Advice needed: filling a void near bow tie inlay

[Joe Craven]

Yeah it's 32"-42" wide and almost 8' long...would have been longer but I lost ~6" due to some lateral sawmill "goof" cuts that I didn't want to deal with. I got lucky sourcing those slabs!

In re getting the straight line, I used a sheet of MDF for a fence and routed them (used a router jig to do the planing, as well). I had to do some tweaking after the first pass and I wish the joint on one side was a little tighter, but I'm not going to get it any better given the limited tools that I have available in my garage workshop. I'll post a full write-up when it's done.

[Joe Craven]

Just wanted to say thanks to everyone for all of the advice. The gap was too small to wedge a sliver into so I ended up taking the sawdust and white glue approach, which turned out very well.

I forgot to get a picture before the poly got applied, but here's the final result.

VoidFilled.jpg

[Thomas Hotchkin]

Joe
Great save! Tom

[Prashun Patel]

Nobody will ever know. Looks great. I'd like to see a picture of the whole top finished. Can you post?

[Doug Garson]

Now if you can just get rid of that ugly red arrow no one will ever notice the filler. Well done.

[Joe Craven]

As requested, here are some photos of the finished slabs. Please excuse the shop rags that are still wedged in those big cracks!

The lighting isn't great and I think I took both of these when the polyurethane was wet. I got through 7 or 8 coats of semi gloss, and I think I will stop at this point. Also used System Three to fill in a bunch of cracks w/ clear epoxy (basically anything that wasn't a through crack).

I also included a screencap from SketchUp - the base is being welded by a local professional now...2" square tubing that I'll probably paint flat black.

SlabsWet1.jpgSlabsWet2.jpgFrameDesign.jpg

[Prashun Patel]

Georgia O'Keefe, eat your heart out...
Looking good. Kudos for sweating the details even when such wild and wonderful figure would hide a lot of imperfections.

[Chris Padilla]

Looks beeee-yoooo-tiful!! Be sure to provide the final shot!

[Andrew Pitonyak]

Looks very nice.... Will you fill that huge hole in the center.... with a cooler for your beer?