I put the finishing touches to our new coffee table this weekend. It started out as three 8x4 oak sleepers which were "happily" ripped down the middle by hand and sweat and lots of swearing. I could likely have worked on them to get a flat face to get a machine blade to... but I likes a challenge (hammer) These were then left to sit in the living room for what felt like a lifetime (1 month). Any major splits were then butterflied using walnut splines.
Not trusting my el cheapo Titan 6" P/T I found myself ordering a Makita 2012NB thicknesser (thanks Barclaycard!) after reading its praises on here. Boy, is it quiet compared to the Titan. It worked like a trooper flattening (via various sized sleds + brackets + screws + wedges), squaring (by adding a fence to one of the flattening jigs) and then taking everything to final dimensions over a couple of stages. It did generate a few shavings!
It's joined using vertical pairs of different sized dominoes (in an attempt at being clever). All joins have an oversized 100x40x14 domino along with a normal 100x14 domino. The oversized dominos in the long sides are on the inside but on the outside in the shorter sides. With the smaller domino on the shorter sides being on the inside (this is making perfect sense isn't it) it pins the larger domino on the longer sides. If that makes any sense you're doing well. I then had a (literal) bash at making my own dowels with a plate and a hammer to pin the rest from the inside. I don't know how much stronger draw boring would've made things, but it was just too much to attempt at this stage.
One coat of Osmo wood protector and two coats of their clear matt poly-x were then lovingly applied to the frame. Those first 3 seconds of the first bit of finish going on to the bare wood is heavenly.
The top is a piece of 900x600x10mm slate which, for £16, was great as original plan involved making one out of concrete. Having a wee boy with only 5 years of wisdom inside him, I was more than concerned about excessive weight being placed in the centre of the table (the current table gets used as a launchpad onto the sofa) so I did my best to reinforce it. There's a 18mm layer of sealed MR-MDF and a 2x1 lattice frame to which the MDF is attached via brackets. Hopefully that should keep it rigid enough not to crack... hopefully. I'd left a 5mm gap between the frame and the slate which was then grouted. The grout claims it'll allow a certain amount of flex so I'm hoping any expansion in the frame won't pop the thing. The lattice frame underneath should also provide some resistance to inward pressures. It'll be fine.
I then gave the slate and grout 2 coats of a water based penetrating sealer. From what I could find, this was the way to go for good lasting protection that doesn't alter the appearance of the slate too much. Wine certainly wipes of nae bother :lol:
From the mountain of offcuts I had I made some quick and nasty coasters and a thing to put them in. That will keep the little ones from scattering them to the four winds for sure.
Anyway, that's my brain-dump. apologies for the wall-of-text!
