Help on a carving board

[Garry Collins]

SWMBO would like a carving board. It is to be oval with troughs to catch the juice from the cooked meat. That's easy with a router and a band saw. However, the meat needs to be held in place on the board. Metal spikes would be nice until the knife hits them and dulls the knife. Wood spikes would also be nice but hard to make them look attractive.

My idea is to create a sloping depression down one end so that the board has an increasing depression that will hold the meat. Think of the a side view of the ocean. I want to remove some of the board so that the carving area of the board looks like the sand coming to up tot the shore.

A router with a rounded bottom bit should make a nice shape, but how to make it deeper at one end and shallow at the other with a nice smooth transition up the board? It would need to be about ¾ inch deep. Any ideas?

Thanks

[Rob V]

Im actually going to be doing the same thing for some xmas presents this year.

My thought was to use a router on a jig that fits over the top of the cutting board that has the profile Im after. Kind of like a u shape - make a sled for the router - then ride the router on the jig foward and back wards thru the us making the depression.

Hope that makes sense. I may be able todo a sketch if you want.

[Charles Spitzer]

put a shim under one end of the board, and use a flat surfacing jig to keep the router level..

[George]

Why would replaceable wooden or brazing rod spikes look worse than steel?

[David Babcock]

I use two cedar shingles with an enlarged base on the router to raise the router when I am forming depressions on a chair seat. I would imagine you could do a similar thing for your project. I draw out the shape I want, then free hand the depression, moving the shingles to the area I need to shape. I might also suggest routing a pattern on the cutting board. This serves two purposes.

1. It directs the juices to a main reservoir
2. The pattern is what holds the warm meat in place. I have used various patterns such as trees, birds, pineapples......sort of depends how fancy you want to get. Some woodworking stores have templates available, or you can make your own, especially if your making more than one cutting board.

Dave