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Est. 1998 — 27 years of woodworking knowledge

REAL MILK PAINT

Marrying Woods

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Marrying Woods

#1

Marrying Woods

Ron Bauman

>I'm finally getting to a table top I put together about 30 years ago give or take. I bought some 8/4 Cherry and joined it on edge with exotic spline joints for looks. What with a divorce, shop building sold, other profession, etc., etc. I never got to finishing it. I'm making white oak legs, but want to use maple for the skirts. Since I'll screw the top to the legs and skirt I'm not worried about a different expansion and contraction of the two species. However, I plan to join the legs to the skirts with just a mortise and tenon joint and wonder if there's be a problem at that point. The wood has split here and there not being finished all these years, but I stopped that with some butterfly keys. I can't tell you how rich the color is after all that time and I wanted to surprise my wife with the table for Thanksgiving. Any wisdom you'd care to share would be appreciated. Oh ya! I like to mix woods for the colors and textures they show.

Re: Marrying Woods

#2

Top

JimReed@tallahassee

>I like to mix up wood for interest and have never had a problem with shrinkage or cracking. Your wood should be pretty well seasoned by now. What made me cringe, though, was the thought of you SCREWING down the top!!! I am sure you intend to use some sort of bracket, but some newbie lurking may get the wrong picture and adopt the technique. Please expound...

Re: Marrying Woods

#3

I can't see a problem but...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond, CA

>Ya might want to pin the mortices. I for one would like to see a pic of it when your finished.

Re: Marrying Woods

#4

Re: Top

Ron Bauman

>I'll be inserting screws through the skirt up into the bottom of the top not through the top into the skirt. The skirt will be 5/4" Maple x 4". I'll drill a hole a tad larger than the head of the screw about 2 1/2" deep from the bottom and then the remaining way the dia. of the screw. Then using 2 1/2" screws I should get an inch of thread into the top. It's a time honored way of attaching the two parts together, Sorry if I was misleading.

Re: Marrying Woods

#5

Re: I can't see a problem but...

Ron Bauman

>My thoughts exactly. As a matter of fact I'm entertaining the idea of buying a cutoff of ebony from Woodcraft or Rockler and making trunnels., ie square pins driven into round noles. As an old friend of mine used to say "Chust for pretty."

Re: Marrying Woods

#6

Z clip

JimReed@tallahassee

>Even a screw from the underside makes me shiver. I have repaired soooo many split tops on antique furniture. It is a shame because the top of a table or the top of a dresser is usually the prettiest piece of wood. Because of my experience, I use "Z" clips to attach tops to my projects.

Re: Marrying Woods

#7

Z clips? Hey Jim...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond, CA

>Care to enlighten me? I've never heard of them, and I'm about ready to attach the G&G's coffee table top to it's base.

Re: Marrying Woods

#8

I get mine from

Jim Reed @ Tallahassee

>Rockler. They are called table top fasteners or Z clips or something like that. I use a small Ryobi biscuit joiner to cut a small kerf about a 1/4" from the top. Z clip goes into the kerf and then is screwed into the top. Bedside table gets four, one on each side. Larger tables get one at each end and a few on each long side. You have to be careful picking the piece up by the top if it is heavy (like a dresser). BUT no splits ever and the wood can move like crazy. Like I said, too many antiques have top splits.

Re: Marrying Woods

#9

Thank you Jim...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond, CA

>Funny My "presonalized" Rockler catalog just showed up in the mail.

Re: Marrying Woods

#10

Their like what I do all ready...

Scott Burr in Ben Lomond, CA

>I cut a slot in the apron then use blocks with a nice slot for movement to screw the top down. Sorry, I thought you might have some anti-gravity method I didn't know about. I'd never screw a top stragiht down in to a base.

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