Table top question

Re: Table top question

Virgil Johnson

My opinion (free) is that stability will vary from lot to lot and species of lumber. I would plane the single board flat and attach it with a method that allows it expand and contract across the grain and not be worried. Its a pretty small top.

+1

Re: Table top question

Dick Coers

Depends how close the wide board was to the center of the tree

Re: Table top question

Yonak

If the wood is dry and flat and you attach it to the cabinet, it shouldn't move. Indeed, the movement of the wood should be independent of whether it's a single piece or two pieces.

You're ready...

Jim Matthews

Finish both sides of the top, before attaching it.

I like Watco "Danish Oil" on Walnut.

Re: Table top question

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

This question came up countless times from customers that bought lumber from us. My repose was always to same.....This 16" wide board has been in the lumber rack to past year and it has stayed flat. Why would you expect it to behave different when it becomes a table top. My follow up is describing the 20" wide walnut board that makes the side of some tall piece of storage furniture at the Shaker community near Lexington , KY.

I don't know where the notion began that wide boards would be unstable but it is bogus.

Why?

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

Depends how close the wide board was to the center of the tree

I don't understand this response. What would where the board came from have to do with whether it should be cut up into smaller broads for a top? If I don't understand Howard may not either.

Wood never sleeps

Re: Table top question

Sgian Dubh

I agree, Bill. If an unworked board dried to 7% or 10% MC has remained stable and flat for considerable time in RH (relative humidity) conditions varying between about 40% and 60% there is no particular reason to think it will become unstable as a furniture part and put into service in a typical house. This is a subject I do discuss in Cut & Dried, as I'm sure you recall. Slainte.

Re: Table top question- Thanks

Howard Pollack

Got it. -Howard

Every woodworker should study it....

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

....it being "Cut & Dried". There is a boggling amount of information available on woodworking. Where to go, what to believe? Rare to find a professional woodworker that takes the time to write about what they know. What they know are things that are efficient and reliable, assured, or they would not remain a professional woodworker.

I was in a Woodcraft store some years ago as a class was letting out from their classroom venue. I heard the instructor earnestly describing to a student the importance of ripping wide boards into narrower boards and then regluing to make "stable" panels. I thought about the occasional wide board we would get in a pack of some lumber and how I set them aside for someone building furniture rather than commercial cabinetry where the "glued up strips" look was expected. I thought about this bogus advice applied to one of these precious boards and I was ready to choke the instructor.

Re: You're ready...

jessecloud

Certainly no harm in finishing both sides of the top, but if it is secured to the base mechanically, there is no need. Stickley didn't finish the bottoms of his tables.

Re: Every woodworker should study it....

Sgian Dubh

"... instructor earnestly describing to a student the importance of ripping wide boards into narrower boards and then regluing to make "stable" panels."

In my experience that sort of advice is quite common, Bill. It often makes sense if they're talking about boards that are showing signs of significant instability or warping where what they achieve isn't actually more stable or flatter; they end up, through the cutting and rejoining, making a glued up panel where the end result is a panel where that warping or instability is parcelled out into narrower sections within the width that can be coped with, e.g., a series of cross-grain ripples rather than one significant cup spanning edge to edge.

But, to reiterate and bolster what you say (again, me saying it) if the board is pretty much flat to start with, there's no particular reason to think that it will suddenly start warping when put into service, all things being equal. Slainte.

A general word on Table Tops

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

Table tops are generally held tight against a frame. The proper fasteners will hold the top flat to this frame, yet allow for movement. I don't worry about how flat tops are to begin with or worry about keeping them flat under any condition. Pulling the top against a frame will keep it flat.

I always finish both sides. I don't have to cut costs like a factory. Finish slows moisture loss/gain, a lot by my testing. Finish on both sides lessens stress during humidity changes. Who doesn't strive for less stress?

Re: Table top question

Clint Searl

So breadboard ends for either single board or glued-up serve no structural purpose?

The name implies the application

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

"Bread Board" is a way to keep an unsupported panel flat, example bread board or drawing board. This feature is decorative for a table top fastened to a frame. The frame better fulfills the function of keeping the panel flat.

Stickley tables...

Jim Matthews

Stickley mass produced tables from multiple boards that oriented the growth rings to avoid cupping. A single board (unless riftsawn or Quarter sawn) will cup if one side is exposed to humidity changes and the other is not.

The OP plans to make the top from a single wide board.

Re: Table top question

Don Stephan

No idea of the validity, but remember reading in a book on the Shakers and/or Shaker furniture, someone was wondering if Shakers adopted breadboard ends on their dining tables to minimize water being absorbed into the end grain of the table tops. Given the Shakers' focus on the quality of their work, the tabletops would have been well scrubbed with water after every meal, and the finishes they used would have slowed but not completely blocked moisture movement.

Re: The name implies the application

Clint Searl

So as applied to a table top, it's an affectation.

Re: The name implies the application

AZ in Colorado Springs

I think it's difficult to expect a narrow breadboard end, perhaps 1-1/2" to 3" wide to hold back a table top 1' or 3' or 7' long if that table top decides to warp, either because the lumber was wet during construction or from daily use.

I use breadboard ends to hide the end grain of the table top. Of course, there's end grain at the end of the breadboard, but the surface area there is much smaller.

Another post speaks to reversing grain in adjacent boards. Again, if the wood is properly dry during construction, no need for this. I go with good appearance on the show face.

If the boards are not properly dry, then you get a sine wave, instead of a flat table top (or side panel or whatever the panel is used for).

Breadboard end

Yonak

Re : "Of course, there's end grain at the end of the breadboard."

I have often thought I'd like to make a table top with breadboard ends that have breadboard ends, that have breadboard ends, ad infinitum.

Re: Table top question

Sgian Dubh

"... the tabletops would have been well scrubbed with water after every meal, and the finishes they used would have slowed but not completely blocked moisture movement."

If you think about it Don, regular scrubbing with water, plus maybe salt or vinegar for hygiene reasons, would fairly quickly largely compromise, destroy or remove a finish applied to a table top. If a top is expected to regularly receive this kind of treatment in its working life, I suspect most makers would choose not to apply a finish at all; it would be my choice anyway, but I can't say what the Shaker's would have chosen to do - the minutiae of Shaker practice are not a subject I've researched in exhaustive detail, mainly because it doesn't interest me that much probably because there's so much cod-Shaker pastiche stuff out there, e.g., 'genuine' (sic) Shaker style computer desks (ha, ha).

Large panels, table tops for example, that start out flat sometimes develop a significant cupping over time through the phenomenon of moisture cycling, with regular scrubbing with water being a cause of moisture cycling.

Each application of water to the top surface and the subsequent drying is a moisture cycle. The wood cells near the top surface adsorb a little water and swell, then dry and shrink again. The underside of the table top remains dry, the cells remain relatively stable, and they resist each swelling of the cells on the top side. The result is the cells near the upper surface gradually distort and collapse leading to permanent cupping with the concavity on the upper surface, i.e., the surface regularly wetted. Slainte.

Re: Table top question

Yonak

Sgian, those that use salt to clean their table tops must be that clan of Shakers called the Salt Shakers.

Re: Salt Shakers

Sgian Dubh

Yonak, maybe they're a breakaway group from the cruet se[c]t? Slainte.