Using old maple flooring for work bench top

[Tim Douglass]

Probably work OK. The thing that the planer does is index off the back of the board, so it comes out at a consistent thickness. You *may* get that result with the router table assuming the boards start essentially the same thickness, but some variation wouldn't surprise me. Run a couple of pieces through (both sides, for flattening and to remove the varnish) and then take your dial calipers and see if they are consistent. Remember that you need to set the infeed side of your fence back the depth of your cut and the outfeed side exactly even with the bit. What you will have created is a small diameter jointer, which, if used carefully, could give you good enough results.

Like I say, run a couple of boards and see. If they don't come out good you are no worse off than when you started.

Tim Douglass

[Tim Douglass]

If the flooring has been sanded I can almost guarantee that you will

*have* to run it through a planer. It is almost certain to have thickness variations that will be virtually impossible to remove any other way.

I have cogitated doing this same project several times in the past when I have had the chance to get a lot of used maple flooring cheap or free. Every time I've decided it was simply way too much work for me to find it worthwhile. If you really don't mind the effort (and it sounds like you don't) I would buy a portable planer and about 4 sets of blades and have at it. Total cost, not counting the planer (which you should be able to re-use or re-sell) would be about $200. I realize that this is partly a sentimental effort, so the cost isn't the driving factor, but it should be borne in mind. Oh, don't forget the cost of glue. Personally, I'd do it all with Gorilla Glue, but Tightbond II is probably good enough. Either way it will take quite a bit.

I *really* want a planer, so if it was me, I'd use the project to justify a new tool. YMMV

Tim Douglass

[Peter De Smidt]

Yes, that's a very good po> Like I say, run a couple of boards and see. If they don't come out

That's a great suggestion. I just ran a board through the router table without feather boards...just to see how it would work. (Gotta make some feather boards.) It worked quite well, and it took the varnish off with no problems. I'll make some feather boards, try a few more boards, and get out the calipers.

-Peter De Smidt

[Lew Hodgett]

If you are going to laminate this material into a top, why is uniform thickness important?

Lew

[Secret Squirrel]

"Lew Hodgett" wrote in news:TOE4d.1290 $ [e-mail]:

Uniform thickness from one board to the next is not. Uniform thickness along the lenght of the board is else you wind up with wedge shaped, or wavy boards which will not laminate especially well.

[Tim Douglass]

Gaps, to be brief. Often when running things past a not-so-good router fence you get waves, at least that is my experience. It means that you can't bring the boards tightly together to glue them up. Even if you manage to pull them together with clamps you will have stresses in the top that will likely lead to cracks down the road.

Tim Douglass

[Tim Douglass]

I bet you mean uniform board to board! Ignore my other response in that case. I meant that it is very hard to get any individual board to a consistent thickness using either a jointer or router set-up. My experience with used flooring is that there are often variations in thickness of as much as 1/8" in a single board.

Tim Douglass

[Tim Douglass]

Get the new DeWalt with the chip ejector, then all you have to do is sweep up bushels of chips... :-0

Go for it!

Tim Douglass

[Lew Hodgett]

Ahh so, a matter of definition.

Never gave the wedge idea a thought.

If you use epoxy thickened with microballoons, you could care less whether you are using wedge shaped material.

It is very forgiving stuff that epoxy.

Lew

[Lew Hodgett]

Yep.

Agreed, it is not only hard, it's impossible IMHO.

Agreed, which is why I suggested the belt sander and epoxy approach.

Clean up each side of the board /w/ a 24 grit belt sander, then stack wedge shaped pieces as req'd to approach keeping things even (kinda like selecting grain pattern for a top).

Laminate the whole shebang together with microballoon filled epoxy.

You definitely are best off only laminating 2, maybe 3 pieces together at a time.

Just snug the clamps, let the epoxy do the work.

My approach will definitely take some time, but all the brick outhouses within 500 miles will fall down before that top comes apart.

When cured, head to the top shop and get it sanded level.

Lew

[Tim Douglass]

I'm pretty much ok up to this point. I would, if this were my project, want to keep the glue lines as minimal as possible, both for the sake of appearance and because most glues are real death on cutting edges. One of the reasons for a wood bench instead of steel is that it is much friendlier to you chisels or what-have-you when you accidentally do a bit of shaping on your bench top. I'm not sure how much of a problem it really would be, but it is something to think about.

I still see this as the perfect opportunity to justify a planer, though!

Tim Douglass

[Lew Hodgett]

That is an absolute, but IMHO, this is strictly a belt sander job unless of course you use the planer to remove the ridges on the underside of the flooring after sanding off the poly on the opposite side.

Why take a chance and screw up some nice new planer blades?

BTW, if some filled epoxy that presents a filled gap of maybe 1/32" on a bench top to a chisel causes a problem, so be it.

BTW, isn't that why Scary Sharp exists.

Lew

[Tim Douglass]

It costs about $45 for a set of blades for the DeWalt 735. I believe that they are double edged. I haven't tried it, but I suspect that you could easily plane off all the varnish with one set of blades. We're only talking 110 square feet, IIRC. I'm a bit inclined to treat things like planer blades as a disposable commodity on a job like this. Back when I did a lot of remodeling I discovered that sometimes it is more efficient to just use something up doing a job. We treated skilsaws and blades that way, since they were frequently the fast and easy way to cut through things like multiple layers of roofing. I actually once reduced a carbide tipped framing blade to a smooth disk cutting in three skylights. It was an inexpensive blade and trying to preserve it would have taken so much time that it wasn't worth it.

The valuations are different on a home-shop project, but I'd still rather burn up a set of planer blades than try to remove all that poly with a belt sander - and you would definitely need to run them through the planer after that to take out the wows, unless you are a lot better with a belt sander than I am.

Tim Douglass

[Lew Hodgett]

It's not the cost of the blades but the change out that is a PITA.

Agreed.

Been there, done that.

Building a fiberglass boat develops some different skills that just working with wood.

A belt sander /w/ 24 grit belts, a 9" right angle sander /w/ 16 grit disks and my favorite, a 4-1/2" right angle sander /w/ 24 grit disks are the tools of the trade.

After while, you develop a touch using these tools.

Different strokes for different folks as the saying goes.

Lew

[Stephen M]

Lew,

You gotta get a new planer. I can't say for sure about the 735, but my 733 is a 10-minute job at the most. The first time I did it, "it was like wow man" :-)

I know where you are coming from though. My previous delta snipemaster-12 was a trauma to change, not unlike my jointer.

-steve

[Lew Hodgett]

My investment in tools is strictly short term.

Buy the necessary tool to get the job done.

When the boat is built, will sell everything and go sailing.

At least, that's the game plan.

Lew

[Ed Bailen]

Several years ago, my nephew bought half of a gym floor to use for flooring in his new house. There was a LOT of maple flooring left over when his house was done. In exchange for a lot of weekends spent cutting off staples, I have unlimited access to the remaining maple. Over the years, I have made a number of desk, table, and bench tops; both edge glued and face glued. Here's what I have learned from experience.

1. If it was decent wood, it would not have been used for flooring. The grain is going to go every which way in any given piece.
2. Buy or borrow a metal detector. (Little Wizard works well.) Check every piece of wood twice to make sure you've gotten all of the old nails or staples out. It only takes one to destroy your tool blade.
3. Buy a good glue line rip blade for your saw. I've been very happy with the Freud.
4. The existing finish has got to go. Stripping will work if you are only going to put an oil finish on your bench top. If you are thinking of a varnish, you will need to remove enough wood under the old finish to make sure you are working with fresh wood. If you are edge gluing, this also goes for the edges as floor waxes will have run down between the planks when you waxed the floors.
5. I have a planer. On the tops I have done so far, I have planed off the grooves. If I were doing a workbench top, I would leave them on and, as prevoiusly suggested, make a top with several layers of edge-glued strips. That will be the most efficient use of your wood, and the grooves will have no measurable effect on the strength of your glue joints.
6. If you do decide that you must face-glue the strips, go ahead and take the grooves off any way you can. When you are ripping the strips, start by ripping just the tongues off, and use that for the top surface of the bench. If you really really want to take the grooves of the other edge, set your rip fence to leave just a little hint of the original grooves. Depending on how you pulled up the flooring, the grooved edges of the plank are not going to look to good, and they are going to be the bottom of your benchtop.
7. You will want to make sure that the ends of abutting pieces are a perfect mate. I made up a fence that is screwed to the panel-cutting sled on my table saw. There are two toggle clamps on each side of the saw kerf. I set two abutting strips under the clamps so they meet in the center of the kerf, clamp them down, and run them through. Then I mark them so I now that those two pieces go together.
8. Your biggest problem is going to be in the glue-up stage. When you start tightening up the clamps, the wood is going to start moving in all different directions. You might consider biscuits to keep the pieces from moving too much. You will need to be clamping the pieces face-to-face, and from end-to-end if you are using more than one piece in a layer. You also want to clamp each new strip down against your construction surface. I recommend starting with a 2 x 2 angle iron the length of your new top clamped to a flat, plastic-covered, surface. use this for a reference clamping surface as you build up each layer of strips. Let each layer dry and scrape off the dried glue before going on to the next layer. (Unless you are nailing each layer together in addition to the glue.) In my case, I made "planks" that were 2" thick and 10" to 11" wide so I could run them through the planer to clean them up. The plastic-covered surface is your reference surface. Each strip should be glued in place with the tongue edge down.
9. Be prepared to spend a lot of time with a belt sander to flatten your new bench top. If you are thinking of planing it flat, go back and look at item 1. It ain't gonn'a work.

When you are done, clean up the ends with a rough pass on a circular saw, and then use your long router bit to skim off 1/32" using a straight edge.

Good luck, it will take a while. Ed Bailen

[Lew Hodgett]

IMHO, trying to level out a top with a belt sander is not only frustrating, but a total waste of time cuz you ain't never going to get it flat.

Go to a commercial top shop and have it run thru that nice 48" drum sander that has at least 3 belts, each driven by about a 25 HP motor.

For less than $50, if you are patient and willing to wait, you get a flat top and no knots in your gut which makes the brewskis taste much better.

Lew

[Andy Dingley]

Ha !

I know people who build a few boats in a year. I know people who've been working on their boat for a decade or two now, and it's coming along just fine, thanks for asking. I don't know _anyone_ who has built (past tense) their boat "over the short term".