Gate-work

Since building the wall at the side of the house the old gate has been barely fit for purpose. As it happens we were wandering around around Snowshill Manor and Gardens a few months ago and spotted this:

Joe was inspired. It was also a good excuse for a trip to our local timbre merchants which is always a dangerous move. They have several rooms full of hardwood planks, oddments and off cuts - unique pieces that are perfect for bespoke woodwork; we always seem to come away with more than we went for.

On this occasion we found some sweet chestnut that is going to look great as a gate, particularly when it weathers in and goes all silvery in colour. We've come up with a design heavily modelled on our National Trust inspiration, though for a single gate rather than a pair: two solid uprights, with three horizontals, and 5 sets of batons filling in the gaps.

Joe's been slowly chiselling away ever since - in odd 5 minutes here and there - though that's not to say that a few power-tools haven't been put to good use where it makes sense. He's now most of the way through the mortise and tenon joints that will hold the main structure together and relishing the challenge of a some proper woodwork to keep him busy.

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Refitting the Bathroom: 5. Two steps forward, one step back

A misleading title really since everything is part of the planned progress, but when you spend your Sunday evening undoing the work of a weekend it doesn't feel like it!

By the end of Saturday we'd got all the cabinets in position. Much chopping and sanding was needed to carefully shape each piece so that they all slotted together really well, but we got there in the end. We'd also cut the worktop into shape and could finally get a feel for how the finished bathroom was going to look. Seeing the wood of the worktop against the white of the tiles started to bring home how close we are to done.

After church on Sunday we cut holes in the worktop for both the sink and the tap and then sat those in position too. What do you think? From the start the counter-top sink has been one of the features we've been looking forward to and seeing it in position - even if not plumbed in - was a very exciting moment.

And then we had to take it all apart again! Our bathroom is now back to how it was a week ago and all the cupboard panels are down in the conservatory so that we can sort all the final details and get everything painted.

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A Tale of Two Tables: 6. Spit and Polish

Here begins the final post in the table saga. It has been a long time coming - the project has taken 18 months from conception to completion but it is done. The observant amongst you will notice that these photos are all of the large table - the small table was finished in the gloom of the evenings. Enough waffle, onto the details! 

We liberally applied a belt sander to take out the slight ridges left after biscuit jointing the top. In a heatwave this was warm work. My hands were turned black with a combination of oak dust and sweat! To get a super smooth finish on the top we then ran over it all with a random orbital sander and 180 then 240 grit paper. 

One smooth, dusty table top.

To get the finish we wanted required several finished, all of which could have been used in their own right. The frame was also a slightly different finish from the top - just to keep things complicated (actually for different wear characteristics but I shall come to that). For the top and frame we applied two coats of Danish oil to bring out the grain somewhat and accelerate the ageing. It should continue to age and mellow further but we are impatient and didn't want to wait 30 years.

Coat two of Danish oil goes on.

The Danish oil will protect the wood to a certain extent but we wanted a very durable surface for the top, one that will stand up to the abuses of many years. There will be many who will gasp when I say what we did next but it should allow us to use and love the table rather than handle it with kid gloves. We basted the top in waterproof gloss varnish. Heinous crime as that is, it provides the waterproof barrier to allow us to not worry when someone spills a glass of wine over it. But it isn't a nice finish. In order to take a final finish of beeswax (which we also applied to the frame) we used wire wool to take the top down to a matt finish. This should allow us to know when we need to add more beeswax as the table will become matt. There is something rather odd about sanding down a layer of finish!

Wire wool applied with the mounds of dust to clean.

The beeswax layer came next to bring it up to its full shine. This was a most rewarding layer to add!

Jenny applies the finishing touches to the polish.

One finished top.

For those of you who didn't see it earlier - this is what the finish does to spilt water. Nicely repellent.

Water pooling on the table top.

With the top and frame finished the final job of joining the two remained. This is an important stage to plan - as I mentioned in the first table post the wood will keep moving, for many years to come. If the top is simply screwed to the frame it will probably warp and crack. It needs to be able to expand and contract, notably across the grain (the width of our table). There are many methods of attaching a top to allow this, primarily falling either into a category of a widened screw hole or a lip / grove combination on the fitting. 

I decided to take a simplified approach to the traditional tongued block and groove on the frame by using a half glued biscuit joint. I glued the biscuit into blocks and put matching groves in the frame. In the middle of the width a block is screwed to the frame and attached to the top with a single screw to provide a center for expansion / contraction. 

Everything was piloted and countersunk at this point as driving screws into oak is not an easy thing to do. This is exacerbated by the fact I have used brass screws to prevent it reacting with the oak over time. These are not as strong as steel screws and are also slot heads rather than plus or posi, giving a poorer grip and greater liability to get graunched. Steel and oak react over time, producing a black iron oxide. This then gets worse with atmospheric sulphur by producing sulphuric acid! Not great in a table that I would like to outlive me. Hence brass screws.

Cutting the blocks.

Block sat beside its groove awaiting fitting.

Blocks being fitted. Note the smaller screw block in the center.

 And finally, a finished table!

Finished table.

Christening the table.

Previously: 5. It's got legs

Or read the whole series from the beginning: 1. Grand Designs

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A Tale of Two Tables: 5. It's Got Legs

A solid base is key to the functionality of any table. A lovely top will be ruined by an uneven, twisted base or one with legs in the wrong place. For our small table we went for four legs in a square, 20" apart leaving an 8" overhang outside the frame. Traditionally the cross pieces would be mortice and tenon joined into the legs. This is a fiddly process but if done right is immensely strong. We do not poses the skill of years of practice at mortice and tenon joints so ours would neither be accurate nor straight! I am very grateful however for the research of John D Wagner who showed that biscuit joints can be stronger than mortice and tenon or other methods. Although the research was limited it provides some armour to fight those traditionalists who think biscuits are no use in structural elements.

Enough design - onto the doing. As we were biscuit jointing all we needed were square legs and straight ends to the cross pieces. As the legs were already square that left us with cutting the cross pieces to length in a square manner. This was another job for the router to try and get the ends square and allow millimetre precision. If you had a decent table saw you may be able to use it instead but there are only a few power tools in our garage!

Having cut the ends we then used a curved bit for the router to round the underside of the bar. The biscuit jointer then came out again to put the slot in for the biscuits. We aligned this slightly off centre to ensure the biscuit didn't show at the bottom (I am sure this probably sacrifices a little strength but it only came out the top a fraction).

With the frame cut, rounded and slotted the attention shifted to the legs. We needed to choose the outside faces, check for any cracks or deformities where the biscuits would need to sit and mark which end to remove the waste from (in a straight manner). Lacking a power saw this was a time for hand tools. The router would not have the depth to cut this one. I used a tenon saw for better control of the cut, the 2 1/2" legs just fitting on the blade. 

To ensure the legs were all absolutely even we strapped them all together with a large quantity of elastic bands (many of which we snapped in the process) and sanded the ends flush. Two slots per leg later we were ready to sand all the parts of the frame and glue it.

To assemble we glued the legs into pairs, let that dry enough to hold itself, and then brought the whole frame together. A webbing clamp held it all together and we used the sash clamp on the diagonal to apply very slight pressure to pull it all square.

Previously: 4. Starting at the Top
Next: 6. Spit and Polish

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A Tale of Two Tables: 4. Starting at the Top

Constructing the table top is a simple theory. Stick several wide planks together. Our table top is based on seven 6" planks, being cut to a square once joined. Rather than just butt the planks up against each other we wanted to join them with a stronger joint. To get a stronger joint you need a larger surface area of the planks in contact with each other. Traditionally that would mean tongue and grove, dovetail or something similar but these methods all require careful joinery with expensive router bits. With 24' of join to make I didn't fancy attempting dovetails! Conveniently there is a modern alternative that provides a reliable joint almost as strong as a well made traditional joint - a biscuit joint.

A biscuit joint is made with a pointed oval biscuit of compressed beech that fits into a cut slot on either side. This reinforces the joint be adding glued surfaces deeper into the join. A biscuit jointer cuts a 4mm high curved slot and is precise, repeatable and fast. A specialist bit of kit but very handy for all manner of things (as you will discover as the project progresses).

Before we even started cutting we laid out all our planks and clamped them to allow us to mark up the square, align the planks and position the biscuits. The outside two planks had alternate double biscuits to add extra strength where it overhangs the frame. all the others had single biscuits.

Having cut all the joints we did a dry run, slotting it all together with biscuits. Fortunately the biscuits resolved the slight bowing that a few of the planks were showing. When clamped it all fitted together well (clamps on alternate sides to prevent curving the top). From here it was time to glue. We took care to glue all the surfaces that would be in contact, including the biscuits. The glueing was also done in stages, few planks at a time and then letting it dry for a while. This was because even with three of us gluing we wouldn't manage to get everything glued and together before it had started to set - the weather was against us!

 To try and ensure a good pressure across the length of the table we used a ratchet strap to hold the centre of the table once it had been clamped, allowing us to move the clamps nearer the end. Note all the blocks of scrap wood to prevent the clamps damaging the surface.

Once dried we then clamped up the ends for cutting. A stress relief cut was made with the router to a depth of 8mm on the reverse, 1cm behind the final edge. This was to ensure the waste wood didn't splinter off with the table top. When cut from the top to a depth of 18-20mm from the top surface the ends gently cracked off, allowing easy trimming of the remaining waste wood. A block of scrap wood was clamped to the outside to try and prevent the edge being splintered by the router. Once cut it was ready for finishing but that is for another post!

Previously: 3. A Twist in the Tale

Next: 5. It's Got Legs.

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A Tale of Two Tables: 3. A Twist in the Tale

Wood is a living thing. Even after it has been felled, dried, and cut it will continue to move. It will expand and contract, crack and generally warp. This is particularly noticeable across the grain on wider planks. Subsequently the attachment of the table top is designed to allow the whole sheet to expand and contract. All the best laid plans however can be thrown by the timber.

Many of our planks have knots in them. The dark swirls add interest to the pattern of the grain and can be a delightful feature of the wood. They are however a pain to work as they are tougher than the surrounding wood.

We got our planks planed and thicknessed by the timber yard as the equipment to do so is beyond the means of most amateur wood workers. When we started to try and clamp the table top together we discovered that one plank was not square. It appeared to have hit a knot when having the edges planed and twisted slightly (you can see the gap between the square and the wood in the top photograph). This wasn't the wood moving for the top remained flat. We therefore had to re-straighten the edges. Without the proper machinery the most accurate we could do was use a router to re-cut the 90 degree edge. Several sessions of carefully measuring, clamping a guide, cutting into the edge of the wood millimetre at a time and remeasuring later we had a square plank again.

Previously: 2. The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Chainsaws

Next: 4. Starting at the Top

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A Tale of Two Tables: 2. The Hills Are Alive With the Sound of Chainsaws

I like wood. It may be strange to some, but those who have worked with it will understand. It is a tactile, sensory thing. Some woods assault the nasal passages with their rich oils whilst others caress the skin with their smooth planed surfaces. Some give to the slightest cut whilst others are strong as steel. They can be as pale as snow or brightly coloured like an autumn sky. Grain can provide majestically sweeping flow to surfaces or interrupt the eye like bright stars in the sky. All in all the choice of wood for the table was going to be pretty important for me.

Aesthetics aside I wanted a native wood, one that wasn't costing the earth but was supporting proper forestry. Practically I wanted something tough enough to survive the abuses of family life and come out with character not flaws. Realistically this limited my options a little! To get the durability I desired I would need to look at hardwood species. This narrowed me down to perhaps a dozen options, which I then narrowed down further based on the strength of the wood. There are lots of papers and books discussing and comparing the toughness but I shall leave those for you to find.

This left me with a choice of oak or cherry. We decided on oak for the extra fraction of toughness (as lovely as cherry is). I managed to find a local timber yard who specialised in regionally sourced woods that were based in Wentwood Forest near our home. This forest is being actively managed and slowly turned back into traditional deciduous woodland. The oak isn't quite ready yet so ours came from Powis Castle, 90 miles away. Wentwood Timber were very helpful, cutting and planing all my planks for me. All the photos on this page were taken on their site one sunny April afternoon.

Finally: one car full of oak for the tables.

Previously: 1. Grand Designs

Next: 3. A Twist in the Tale

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