Choosing the boards for the table top

Planing wood is kind of monotonous. You put the boards through the planer and shave off 1/32" or sometimes 1/64". It's kind of like sanding, just the same thing over and over again.

But there's one thing that's awesome about planing, and that's seeing the grain for the first time. Take the board on the left, run it through the planer a couple of times, and you get what's on the right:

So Wesley and I got a bunch of planing done on Saturday and it was time to invite Lynne over to choose what her table is going to look like. This is Lynne trying to choose which boards should go on the top:

It was a tough decision! And it took longer than we expected, but you absolutely can't argue with the result.

A stunning table that the picture can't possibly do justice to. We chose mostly boards with spalt, resulting in a highly figured look. Really, really beautiful.

My tablesaw

This is my tablesaw:

It's funny that I should be so attached to an old tool, but I am. I took woodshop in Junior High School and absolutely loved it. I thought I was in heaven, cutting wood to size, routing the corners, finishing with stain and polyurethane. I made a jewelry box out of pine for my mom and 25 years later it still sits next to her bed. Over the years I thought many times about getting into woodworking and having my own shop, but man, tools are pricey. I didn't think there was any way I'd be able to do it without sinking thousands of dollars into difficult-to-justify purchases.

But then Angie's grandpa decided he didn't need his old tablesaw anymore, and gave it to us. Anyone else might look at this 1950s era hunk of steel and aluminum and turn up their nose, but I thought I'd hit the jackpot. And I discovered that you can sure make a lot of cool stuff with just a tablesaw.

And it sure served me well the other day when I took a bunch of massive boards like this...

...and ran them over the tablesaw like this...

...and ended up with a whole bunch of beautiful silver maple boards, all ready to go to the jointer:

Twist

I had a bit of a scare on Saturday.

I started sorting through the wood for the table and board after board was twisted beyond use. What is twist, you ask? A tree is wet when it is cut down. After "rough-cutting" the trunk and larger branches into boards using a sawmill, the wood must be dried. During the drying process, the wood wants to change shape. Experts know all the tricks to keeping wood straight during the drying process, but yours truly is a rookie. I'll spare you the details of all the mistakes I made, and get straight to the punch line. The wood was twisted. Check out this picture:

The board sitting on the table is about 3 feet long. See how the corner closest to the camera is a good 1/4 inch off the table? Yup, that's twisted wood. If I press down on that corner, the corner furthest from the camera would come off the table.

Normally a little twist is no big deal. You just run it over the jointer:

The jointer will shave off "high points" to even it all out. No problem, right?

Not so fast. I'm looking to use six foot long boards, and even a little twist becomes a lot of twist in a board that long. Shave off the high points and you won't have anything left. Hence, my worry.

But have no fear! I dug down lower in the pile and found some boards that look like they'll work beautifully. I'll know for sure in a couple of days when I have time to actually run them over the jointer, but I think we're going to be okay. Whew!

Genesis

This is Lynne's table.

It won't fit in her new house.  Well, no duh -- it's 9 feet long, 4 feet wide and weights about 10 million pounds. This leviathan of a table wouldn't fit in any reasonably-sized dining room.

It's really a tragedy that Lynne and Paul can't take their table with them to their new home in Utah. They had it custom built to be the perfect complement to their stunningly beautiful home in San Diego. The table is solid (and I mean solid!) maple, built from 8/4 lumber, resulting in a 1 3/4" thick table top and pedestals and benches to match.

Lynne approached me a couple months ago about the idea of modifying the table to fit in her new home. I was excited about the idea, but had reservations, not only because I'm only a (very) amateur woodworker, but because any time you take a blade to a thing of art it feels like you're taking someone's life into your hands. It's a scary thing. Then we had an idea that changed our entire course. But first, some background.

My brother Farrell had a tree. A towering, glorious silver maple that shimmered in the afternoon sun and made their front yard the toast of the neighborhood.

After a couple of windstorms caused near misses with broken branches, Farrell and Laurel decided keeping the tree wasn't worth risking their roof, home, and lives. With great regret, they had the tree cut down.

I had just moved back to Utah and asked Farrell if I could have the wood. We hired a sawyer out of Cache Valley, and two days after the tree touched the sky, it was sitting in my garage.

After a long year and a half drying time I finally made my first project out of the tree: a treasure chest for Dane.

Now back to Lynne. I suggested to her that we build her an entirely new table. We discussed the idea but it didn't seem like exactly what we wanted to do, until I brought up the idea of using the wood from Farrell's tree. She and Paul were sold. Immediately.

And so we're doing it! Lisa and Seth bought Lynne's old table (and it looks like it was custom made for their dining room) and I got my shop set up for my biggest project yet. And last night, I finally planed the first board. Woot!