Quick and painful monitor stand made from Bloodwood

[Wes Billups]

Over Christmas my wife asked if I had a 3-4" thick chunk of wood she could use to raise the monitor up on her desktop.

Being a woodworker meant I had to overdesign something and have it take ten times longer than it should. Below are the results.

I figured this would be an ideal time to use up some of the exotic scraps I've been hoarding for years. I had a 9" wide x 28" long board of Bloodwood that was the perfect dimension and would probably never get used so I decided to use it for the stand.

I'm always looking for reasons to use every tool in my shop so I decided to break out the Leigh dovetail jig for the corners. Little did I realize that Bloodwood splinters very easily and those splinters are how it truly got it's name. Overall I'm happy with the results and pretty proud to be able to knock a project out start to finish in under a day.

Monitor stand.jpg

Overall dimensions are 4" tall, 17" wide, and 8" deep.

I'd love to hear if anyone else has experience using Bloodwood. I've got a couple more boards and I'm not sure what to use them for in the future due to the splintering problems.

Wes

[Christopher Charles]

Nicely done! Haven't used bloodwood but your stand reminds me of some sushi serving trays I made a while back.

Best,
Chris

[Jim Becker]

Doesn't look painful to me...unless you added your own blood to that beautiful wood. Nice job!

[Wes Billups]

...unless you added your own blood to that beautiful wood.

Fortunately all the splinters I got didn't bleed too much but the finished product makes me eager to build something else with this wood. I have a bunch of exotics from a good friend that passed away a few years ago. His wife gave me his stash as he loved collecting wood as much as building projects. I always enjoy using the wood she gifted me as it definitely gives the finished product more meaning.

Before anyone asks, she's gotten a project from the wood she gifted me and I send her a picture every time I make a project with them.

[Phil Mueller]

Beautiful stand, Wes. Maybe make a small box for the shop to hold tweezers and bandaids

[John Ziebron]

I bought a piece of bloodwood about 25 years and 2 different shops ago. It was buried all that time but I rediscovered it in December when I was making ornaments. Not being familiar with bloodwood I examined it and was heavy and looked dense. So I cut off a piece and thought it might be nice for one of the small finials I was making. I was almost done but decided to skinny down one section a little more, close to 1/8 inch. That's when it splintered in half on me. No blood was drawn but I made a mental note to not use it for any more finials.

[George Yetka]

I have a piece I bought a few years ago. Sliced off a small piece to throw in a cutting board, and after letting glue dry took it out of clamps and board fell in half like I forgot the glue. Think I read after that, that there's some strange oils in it. Haven't got back to it. but Makes me think Dovetails were a good choice. Nice work

[Wes Billups]

I was worried about conventional yellow glue working. I just used original Titebond but had it glued up within an hour of cutting the dovetails. Hopefully it'll hold up, though it shouldn't see much stress. My fear of glue is primarily what drove the dovetail decision.

It appears that the glue is holding up fine but the joints were also very tight. Cutting joints like that in dense woods is not fun as you have zero fudge factor.

[roger wiegand]

I love the color and texture of the wood, it makes wonderful accents. I too have experienced glue failure with it, a container base I made has completely come apart, the mortise and tenon joints pull apart as if they were never glued. The mechanical connections are adequate to keep it together, but I really should re-glue it. Is epoxy the best approach?

[Jim Matthews]

Any project that draws blood will last forever.

[Frederick Skelly]

Any project that draws blood will last forever.

Jim, I'm putting that up on the wall of my shop!

[Curt Harms]

I love the color and texture of the wood, it makes wonderful accents. I too have experienced glue failure with it, a container base I made has completely come apart, the mortise and tenon joints pull apart as if they were never glued. The mechanical connections are adequate to keep it together, but I really should re-glue it. Is epoxy the best approach?

I recall that wiping the mating surfaces with acetone immediately before gluing helps. That's just a recollection though, I've never used that technique.

[Dwayne Watt]

I recall that wiping the mating surfaces with acetone immediately before gluing helps. That's just a recollection though, I've never used that technique.

I have successfully glued up oily exotic woods including ipe, bloodwood, and purple heart by first cleaning the glue joint surfaces with acetone and then immediately finishing the glue up. So far none of these have come apart after 10-15 years. I have only ever used Titebond 2 or 3.