After applying four layers of the Target Coatings’ EM2000wvx topcoat to the underside of the table, it feels like it might be done. However, before turning over the top, to complete the finish on the top side, I will check it again tomorrow morning (Saturday), and decide then.

Today I sanded lightly but thoroughly between each application of the topcoat. It paid off, as the fourth and final application today resulted in a wonderfully smooth surface. In the following photo I am using 600 grit sandpaper between spray sessions, slow and easy, until I know it is ready – it will feel ready for the next layer:

In between spraying the table top, and waiting at least one hour to do the sanding, I started measuring for the table legs. I cut walnut for the legs for this table, and for the stand-up desk I will build later for my client; with the FMT and other “stuff” on the workbench, I must make do with my old folding saw horses :-( :

The day went well; the weather was terrific, as we had lots of sun and 66°F – a wonderful Spring day in the middle of Winter in NW Missouri. With all the blinds in the shop open, and a window cracked to allow make-up air to come into the finishing room, it felt great!

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Where I was a while ago: Application of the Zinsser SealCoat™ (an alcohol-based, wax-free sanding sealer) went well. The secret: Apply very thin coats with a lint-free rag, wiping as you go. Wait a minimum of 2 hours, then sand with 400 grit sandpaper, until smooth to the touch – but don’t sand all the way to the wood. Repeat once.

Today: 1) Time to apply the first coat of Target Coatings’ EM2000wvx waterborne alkyd varnish:

Also today: 2) I fine-tuned the mortise and tenon fit on a test leg made of scrap, glued-up quarter-sawn white oak (QSWO):

Now, some details.

Setting up the FMT to make the tenons – I don’t want to do this while perched 6 feet above the ground, so I do this with the FMT on the workbench:

As a first step, I record all dimensions for the test tenons; this simply makes it easier to tweak the fit:

Just for kicks, I make sure I won’t cut through into another mortise. For this I make a new test mortise, at 90° from the first one, on the face where the other tenon will be – I cut this one, to share with YOU:

Now, to cut a test mortise:

This is my view when I remove the router from the FMT:

I wanted a 1/4-inch reveal from the front edge of the leg – and got it:

Now that the mortise and tenon joinery fit has been tweaked, I turn my attention to spraying the table top.

Getting ready to spray took about 10 minutes. The steps:

1. Filter water into one Teflon®-coated aluminum spray cup, using a Fine paint filter – I will use this water to clean the internals of the HVLP system; I will do it after spraying each of the 2 or 3 coats:

2. Stir the top coat. Satin sheen coatings have a “flattening agent” that settles to the bottom of the can; it must be stirred prior to application:

3. After stirring, filter the topcoat using a Medium filter, directly into a Teflon®-coated aluminum spray cup:

4. Proper application of a finish using HVLP equipment requires careful adjustment of the air flow, and of the material being sprayed. I shoot into Kraft paper I tape to the back panel of the booth:

5. Once I am happy with my adjustments, I start spraying. I am especially careful to fully coat spray all edges, and about 3 inches into the top surface. This ensures proper coverage:

6. As soon as I finish spraying I inspect the surface, to ensure sufficient coverage. The applied spray must be “wet”, and applied at a wet film thickness of 2-3 mils (thousands of an inch); if not, the finish will have a somewhat rough feel. On inspection, this first application of the varnish went well (the final appearance will not be shiny, but rather a nice, satin finish):

Actual spraying took about 5 minutes, followed by about 5 minutes to clean up the spray gun.

Enough for today. After cleaning the spray equipment, I headed to the house, and a wonderful dinner – spinach salad and a few crackers!

Next: Continue spraying the table top, mill the QSWO boards for the aprons, finish milling the walnut blanks for the legs, glue up the legs. Use the Leigh FMT to cut mortises on the legs, and the tenons on the aprons.

Thanks for following along!

Al

From my blog:

Sometimes, decisions are tough.

For example, to start the work day today, I debated whether to start applying the Zinsser Seal Coat to the table top as it lay on the workbench, or take into the finishing room. The finishing room won:

I include the following photo to illustrate the importance of using a turntable, to make it easy to arrange things. Since it is critical to be able to properly reach all sides of the work piece, something is needed to make this easy. Imagine YOU between the work piece and the exhaust fan (as in the photo above) when spraying – bingo! You get the idea – spray all over your face, your clothes…

The next photo illustrates the best arrangement: The work piece should be between you, and the exhaust fan -and the turntable is the best way to do it:

Now that I am set up to apply the finish in proper sequence in the finishing room, it is time to start work on the legs and aprons. I milled one test board out of quarter-sawn white oak (QSWO); it is of the same dimensions as the actual table aprons: 1 inch thick, and 4 inches wide. I started carefully laying out the tenons.

The Leigh FMT is a machine that gives extremely accurate results, and lets you dial in the fit; but it requires accurate layouts, and test cuts to dial in the best fit. In the next photo I am carefully marking the center of the width of the board – and I will do something similar when marking the half-thickness. Notice I use calipers to achieve the accuracy I want, and need:

Now I take the apron to the FMT, and start the setup for the test runs – it is important to make sure the side stop fence is set such that the work piece will be centered properly:

After placing the apron against the side stop fence, I adjust the table limit stops (for the X and the Y directions) on the FMT and lock the settings – I don’t want things moving once I start cutting mortises and tenons:

The work piece is centered in the table bit opening fairly well. I set the work piece tight up against the joint aligning sight; it looks like a target – and it is:

An amazing thing about the human eye is its ability to excel at comparisons. I believe I centered the work piece quite well in this next photo – if you click on it to enlarge it, you will notice that I actually marked two lines, one from each side of the board, using the calipers; I may be off center by a little less than 0.001″:

Once the work piece is aligned properly, it is time to set the router bit cutting depth. For the aprons I want tenons 2-1/4 inches long, and 1/2-inch wide; they will go into mortises in the 3-inch square legs:

As I will make test cuts with the FMT, and I want to make both the mortises and the tenons using only one setting, I will also need test legs. I milled some waste QSWO, glued it, and now I start milling the glued up test leg. First, I must remove the glue that squeezed out:

After scraping the glue as well as possible, I trim to 3-1/4 inches, square, on the band saw:

By now it was time to head to the house, get some rest, and have dinner (or supper, depending on where you live).

Next: I continue applying the finish to the table top. And, while each coat dries, I will continue setting up to cut mortises and tenons using the FMT. And, in between all this, I will get the walnut ready for glue-up of the legs, and start milling the QSWO boards that will be the aprons.

Thanks for following along!

Al

He was right, of course. nd I have photo evidence. Please read on.

From my blog:

I truly must stop reading Christopher Schwarz’s blog. First, it cost me $20 for the first copy of the EyeClops. Once I learned what a terrific “toy” it is, I bought another one (this one for $28, as the price went up) for use by our granddaughters.

But now I am glad I bought two copies of this very special toy!

Recent discussion on glue-ups, particularly the table top I have been working on, highlighted to me why it is important to wait to clean the glue until it has gelled well. If one rushes to clean, as I did due to anxiety (to measure table top flatness), the glue line is starved near the surface, as it shrinks.

This first photo shows what the glue line should look like, if one waits:

But, by cleaning the glue at the glue line, voids in the glue line develop – the glue shrinks as it dries and cures:

My woodworking friend “rhino”, on this thread on WoodNet, was 100% correct. Of course, I knew this was likely to happen, but anxiety does funny things in the heat of a critical glue-up.

While the EyeClops was in the shop I looked at other features on the table top surface. This one is a small crater, part of a tiny knot near one of the ends of the top:

The side grain on the quarter-sawn white oak looks like this:

Focusing is critical using the EyeClops. And it requires a steady hand, to get good photos. But, once this is learned, it is very easy to use:

Chris, thanks for finding this little treasure!

Al

Progress!

The table top is back, cut to final length, and sanded (sorry, no chance to take photos of my friend’s amazing shop).

I beveled the edges, using a table edge bit for the topside, and a small, 1/8-inch roundover for the bottom side. Routing the top bevel free-hand requires much care and concentration, as this bit is large:

The bevel profile:

I am very pleased with the overall appearance of this table top. The bevel will provide a much better feel on the arms than a normal table edge:

Hopefully you will get a sense of the size of this router bit. The router base plate is one of two that came with my DeWalt 618, and has the largest opening – the bit’s cutting diameter is 2-1/2 inches:

To use such a large-diameter bit one must reduce the router speed to around 10,000-12,000 RPM. In addition, I suggest shallow cuts. I took four passes to route the entire profile.

Now the table is ready for the first coast of Zinsser’s Seal Coat. I will apply using a lint-free rag. This results in application of a very thin film of shellac on the oak.

Now, some neat stuff about finishing oak with waterborne coatings – and the reason you pay to access my blog (just kidding…!):

1. White oak, and especially red oak, have high tannin content. White oak may or may not be marginal. This high tannin content makes them acidic.
2. The typical waterborne coatings are very high pH, typically pH 10 or higher.
3. Applying the typical waterborne coating directly on the surface of the oak can cause nasty reactions. For example, it is possible to get bridging and pinholing.
4. Therefore, a work-around is needed.
5. Enter: Zinsser’s Seal Coat dewaxed shellac. I apply two very thin coats using a lint-free cloth. I allow it to fry for two hours, sand between coats to 320 grit, and then apply my waterborne coating.
6. For this table I will use Target Coatings’ new Emtech 2000wvx alkyd.
7. My client liked the finish on the half-scale tables. As a result, I will use the same finish, and apply 4 coats minimum , using a Fuji Q3 Pro HVLP system.
8. The EM200wvx imparts a very nice straw color to the white oak. And it looks great on walnut (the legs of this table).

Related posts:

The full-size table is ready for sanding

The full-size table: Gluing up the top

The full-size table: The beginning

My entry in the Lumberjocks Winter 2009 Woodworking Awards

Thanks for reading, and following along this build!

Al

From my blog:

Whew!

Today was time to glue up the two halves of the table top. I trimmed each of the two halves on the table saw, using the crosscut sled. Leaving each half slightly over final length, I tackled the glue-up. Sandy came to the shop to lend a hand, as I did not want clamps moving and lumber falling to the floor.

Three hours late I removed the clamps, scraped the dry glue, and completed preparations for sanding tomorrow. I will drop off this panel at my friend’s shop, and will wait for his call. He requested I write down final thickness, width, and length. I may not be able to share you this part of the job – but I hope to snap some photos of his shop.

Next: I will start milling the walnut legs, in preparation for glue-up; the legs will be 3 inches square, so I must mill two halves, and glue them to prepare the legs for final milling prior to machining the mortises on the FMT. I also have to mill some 4/4 (1-inch, rough) quarter-sawn white oak (QSWO), for the aprons; then to the FMT to machine the tenons.

I purchased gorgeous walnut and QSWO at Simpson & Sons, a large saw mill just South of town. The people at the mill go out of their way to help customers dropping in to buy one board, or a full truck load. Simpson has “… in stock walnut, maple, white oak, red oak, hickory, hackberry, red elm, and ash, and gun and rifle stock blanks. From 4/4 to 8/4 we have all your furniture grade needs. Planing is available on request. Stock lists and price lists are available by fax…”

Now I continue, with the glue-up of the boards that will make up the table top. The top will be 1-1/2 inches thick, 30 inches wide, and 60 inches long. At this stage the boards are a little thicker than 1-5/8”.

From my blog:

After prepping the boards that will make up the table top, it is now time to glue them up. Due to their sheer size, I do this in stages, two boards at a time. Doing it this way removes much of the anxiety associated with large glue-ups.

I apply sufficient glue to get some squeeze out and, using several clamps while carefully lining up the edges as I go, I gradually start clamping down from the center toward the edges. When finished, I normally want a small bead of glue all along the glue line, on both sides of the boards being glued. I then wipe down much of the excess; and, when the remaining glue starts to gel, I scrape it off. The following photo shows one half of the table top immediately after tightening the last clamp; note the size of the glue bead I get:

Once I remove the bulk of the remaining glue I check for flatness, using a good straight edge; the two glue-ups I did today were perfectly flat – a pleasing result after the work that has gone into these so far.

No doubt, the nice flat surface is the result of spending the time with a hand plane to touch up the board edges, in preparation for the glue-up.

Next: I will glue the two sets of boards I glued up today. At that point the entire table top will be ready for sanding to final thickness. Since I don’t have a machine that will take this huge slab, I will use a friend’s wide belt sander. Later I will use another friend’s slider to cut the top to final length on his table saw. I hope to document those two critical steps soon.

I think my newly-found muscles are starting to feel better. They ached for two solid days. And, to quote Peter McDonald, one of James Patterson’s characters, today ”...everything was copacetic…” (1)

Thanks for reading about my build of this table!

(1) The Season of the Machete, Page 75, James Patterson, 1980

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Now I start the full-size conference table for a client. This table will be 2X the size of this one I shared here, and submitted to the Winter 2009 Woodworking Awards:

But I will change the edge treatment as follows:

I want to be able do preliminary grain matching, before cutting the boards closer to size. Since at this stage I am not flattening the boards, the #3 is perfect and fast for the job:

Rough boards are not perfectly flat, so my planing stop did not do its job. Time to bring out something more substantial – the Gramercy holdfast – one good WHACK!, and I can resume planing:

Cleaned up, so I could use the floor to match the boards before cutting them to length plus about 6 inches:

Now I can better match the boards, and decide where to cut them:

Once cut, I use the power jointer and planer to make these perfectly flat. The edges needed a little tweaking, so I used the “other” jointer, to create a little “spring” in the joint, to minimize the risk of gaps developing near the ends of the table; the boards in the clamps are already done, and the surface between them is perfectly flat; but I still must do the third and fourth boards:

At the end of the day I had to peek at the grain on one of the boards for the aprons:

The build continues… Thanks for following along!

Al

Sometimes a project calls for drastic action. This is exactly what I had to do, to allow me to cut integral tenons on very long rails for a project for a client.

I normally work with the Leigh FMT on the workbench. But now I am using the workbench to make a stand that will allow me to set the FMT on this new stand on the bench: A kind of self-raising, tower crane. I start the process by milling stock for the legs, and all rails. After a couple of test cuts, I am ready to cut the mortises, and then the tenons:

Cutting the mortises:

And now, cutting the tenons:

I always dry fit, prior to glue-up. I do it in stages – I like to glue up the legs first:

Then I glue the rails onto the two sets of legs previously assembled, and check for square:

Some tweaking is required – and hand tools are sometimes the quickest way to get it done – thus, the integrated shop:

Now I can test the surface mount Leigh clamps on the new plywood top:

The self-raising, tower crane-like FMT on its new perch, with a mock-up of a long rail; I must use a cleat to make attachment to the bench a little cleaner:

This little stand will allow me to cut integral tenons on long pieces. But I still must figure out a way to better clamp all four corners – I think I will probably use cleats on either side of the stand.

Thanks for reading!

Al

Christopher Schwarz moderated this session on the second day of Woodworking in America in Berea, KY. Robin Lee and Thomas Lie-Nielsen participated. Highlights of items covered during this session:

Summary (from notes I took during the session – but everything is on the video):

1. Characteristics of both types of hand planes.
2. Questions with Robin Lee and Thomas Lie-Nielsen.
3. Questions from the audience.

Now for the good stuff:

Using a Veritas bevel-up plane as an example, Schwarz explained:

1. There is no removable frog.
2. These have been called “low angle” tools, which can be confusing because they can be made into high-angle tools.
3. What changes when using a bevel-up plane? We gain, due to some of the following advantages, and lose some due to a few disadvantages:

• The sharpening angle of attack influences the angle of the tool: Low angle, for end grain, for example; and high angle for “tricky” grain.
• The adjustment mechanisms are vastly different; they result in easier, and more accurate, blade adjustment with the bevel-up tools. Blade projection is easier; but lateral adjustment can be more tricky on the bevel-up planes.
• There is no separate chip breaker. Robin Lee discusses wood failure.
• Some discussion followed on changing the angle of attack by changing the back bevel on the iron; Schwarz does not like this approach, as it doubles sharpening time.
• A major advantage of bevel-down smoothers and jointers: Making adjustments “on-the-fly”, which gives great feedback to the user.
• A disadvantage of the bevel-up tools: Cannot “point” with the index finger, or make adjustments.

Starting about 45 minutes into the session, the panel took questions from the audience. This was a great session with two major players on the tool manufacturing side, an amateur woodworker who doubles as a magazine editor, and an audience hungry for information.

Al
View videos from Woodworking in America on my blog+-+

The following is a screen shot of the session: