Joining Boards

[morpheus83uk]

Hello,

I am looking at making a semi circular table however it needs to have a radius of 300mm. I have looked and I cant find any board which is this size so I am figuring I have to join them in some way. I am thinking that I just glue the edges together and clamp them down so that they stay together and sand them down but I don't know if there is a better or a proper way of doing it or if there are additional steps to my gluing method.

Any help would be appreciated.

James

 

[rsgaz]

 

[EddieM]

Does it have to be a real wood top. Or would mdf or similar do?

 

[bobsuerita]

you can buy timberboard up to about 800mm wide but depends on type of timber you want

 

[JohnD]

An eccentric timber merchant near me has a stock of these boards in various sizes up to refectory table. I presume he got a job lot from the furniture trade. They are very heavy.

Nowhere near Manchester.

I have seen kitchen worktops made the same way, you might get an offcut on fleabay

 

[Notch7]

Pine laminated board or oak solid laminated board is available on ebay.

If you want to make yourself you will need boards with dead straight flat edges from a surface planer or track saw, biscuit jointer to align and sash clamps for gluing up.

 

[morpheus83uk]

Thanks i didn't think of laminated board. Can that be covered in Danish oil?

Also can you get anything thicker than 18mm as everything I have seen so far is only 18mm?

Thanks

James

 

[Tigercubrider]

look for second hand brown furniture.
people can't give it away and some is very solid

 

[big-all]

i make wide tops up from combinations off 2/4/6/7" pine boards always flip the grain this virtually eliminates the need to square up the edge iff you choose the boards correctly
i just double up on the edge in a picture frame fashion with 2x1" making sure the glued top is stored at room temperature for several days to reduce the moisture content to avoid shrinkage and cracking when you double up on the edge

in your instance just make 2 round boards and glue at 90%

 

[morpheus83uk]

Thanks for the suggestions.

I am not sure what you mean @big-all when you say flip the grain and double up on the edge?

Do you mean literally just glue the edges together?

Thanks

James

 

[big-all]

all depends on what your making and how wide
cabinets/dressers or any board around the 16-18" width will be ok butted and glued and clamps with batons across the face and clamping blocks and sash clamps every 12-15" along the length
i used to dowel but provided the boards are acclimatized to room temperature to reduce shrinkage you dont get boards splitting
grain up grain down on alternative boards
and 20mm boards doubled up on thickness but mitred at the corners on the added timber underneath

 

[Ian H]

How thick do you want it? You can get 300x50 C24 timber.

 

[Deleted member 174758]

If you are looking at making your own tops you will need:

A planer/thicknesser OR a decent timber merchant who can supply materials planed and thicknessed as required

Several sash cramps OR cramp heads and home-made bars OR pipe cramps with pipes - these are to clamp the timber together at something like 150 to 250mm centres whilst the glue cures

A heavy duty scraper - to remove glue squeeze-out (an old chisel works almost as well)

In all probability you will need to consider dowelling or loose-tongueing the edges so a drill, dowel jig and dowels OR w grooving cutter, arbor and bearing for your router (I know you have one)

Even then it is highly likely that you will need to surface the stock on both sides to get a nice flat board to work with, so - jack plane, bench, clamps (2 or 3) and possibly a belt sander (with a vacuum cleaner)

TBH, unless you already have the woodworking skills required to dress a timber slab I'd be tempted to buy-in a ready-made slab and start with that. I know that you are in Manchester and I have a supplier in Blackburn who may be able to supply what you need.

 

[justbigboned]

Hello,

I am looking at making a semi circular table however it needs to have a radius of 300mm. I have looked and I cant find any board which is this size so I am figuring I have to join them in some way. I am thinking that I just glue the edges together and clamp them down so that they stay together and sand them down but I don't know if there is a better or a proper way of doing it or if there are additional steps to my gluing method.

Any help would be appreciated.

James

James,

300mm wide timber can be purchased, but you'll pay through the nose. I'd suggest two sections of 150mm width. You could go narrower, but there is more chance of error when jointing them.

Edge jointing timber properly isn't straight forward for a beginner, but can be done with care and practice.

Before I can offer any guidance on how to do this, I need to ask a few questions.

1) what species of timber are you wanting to use?
2) what is the table to be used for and is it indoor or outdoor?
3) do you have a flat surface large enough to accommodate the table top size you have in mind +10% around?
4) what are to be the desired finished dimensions of the table top?

Cheers.

 

[morpheus83uk]

Hi All,

I am looking at making this around 30mm thick and I have found some laminated pine on Ebay for about £15 which is big enough for my needs. However I am unsure if I can then stain it afterwards or what laminated pine even is properly.

I have sash clamps and I have watched a few videos online showing that you just glue the edges together but they must be perfectly flat to be viable for being a single piece.

I was looking at using pine and it will be used indoors so I was going to get some smaller boards and gluing them together to form a larger board like I have seen online.

It will need to be the dimensions above top and bottom with a stand in between and possibly some small wheels to move it around.

I am also looking at getting a belt sander but that's another post altogether.

Thanks

James