My first two projects

[Stu Pollack]

Although I joined SMC about a year ago, I've only visited the site a few times. I'm relatively new to woodworking - probably an advanced beginner in skill level, but slowly improving as time permits. I enjoy seeing what others have made, so I thought I'd share my first two projects here for your interest.

The first is a mirror for our powder room made of mahogany and wenge (with a 3/16" cherry ply removable back), sort of in the arts-and-crafts style. It is a fairly simple project, which took me a few of days to make (I took my time). The mahogany is 3/4" and the wenge is 1", which I had to laminate from two 3/4" pieces (which is all I had at the time). Prior to this project, I had done only construction-type building and handyman stuff. Many basic techniques were new to me such as miling stock, laminating, glue-ups, rabbeting, finishing, etc. I made some minor mistakes, but they are subtle and not easily visualized.

I spent much of my subsequent time working on developing a suitable shop (e.g., I needed a jointer) and practicing on my tools to become more comfortable and facile with them.

My second project was a considerably more complicated one, perhaps TOO complicated for my level, but it turned out quite well, surprisingly enough. The project is a triangular corner table my wife and I wanted for our family room, to fit between a sofa (with a 45 degree end) and the adjacent wall. The table consists of a hard maple frame, a inset top made of band-sawn bubinga on top (mahogany on the underside) in a pie-wedge sunburst pattern, and gabon ebony inlay at the junction between the top and the frame. I had some superb instruction on band-saw veneering and access to a vacuum press for making the top, which took about 30 hours by itself. The joinery is floating tenon and the glue-up was hair-raising because I couldn't clamp the angled apron and legs as easily as I did during a dry-fit. Nothing a bit of swearing couldn't solve, though. The project took me over 60 hours to complete (I admittedly take my time, measuring twice and thinking thrice before cutting)! I think I'll stick to some easier stuff for the next several projects, so I can actually have a bit more to show for my time.

Currently, I am working on a small powder room cabinet (so the additional toilet paper rolls don't have to be in plain view) to match the mirror I made, made from mahogany and wenge. If anyone is interested, I'll post some photos when done (or along the way if anyone cares).

From time-to-time, I note that there are other woodworkers (e.g., in FWW and PW magazine write-in's and on SMC) in my locale of Bucks County, PA (near Doylestown). Do any of you get together? Are there any local woodworking clubs? I'd certainly be interested in hooking up. By her own admission, my wife has little interest in anything but the final product of my woodworking efforts (not that I fault her for it).

I look forward to participating in the forums.

Thanks and happy new year to all!



Stu


(I hope these images display properly)

mirror 1

mirror 2

table top after veneering

table 2

table 3

table 4

table 5

table 6

[Michael Charles]

Stu,

Great job. That table is amazing. What type of finish did you use? From what I see you are more than just an advanced beginner. Thanks for sharing.

[Gregg Mason]

I love the table top. A very nice design and execution.

Well done.

[Richard Neel]

Can you describe a little more about the veneering process? I assume you mean you resawed the veneer on the bandsaw. How thick was the veneer? Did you have access to a drum sander?

I am preparing to start a table project and am considering veneering but I don't have access to a vacuum press.

Your table came out very nice. You should be proud of yourself.

Thanks!

[Vaughn McMillan]

Excellent job Stu, especially on the table. It's apparent you paid attention to every detail, and got them right. I really like the pie-shaped veneer pattern, and the wood is gorgeous. Well done.

- Vaughn

[John Buzzurro]

Stu,
Nice work. The table is really beautiful.

[Ken Shoemaker]

Stu,
If your a beginer, I am producing firewood at a blistering pace. The mirror and table are equisitely done!!!! They say "It's all in the details".

Well done!!!! Thanks for letting us see it.

Ken

[David Fried]

I'm an advanced beginner in skill level

Cheese, everyone's ahead of me!

Stu,

Those are great projects.

They may rate as beginners projects in someone's book but they came out looking very polished! It looks like you broke the edge on the mirror but have it tapering off just before the corners - a very nice touch!

The table looks great too! I know the top should hold my interest but the intersection of the sides and legs kept drawing my eye. Yes, I wanted to just touch it! It has a nice modern look with a really appealing simplicity to it, very clean and again really, really well done.

In short, you are being promoted to intermediate effective immediately because your making us true beginners look bad!


Dave Fried

[Jim Becker]

Beautiful work, Stu!! Thanks for sharing.

[Stu Pollack]

Can you describe a little more about the veneering process? I assume you mean you resawed the veneer on the bandsaw. How thick was the veneer? Did you have access to a drum sander?

I am preparing to start a table project and am considering veneering but I don't have access to a vacuum press.

Your table came out very nice. You should be proud of yourself.

Thanks!

Thank you everyone for the flattering feedback.

Richard:

I began with a plank of bubinga 4/4 S2S, about 10" wide and 15' long. I selected the most figured portion of the plank and crosscut a 3' length of it (leaving me plenty of bubinga for future projects). I resawed the plank into 6 pieces, about 3/32" thick each. I then drum sanded the veneers to uniform thickness, just proud of 1/16" thick. This still amounted to considerable stock thickness for planing, scraping, and sanding. Then, I made a pie-shaped template from 1/2" MDF, and centered it perfectly on the first veneer, marked the perimeter, and cut it slightly oversized on the bandsaw. I repeated this for all 6 veneers, making sure to keep them oriented properly to achieve a 6-way bookmatch. The veneers were too fragile to trim with a flush-trim bit on a router, so I sandwiched a pair of veneers at a time between two pieces of MDF and carefully ran them over the jointer a couple of times. When all five glue interfaces were jointed, I edge-glued them together with Titebond I, and used many, many pieces of veneer tape to "clamp" them together. I finished by placing some weight on top to keep it flat overnight.

I repeated this process for the underside veneers (some scrap mahogany). I bonded both sides to a 1/2 plywood substrate using urea formaldehyde glue (URAC). I taped the veneers along the edges to keep them from slipping, placed the board between two appropriately shaped MDF cauls (covered in plastic), and placed the entire "sandwich" in a vacuum press overnight. The final result is shown in one of the photos, after a little bit of work with a #80 cabinet scraper. The beautiful thing about these veneers was that although 3/32" is kinda thin, with all of the scraping (and scraping and scraping) I did, I never felt at risk of scraping (or sanding) through. Certainly, one could not do this with the 1/42" thick commercial veneers. Bandsawn veneer is nearly tantamount to working with solid lumber, IMHO.

Hope this helps. Thanks!

Stu

[Stu Pollack]

Stu,

The table looks great too! I know the top should hold my interest but the intersection of the sides and legs kept drawing my eye. Yes, I wanted to just touch it! It has a nice modern look with a really appealing simplicity to it, very clean and again really, really well done.

Frequently, we find endgrain obtrusive, and less desirable than face grain. In this project, I found the natural contrast affored by the maple endgrain compared with its neighboring lighter maple face grain, was a welcome addition, adding some more visual "candy" to the overall appearance of the piece.

In short, you are being promoted to intermediate effective immediately because your making us true beginners look bad!

Thanks for the vote of confidence, but you might want to hold off until you see the results of my next project, my first cabinet ...

Stu

[Bruce Page]

Advanced beginner? I don't think so...
Lovely work, the table is too beautiful to place anything on top!

[Don Dean]

Beautiful! I hope my first projects look half as good as yours.

[Richard Neel]

Stu, thanks for taking the time to post the details. I don't have the equipment to resaw a 10-inch wide piece (only a 14-inch BS here). Are you using a 14-inch BS with riser or a large BS? I also don't have a drum sander. I was wondering if there was a workable technique for using a planer for finishing the saw marking after resawing? Maybe someone could chime in about that.

Again, just exceptional work!

[Stu Pollack]

Stu, thanks for taking the time to post the details. I don't have the equipment to resaw a 10-inch wide piece (only a 14-inch BS here). Are you using a 14-inch BS with riser or a large BS? I also don't have a drum sander. I was wondering if there was a workable technique for using a planer for finishing the saw marking after resawing? Maybe someone could chime in about that.

Again, just exceptional work!

Richard:

I have a 14" BS with a 6" riser block and tall fence which works fine, as long as your saw is well-tuned and the fence is properly adjusted for drift angle. A drum sander is the preferred tool for thicknessing veneers, although a planer can be used if absolutely necessary, using a sled for thinner material to lend support bring the height above minimum for the planer. Note that a planer can be a bit rough on figured stock, creating tearout, which won't usually occur with a drum sander. Back-bevelling the planer blades can minimize this effect, however.

Stu