled slotted holes to allow movement.
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=82097

Each pair of upper and lower stretchers is grain matched by taking neighbours from the same board.
Each spindle gallery is also from one board, so the rays match.

When I topcoated the top, I found ugly pigtail swirls from the ROsander.
Fearing it would bother me forever, I hand scraped top and shelf and
refinshed them by hand. Much better...no shortcuts to the good stuff.(shucks)

I blended up a redder oil stain than my usual, with poly on top for a durable living surface.
From rough oak, I spent 2 weekends dressing and building, and 2 more weekends into finishing.(and refinishing uggh!)
I know it's built like a brick out-house, maybe it won't appeal to all, but that's what I was going for...
I am only a self-taught weekend warrior in it for the laughs anyway!
take it easy,
Walt
:)

pics are:
parts minus panels
forty m & t
six matched slats
cutout as cawl
end in clamps *more pics to follow*

Walt Caza
05-19-2008, 11:24 AM
pics are:
table top on grass
grain matches
3pc leg up close
top mounted with Z irons into biscuit slots
end table

Richard M. Wolfe
05-19-2008, 12:59 PM
Nice job, Walt, and I think robust is an apt description. Some serious ray fleck in the oak....really like that. (Has nothing to do with anything, but the first time I saw fleck in oak I worked and worked trying to sand those imperfections out of a cabinet I was refinishing. :o Shows you how much I knew and how much homework I did beforehand. I know a lot more now but strange how it all seems to go on hold when I walk into the shop).

Jim Becker
05-19-2008, 1:32 PM
Walt, that's a great looking table! Bravo!

John Thompson
05-19-2008, 1:55 PM
I just had to know what a robust table looked like and it is robust. Glad to see you use M&T's as you did. I just finished a face frame for a small TV stand that will match other BR furniture and it got M&T's in the face frames as all the frames I do. Would it hold using modern short cut methods? Probably.. but I use them because I have used them for 36 years.. thats my style and simply because I Can. :)

Nice book-matching and grain blending.. super heavy duty joinery and maintaining a simple design that compliments functional while being a very attractive piece.

Regards...

Sarge..

gary Zimmel
05-19-2008, 3:10 PM
Walt

Great job on the Arts and Crafts end table. As you know I'm a big fan of the style.

One comment though. When I do 3 piece legs I start by glueing 1/8" pieces on faces and then plane them to 1/16". Seems to make the leg look a little more like one piece.

Whats next on the project board..

Roy Wall
05-19-2008, 6:46 PM
Walt -

You've really been cranking out the A&C stuff........... They're robust - and they're also beautiful. THe grain pattern is awesome.

You build a little like me.......get an idea in the middle of the project -- adjust....and move on:) Makes for more fun and it usually works out in the end! TERRIFIC WORK AS USUAL!!!

glenn bradley
05-19-2008, 7:35 PM
Great job. Like the leg treatment especially.

Dave MacArthur
05-21-2008, 2:53 AM
nice work. I like the grain matching across the spindles.

Lee Koepke
05-21-2008, 8:08 AM
Thats a nice table !!!

My "first project" table was intended to have the spindles too, but alas, my skill level isnt there yet. I needed to finish ONE project before I move on to more complex ones !!

Again, very nice work.

Walt Caza
05-22-2008, 1:02 PM
Thanks for all your kind words,
Rich W, as I am building skills and gathering tools, I am working thru an oak/A&C addiction...I intend to build less robust down the road...
but for now, to compensate for my sparse past, I wanna live with slabs of
solid wood around me...sorta an emotional response to our fast and plastic world (the Ikea uggh!)
chuckled at the thought of you sanding out ray fleck!

Sarge, your kind words touched me, like a kind and knowing father I never knew...thanks

Jim B it must be hard to keep finding words to praise the work of so many,
I say the good things we say about others, reveals more about ourself

Mr.Z my fellow Canuck A&C addict, thanks for your tip on thinner leg caps, I will carry that with me into the workshop (make that playshop)
**I feel strongly that you are onto something good**

Since ww is a journey, not a destination, it is inspired and inspiring to
say to our fellow community members, what you said to me:
great work, what's next?
I think we gotta spread this throughout our online family, as a means to
better typed conversation...establish a bit of project continuum,
like an ongoing chat between distant friends

Roy, ya I do leave slack to surf what comes, and feel it adds funk and fun...we are here for a good time, not a long time!
I do mean to work up to more refined, less chunky monkey furniture in my own good time, God willing
(curves, tapers and delicate drawers or bust!) hehe

Well Glenn, the leg treatment is perhaps less than nice, as I have already mistreated this table as a sortta scaffold for a few minutes!

Thanks Dave, it is not the most efficient use of stock, but trying to massage grain into a pleasing project feels important...
plus I planned to live with this one daily, and like oak

I smiled Lee reading that, I too had not done spindles just one year ago...
only way is your own path thru, keep pushing and keep it fun.
I too am building skills one small project at a time, with aim to go bigger and better as I can (that's in Gus Stickley's motto,nifty...as I can)

To answer GZ, I am just assembling 4 panels into an umbrella stand next
chance I get some shop time...
(in my king-iest voice... My kingdom for some shoptime!!)
thanks all,
Walt
:)