Ronaldo,

I put a backer on the aprons of my tables. However, after talking to Tommy, he said that there really is no need to but a backer on the apron. His reasoning is that when you do bricking the grain is going all over the place and a backer is not really needed.

yup especially because its curved.....keep going chuck and austin ...i am looking forward to seeing the next section completed....and guys of the 207....how about some input on this thread...chuck is going way beyond what is expected over here ...are we..as for myself i can say not so much...sorry you 2 i will try and be more active....

Tommy,

I am still stringing legs...will post pictures after all the stringing is done and one side of a leg of bellflowers has been completed. Unless someone ask to want to see pictures of the second section of stringing is completed, or how the bellflowers are going to be completed.

Hullo Chuck and Tommy,

I thought that for every situation where we create an unbalance, we should
do something to put things back in equilibrium.
A guy I know veneered just one side of a piece of Plexiglas and the damn stuff bowed after a while!

-Ronaldo

Ronaldo,

Tommy may give you a different answer than my uneducated one. But the Plexiglass would be fairly thin in comparison 1/16" to 1/4" thick and I would guess and a flat surface. These tables are half circles and they are 1 1/8" thick. The bricking grains are not in one direction but at list 20 to 40 degrees from each other per layer of bricking and there are four layers. As I mentioned in my post regarding this matter, I did veneer the inside curve with the same thickness veneer as the outside (face) of the apron. I experienced some bonding issues due to using such a heavy veneer on the inside. Knowing what I now understand I would not have veneered the inside or maybe would use a commercial veneer, which is only 1/32" to 1/42" thick. (Again would you have solved anything by using a thinner veneer...would you not still be unbalanced, if it were an issue)

Anyone else out there have an opinion on this subject, please feel free to comment.

Here's my 2 cents......

When in doubt, balance it out.

When I had my cabinet shop we for several years did a lot of veneered architectural panels, you know, like you see in banks and office buildings. Many times these were large, like 4' x 10'. As we were an AWI certified shop, we built everything to AWI Premium spec. This called for all veneered surfaces to be balanced with a similar if not identical material.

I think it just makes sense that an artical that is of equal materials that is finished the same both sides would be more stable.

Rick

Here are some pictures of the second sequence of the leg stringing. However, here are a few things I learned on the way to completing the stinging. First, I started with a syringe that I purchased from Rockler...it worked but required a lot of thumb pressure and the glue flow was slow and uneven. Neil sent me a Monoject 412 (Steve Latta recommendation) and it required much less pressure and the glue flow was much more even. Second, I had used a small block plane and chisels when taking the stringing down on a previous project, this time I used a card scrapper and chisel only on the corners (another Steve Latta recommendation). Using light pressure with the card scrapper, you get some fuzzyness, but when the stringing gets flush with the surface that goes away and your left with a nice clean line.

my table is made from mahogany, what kind of wood should i put in the back for the knuckle joints

Yo Chuck..............look'in sweet with all the stringing. I like that loop-da-loop. OH man.......them dang bellflowers and dots are next. First the vacuum bag and veneering, them that stink'in knuckle, then the stringing, you are putting it there Chuck.......very nice stretch!!!!! ....OH and who the heck is Latta, how do you know he didn't ask me what syringe I use (Jamestown Distributors- been using them for years, they last longer than you would think too)

Hey Austin...(AKA: Ad)......way to run down the fly ball and end up in the Irion Dugout......EXCELLENT!!! From Palletmaker of the Month to Irion, not a bad year Ad!!!!! OH.....Chuck would know better but I believe he was always mentioning white oak when he talked about the knuckle.

yeah good year LOL now i just need to finish this table and get it sold....

Hey Chuck

I think it would be ok for the thinner veneer in the backer.

Maybe the thickness of the support does not matter. The bricking is
wood and in my thinking it will absorb moisture unevenly if veneered
just on one face. So no matter how big it is in relation to the veneer
it will be under the risk on unbalance and may warp.
btw, I think the plexi was 3/8 inches (10mm thick).

My questioning was to not to say you are doing wrong, please don't take it wrong it was
just a concern of the conservation of the table with time !

-Ronaldo

Austin is the wonder boy, he's taking seriously the task of being better than Tommy
Way to go !!!

Congratulations again !!!

-Ronaldo

Ronaldo,

Thanks for the your concern about my feeling, however, I did not take what you said as a negative but as a different approach. I welcome any opinion out there. As I had mentioned before, on this set of tables I happened to have veneered the inside as well as the outside faces. I was passing along what Tommy's opinion was and Steve Latta construction did not require an inside veneer. I considered what Tommy thoughts were and I had thought he made some very valid and reasoned points. I would be conflicted on wheter or not to veneer the inside face on another project using bricking. Since you and Rick , make some very good arguments.

Hi, everybody!

The tables look great and you're really moving through them. Also, congratulations to Austin! I've been wanting to see the Irion shop, so maybe I'll come visit sometime.

With the counter veneering, at school we don't do it on the bricked tables. I believe that the shape of the table and the nature of the bricking are resistant to wood movement. I'd also imagine that if we don't do it, it probably wasn't done on traditional pieces. We don't even flush the insides. We just bandsaw the inside of each piece to the same curve as the outside.

Austin,
I know some traditional fly rails used different woods, like oak. At school, the instructors have us use the same wood as the rest of the table. Over normal distances, particularly with a leg on it, the knuckle joint is plenty strong. A stronger wood might be worthwhile on a large table with no leg on the fly rail.

Eli

haha come on down eli, i'll give you a tour. The shop is awsome (and kinda dirty). But the one thing you have to see is the patterns. In the machine room the whole celing is covered in patterns just haging there. Its really cool.

here is a little bit of a tour....
http://woodtreks.com/window-into-the-pa ... built/725/

The main tools for the bellflowers will be a series of #5 sweep gouges (5/20, 5/16, 5/12, and 5/8), dental tools, 1/32” and 1/16” holly veneer, hot plate, sand and a pan.

It is time to start the bellflowers on the legs. First, I needed to make a few practice bellflowers on some scrap wood than moved to the "special leg" from an earlier mistake to see how my spacing will look between the bellflowers. On both of these practice pieces, I using two different size gouges. However I did not like the way they looked, so I have decided to go back to using to using one gouge for all three petals. Again there is a certain sequence to making bellflowers. The middle petal will be completed first and then the right petal, followed by the left. I tend to work on all the legs at one time prior to moving onto the sequence. This way I only need to set-up once for that amount of work in a sequence.

The first sequence is to evacuate the center petal for all the center bellflowers using the series of gouges. All that is required to evacuate the petal is a stab cut with the gouge. On the second side of the bellflower, make a stab cut lining up the corner edges of the gouge with the first gouge cut corners then try to pop the wood between the two stab cuts while lifting out the gouge. This creates one of the petals of the bellflower. Complete this down the center of the leg at whatever distant you want your spacing to be. I have determined that I will want to place progressively smaller dots between each bellflower and that my side bellflower petals will be only go down two third of the way of the center petal. Prior to making the stab cuts for the side petals, a line will be drawn to where the bottom of the side petals will be to relation to the bottom of the middle petal.

Using holly veneer is will make the petal with the proper corresponding gouge. With all the petals for the center petals cut, they be placed in a pan of hot sand for scorching on one side. They will then be placed into the leg. Sometimes when the wood from center of the petal is removed it is deeper than the holly veneer. I is necessary to place two cut pieces of holly into the evacuated area. (Just make sure there is glue under the first piece of holly and between the first and second piece of holly). After all the bellflowers and dots have been completed, carefully scrap down the holly with a sharp hand scrapper.

When I have set-up for scorching the center petals, I will take some more pictures to show how that looks. Then after all the legs have be completed I will show the completed leg with stringing and bellflowers. I will not be doing a cuff banding on these table legs, however, Austin is doing a cuff banding and maybe he can explain the process he used.

This part of the project will be slower due to the some family requirements and Christmas and New Year holidays. If I am unable to post anymore progress on these tables prior to Christmas, I would like to extend everyone following this post a MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

i'm doing the same banding that tommy did on the fed table, but i'll take some pics and show you guys how i did it. It prolly wont be for a while due to the holidays and such

i know its a little early to be thinking about finish but i am curious. I saw tommys lumberjocks video and got excited. I want to do boiled linseed oil and shellac. Where do i get started with shellac? Pre-mixed? What kind of flakes, and where to get them? Also i have a sprayer but dont really want to use it because it kinda sucks.

i wouLd ask this questionin the FINISH THREAD

haha good call

Wow! What a great project!

Being relatively new to woodworking, you post is an awesome how-to example. Thanks for going out of the way to keep a good chronology.

Vick

Thanks for the kind note Vick. I hope everyone on the forum who are posting threads showing thier progress and techniques are doing it to teach others, obtain help from more experience woodworkers, or inspire other new woodworkers to start similar projects.

I would like to say sorry to everyone for the long delay since the posting any progress on the tables. Yesterday I started working on the tables again. Today, the middle and side petals have been completed. It is taking me approximately four to five hours to complete each section of the petals on the bellflowers. This includes the evucation for the petal, cutting out the petal, shading the cut-out and glueing it into the leg.

Here are a couple of small information tips about shading:
1. If you need to purchase a hot plate (single burner), do not buy the die-cast burner plate (cost approx. $20 to $25) they do not get the sand hot enough. You want the hot plate with a simple heating element that looks like a coil (think old electric kitchen stove heating element), which cost $12 to $15. The problem is the cheaper hot plates are becoming more difficult to locate. I found mine at Bed Bath and Beyond. You may ask how I know this bit of information, well I now have both types of hot plates and Neil has the die-cast burner plate as well and we both were not able to get the sand hot enough for shading.

2. I found the sand at a hobby store, which is a really fine sand and slightly more expensive, seem to work slightly better and more even.

3. Let the sand heat up for about 15 to 20 minutes proir to using and stir the sand every so often. The shading with hot sand should only take approximately 5 to 10 seconds.

I finished all the bellflowers today and started doing some repair work on some of the stringing. I did not like how a few of the straight lines looked…some of the holly I had used was a little too thin and I am replacing it. Still need to complete the dots on the legs.





However, it is a good time to give a summary of some issues and things I learned while completing the stringing and bellflowers.

Lie Nielsen’s thicknessing gauge does more than scrape the stringing down to a uniform thickness. I recently learned that Jeff Williams, at Irion, uses a similar tool to not only scrape the wood to a uniform thickness but to shape the bottom of the stringing into a wedge shape so that it goes into the stringing groove easier and wedges itself into the groove. (You still need glue). If you look closely to the LN tool it does indeed have a slight angle to it.



After building a jig for cutting the arcs you may use in your stringing design and determining their the center points on the jig, drill those center point areas and put in white oak (or a similar tight grain wood) dowel. Otherwise, the LN radius cutter center point or trammel center points will sink into the wood and slightly change both the angle of the cutter and radius. I did not do this on this project, however, next time I will. Second time I reviewed Steve Latta’s video, I notice he had done this to his jig and now I know why.



In the previous post, I already mentioned the two different hot plates and which gave the best results. I forgot to mention that I first used a cake pan on top of the hot plate, but changed to a cast iron skillet. The cast iron skillet seems to heat the sand more evenly than the cheaper cake pan.

Let me wrap this up by saying there are many ways to complete the stringing and bellflowers, this is just some of the things I learned on this particular project. It seems that every time I do a process, such as stringing and bellflowers, I learn something new. There seems to never be just one way of doing things, just more efficient ways.

Next step will be determining what type of leg badges to make and how to make them. I have thought about couch shells or shaded fans. I am leaning toward shaded fans, but we will see.

the other day at work...irion..i was cutting some stringing for a guy and jeff had me make one of those gauges like he uses. And if anybody is doing any stringing, they need to make a tool like this. You dont have to mess with the right size groove or the right size stringing. And the best part is it only takes about 5 minutes to make from scrap and an old jig saw blade

Austin,

Just don't tell us about it...show everyone how to make one of these jigs.