Idea for kitchen worktop, will it work?

[Jarveye]

I am trying to do a very tight budget kitchen revival, and i want to replace the awful chipboard laminated worktops with something nicer for a cheap price, now heres my idea....

I found old style treated floorboards which come in 4.2m lengths, they are tongue and groove, and 140x30mm, so a nice thickness, and with around 4.3 planks making the equivilent of a worktop, they look nice enough apart from the yellowy colour from the treating.

I figured if i vut these to size, then glued and clamped together, sanded them down good and then stained and either oiled or varnished them, they would make fantastic worktops for around £10/m which seemes almost too good to be true...

the only potential flaw i can see thought is perhaps being solid planks they may warp with the grain either when stained/sealed or over tim..

Any advice on this would be fantastic, also if you thin kthis is a genius idea the best way to both stain the wood (to get rid of the yellow colour) and also to give it a good kitchen worktop seal without it being too glossy.

Cheers!

 

[foxhole]

Quite thin for a timber worktop and very weak around any cutouts unless you have a biscuit jointer and the skill to assemble correctly. A 9mm sheet of ply to the base allowing you to screw up into the planks might help avoid warping and give a stronger top [leaving the ply short where it overhangs the cup'd front so it's not seen].
Oiling the top after dying will keep the moisture out.

 

[Jarveye]

Thanks for your reply, luckily i have no cutouts, as the sink is in a skullery porch area, so basically i have 4 parts, one part is 1250mm, the next part is 1660, and the last 2 are 670mm + 1170mm and meet butting up making a corner.

i like your idea of the plywood, i was thinking of something similar if i used smaller planks, then using a thicker end bit (at the front edge of the worktop) to make it look like it was thick all the way through, can you explain your idea about the cup'd front further though please? not sure i get what you mean,

Cheers!

 

[foxhole]

If the ply base runs to the front edge it will be visible , if it's kept 30mm short it will no longer be seen on the front edge.
I re-surfaced my old worktops with floor tiles worked out at less than £5 linear meter.

Untitled

• foxhole
• 27 Jun 2014
• 2

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Please post a picture at the end.

 

[ladylola]

You could take the ply to the edge and glue on a lipping to hide the joint. The general idea you have is sound , the thing I would pick up on is where you refer to the boards as " treated" . Do you know what they are treated with as personally I wouldn't use treated timber in a food perpetration area.

 

[Jarveye]

Great thanks guys, this is quite encouraging, regarding the treatement being a potential problem, if it has been sanded, stained then well oiled, will this not give it a pretty good protective layer from any remaining chemicle in the wood? id hope we wont be placing any food directly on the surface anyway and certainly not chopping on it

its a yellow treatment for floorboards, but other than that i dont really know what kind of chemicles are in it

 

[geraldthehamster]

"Treated" timber usually means timber treated with chemicals for outdoor preservation. I'd be surprised if this were done to floorboards. I'd have thought floorboards would be more likely to have been treated with varnish, stain or oil, for appearance. Maybe check with the supplier what the "treatment" is.

cheers
Richard

 

[Jarveye]

i think they have some kind of wood worm treatment and fire protection treatment, they didnt give me any kind of official name of the type of treatment, all i know it has given the wood a very yellow colour, but this seems to lift away with a bit of a sanding when i tried out on a scrap.

 

[ladylola]

To be perfectly honest I wouldn't use timber that has had what is potentially a cocktail of woodworm and fire treatment chemicals applied to it in a kitchen envoirment . You may choose to of course , it's your decision.
I do have wooden tables and treen ware that are used for food preparation that are used by myself and others for re-enactment and have had no problems with it. At most the timber is oiled with olive or vegetable oil and the table has a coat of beeswax . I haven't made any effort to stain them to change the colour although I did one piece for someone else who wanted it darker and I used a combination of tea and a little food colouring.

 

[Jarveye]

Sorry Ladylola, can you clarify, i got from your post that firstly you wouldnt use it, but then that you have wooden tables and 'treen ware' that you do use without problems, so im a bit confused if your saying go for it or not

I personaly cant see an issue, if the woods got a good coating or oil or varnish protecting it, then unless your really rubbing food into a worn part of the surface or cutting on the worktop to a degree where your hacking it up then surely any chemicals arent going to end up in any food, i just hoped that somone might assure me that it is relatively safe to use it, as the size etc of these floorboards is perfect for what i want to do.

I mean if it was so toxic then i doubt it would be safe for household floors where your going to have babies crawling along them etc...

And i plan on keeping the surface nice and using chopping boards etc, if anyne dares chop directly on my nice wooden worktop they will be in trouble

 

[geraldthehamster]

i think they have some kind of wood worm treatment

Eek. In that case I agree with Ladylola.

I think your reclaimed boards idea is perfectly viable, but find some that aren't treated.

Cheers
Richard

 

[Jarveye]

im just surprised that they sell floorboards which can be so toxic, id say theres more chance of a child or pet being contaminated playing/eating on the floor than a peice of food being contaminated on the worktop especially with a coating of oil or varnish...

they dont appear to have untreated ones, not the same size with the tongue and groove, and im in the shetland isles so its slim pickings whats actually in stock.

 

[ladylola]

Sorry if I was confusing. The treen I use is untreated raw timber or at most given a coat of edible oil such as olive oil or perhaps beeswax. It is washed with hot water. We do have a bread trough for working dough which is untreated and unfinished in any way I.e. raw timber and traditionally these were not even washed out but allowed to build up live yeast in the surface although that was when they were being used daily.
While the risk may not be very high there is the real possibility of chemicals leaking or migrating through finishes and being spread through washing. Look on the side of any tin of treatment and it will say " not to be used on surfaces used to prepare food on" which is pretty clear. Ask yourself if you would be happy with say a lead paint on the work top or using the washed out treatment tub as a fruit bowl . It's lowish risk and it's up to you of course , I'm just saying I'd personally prefer not to take the risk.
Incidentally if you are sanding the boards the dust will contain a higher proportion of chemical residue so ensure you use masks and preferably extraction equipment.
As to why they sell treated timbers it's down to use and positioning. You could probably get untreated timber which if it isn't t&g could be jointed with a butt joint or biscuits .

 

[geraldthehamster]

Have you considered scaffolding boards?

Cheers
Richard