How to prep this wood as a table

[Ttrees]

Do go and have a look at it soonish though, like right now, if you are wanting as much of the whole thing as you can, regardless of sapwood
usability/opinions or not,
or you may end up with some planks rather than a slab.
That might only take a week or even less .
Might not be a bad thing, as its easier to be ruthless cutting off rot with a plank.
The upper part of the photo shows what looks like good stuff to me,
I would be afraid of lots of splits "end checking" of the end grain, and those can travel. which are called shakes I believe.
Richard's posts here will likely have everything on that.

Some folk do the whole epoxy thing, but not sure if that would tie with regency styled furniture, and if you've got a damp environment could
spread over to the rest of the room.

All the best
Tom

 

[MarkAW]

I follow with interest. I'm in an a very similar situation with a chunk of spalted beech. I hope to turn into a side table. It's not completely slabbed though. It's from the edge of the tree when cut through and through so I have about 14cm in the middle to about 5cm at the edges to flatten. Too much work for hand planing. Some soft bits near the edge that will probably need to be cut off. Haven't considered finishes yet

 

[Jacob]

....

looking again at them, the paler wood on the right (sapwood?) by the waney edge, seems much softer, do I just leave it like that, or is there anything I can do to improve that?

Hack it off carefully with an axe and finish with scrapers- could leave you with waney edge on the better heart wood.