Ash Dining Table

[Scott Bernstein]

I have recently completed construction on this Ash dining table - next weekend I will start sanding, rounding off edges, squaring off the ends, applying finish etc.... Thickness of the top is 2.5", and it is 38" wide, 70" long. It's about 30.75" tall. I used epoxy for the glue up for two reasons. One is that I wanted the prolonged open time to allow enough time to apply the epoxy to all the pieces (and the many, many dominoes i used to help alignment) and two is that there was some time that elapsed between final milling and actual glue up (epoxy-up?) so I figured there might some small gaps between some of the boards I could not completely eliminate with clamps. It came together fine with just minimal gaps between the boards here and there. The joinery between legs and table top is 1/2" fingers which I made with my pantorouter. The tops of the legs are 2.5" square and taper down to about 1.75" at the bottom. So my question is...how do we think the epoxied finger joints will hold up over time? Would it be advisable to insert a wooden dowel/pin through these joints? I could do this with an angled hole drilled from underneath the table through the joint (but not all the way through) to conceal it.

Scott B

[William Fretwell]

Scott, epoxy holds up just fine for regular joints, often stronger than wood glue. Your 1/2” joint is a concern as the leverage of a leg against such a joint is huge. Whatever your glue it could fail. Any pictures of the joint?

[Jamie Buxton]

Scott, where your photos should be, I only see a "broken" icon which says that something is missing.

[Scott Bernstein]

Let’s see if this photo shows up...

F2A9F1E3-9D21-472C-9ED6-2D0A5D4C0370.jpg

[Shad Schreiner]

It doesn't seem like a dowel would make any difference in strength of the joint. I'd still be a little concerned about big lateral forces to the table breaking the joints apart though. If there aren't any stretchers across the legs, the wood could fail at the top of the joint with a decent stumble into it. Good looking table though! I'd personally reinforce a bit from underneath. If your household is pretty tame, itll probably work great!

[Scott Bernstein]

Thanks - I am very happy with how it is turning out. Couple things about those joints. About a year ago, I made a prototype version of this table - a smaller version with the same materials that my son uses as a desk. We have not been particularly gentles with it - it gets moved around a lot, stood on and jumped off of by the kids, etc... Seems awfully solid. Before that I prepared a stand-alone sample of the joint with a couple of pieces of Ash - kind of like two table legs joined at 90 degrees. I let the epoxy cure for a week and tried my best to break the joint. Hitting one end with a sledge hammer, sitting on it, etc... So I think in the short term the joint is strong I just wonder about over many years. I think a dowel from below would help prevent the table from crashing to the ground if the glue/epoxy does fail.