Ping Swingman - Glue up question

I've done that quite a bit on table legs, and also on chair rails, where it's often hard to get the thickness required to cut a suitable arc without compromising the integrity of the wood due to grain direction. I've yet to have a problem.

I've also "laminated" the sides of casework with two thicknesses of wood with what I think is success, but it may take another 100 years to prove that.

About the only caveat I would recomment is to consider trying to match the "cut" of the wood ... i.e, flat, rift, quarter, etc.

Mind you, this is my experience and I like to experiment, but in that experience, as long as you stay "long grain to long grain", with roughly the same dimensional instability characteristic of your stock, you should be fine.

This should keep you in the ballpark on the latter:

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Reply to
Swingman
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-------------------------------------------- SFWIW:

Built several tables from white oak that had tapered legs and required

1-3/4" square blanks.

Glued up 3 pieces of 3/4" stock, then ran them thru planer to get

1-3/4" square blanks.

Reversed grain on adjacent pieces.

Tapered to size on T/S, sanded and finished with BLO.

Person who got them was happy.

Lew

Reply to
Lew Hodgett

Example" These are 3 x 3 table legs made from glued up 6/4 stock:

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has been no measurable/discernible movement in about 7 or so years.

Reply to
Swingman

I'm fully familiar with gluing up planks for width such as table tops, but I was wondering about gluing up planks for thickness. I'm sure they still exist, but it's been a long time since I've seen hardwood planks 1-1/2" thickness for sale.

Considering the cost of thicker hardwood, I'm wondering about gluing up 3/4" planks to increase thickness. Have you any experience with that? If so, how invisible do the edge glue lines turn out?

I know I can add a layer or more of plywood and use some veneer edging to give the same appearance, but I'm considering something that's all hardwood.

Thanks.

Reply to
Upscale

I was told a long time ago to glue up wide flatsawn planks with the same sides in the middle. ie heart-to-heart or bark-to-bark. This supposedly matches the expansions and, more importantly, the cupping cancels each other and the planks stay flatter over time and humidity changes. I've always followed this and have had excellent results and no long term problems. YMMV. Art

Reply to
Artemus

What I'm more concerned with is how visible are the glue lines? Sure, it makes sense to match grain with grain, but if hypothetically I glued up 3 x 3/4" planks and if needed, ran the edge through a jointer, is the resulting 2-1/4" edge likely to look like one solid piece? And if that piece was stained, would it continue to look like one solid piece or would the possibility of stain soaking in amplify those glue lines?

Reply to
Upscale

Sounds unusual that you want a 1.5" thick table top--will make a top look (and be) heavy? Make it look thicker by adding a hardwood lip around the edge.

Reply to
Phisherman

You be the judge ... of the four legs shown in this photo, three of them have glue lines, on the sides facing the camera lens, that are almost a decade old:

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skill/care in doing the joinery, and your choice of grain matching will be no different than if you were doing a glue-up for a table top of panel.

Sorry about the photos ... took them before light this morning in an area of the kitchen that is not all that light at the best of times, and on my blackberry's camera.

Reply to
Swingman

I've glued up boards to make thicker ones many times. The glue line was never noticeable - or even visible - but I never stain things so can't say about that. I doubt it would be though.

There *is* one caveat about doing it though...wait a week or so before sanding. The reason is this...

Say you are gluing up 2" wide strips to make a 2" board. That's a lot of glue and - if you are using a water base glue - a lot of water. The glue and water is soaked up by the wood, the wood expands. Next day the glue is dry and you sand the surface nice and smooth. Trouble is, the wood along the glue line has dried more than the wood farther away from the glue line and after it eventually dries you'll wind if with very slight ridges at the glue line.

The effect seems to be worse with denser wood. For example, I made all our interior doors out of butternut. The 1 1/2" rails and stiles were glued up from 3/4" x 1 1/2" strips, no problem with ridges. I also made a desk for my wife from hickory; the top was glued up from 3/4" x 1 1/4" strips. One can't see any glue line ridges but they are there, I can feel them - very slightly - with my finger. It is possible that lack of ridges on the door pieces is because they dried longer (I was making a bunch) before sanding rather than the wood species.

Reply to
dadiOH

You are going to have to experiment and see if it is acceptable to you. I have pieces that are glued up to make thicker stock. On one end it looks like a solid piece of wood. Going down to the the other end the grain on one board changes and brings out the differences of the two boards.

Still I think the difference is a non issue most of the time. I really do not mind if you can tell if there were two or more boards used to make up the needed thickness.

And you can always trim the edge of the glued up panels with a solid one piece board to cover the joint line.

Reply to
Leon

Go to an actual lumberyard or hardwoods dealer and ask for 6/4 ("six quarter") stock. If you need it to end up at 1 1/2" finished thickness, ask for 8/4.

Same as any panel glue-up. Depends which glue you use and how good your grain and colour matching is.

Chris

Reply to
Chris Friesen

You can make one edge nearly invisible by book matching. Say you need a 1 1/2 thk by 3 " wide board.

Rip a 6" wid board and roll one side over on top of the other. The edges where you ripped it are mirror images of each other and the joint is usually nearly invisible.

As an added benefit, on the far side at least they are both from the same board so color maych and stain absorbtion (density) should be pretty much the same.

I do this a lot.

Great tip on the sanding after the water is out of the glue. This is really bad when you use biscuits. I have seen them telegraph clearly along a joint on panel glue-ups when you sand it flat while the wood is still swelled at the buiscuit locations.

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SonomaProducts.com

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