Hall table #2: Finishing up the Thorsen Hall table

The continuation of my Thorsen Hall table. The beginning is here My wife is happy with what is happening so far.

I suggested that I try the other Greene and Greene feature that is the breadboard spline a key between the top and the breadboard end. I used a book that I bought on Greene and Greene furniture. The book is called Greene and Greene Design Elements for the Workshop by Darrell Peart published by Linden Publishing 2005.

I got a piece of Blackwood 1 ¼” square and 5” long.

I ran it through the jointer to clean up all of the edges.

Then I went to the bandsaw and cut ¼”+ slices. Just a tad over ¼”

Then I did a ¾”- cut from each end.

I then cut them apart and cut a little bevel on the wide end. So I ended up with 4 pieces. Just the number that I needed since the table has four corners.

I took the table top and just lightly cut about 1/8” into the board on each side. I then measured the thickness of the table end. I kept cutting until the ½” tenon fit into the mortise on the breadboard side.

Sorry for the quality of the last picture. I then cut a 1” tenon on each end of the table top. And then I trimmed it to match the mortise cuts in the breadboard end.

I then slid it on. Maybe more of a pound.

Then I set up my table with a ¼” router bit and I put an upper support bracket for longer boards.

John Nixon posted a blog and in his video he showed a digital readout that he put on his router table. I chatted with him and installed one on my router table. I had just around 9/16” width on the narrow end of the inlay. So I wanted to rout a little less than ½” so I went to 0.475 of an inch.

I cut the slot about 3 5/8” and cut the end square.

I then sanded, scraped, gouged to cut a few thousands off the blackwood piece. I found the easiest was the edge of a chisel back. I could peel off wood and still control the amount of wood to take off. I then installed it into the table top.

I had to cut a similar slot in the breadboard end. When it happened accurately it looks like this.

Now to point out the un-obvious, at least to me. When you cut the table top down from it’s length of 37” to 37” with the breadboard. I cut 5” off the table top and in doing so I ended up putting the breadboard on top of the legs. So It was a little modification to the breadboards to allow the legs and aprons to fit into the previous space of a portion of the breadboard. A picture serves me well at this time.

So this is the table as it sits in the workshop tonight with a coat of Danish Oil on it.

-- Karson Southern Delaware karson_morrison@bigfoot.com