# Flattening a edge glued board



## robc (Jan 24, 2010)

I had to edge glue board to make a wider one. I don't have a sander to run it thought. What is the best way to flatten it.


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## grizzman (May 10, 2009)

then use a hand plane..how big is the board..


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## HallTree (Feb 1, 2008)

A belt sander works good, if you have one. Be careful, if you are not very good at using one you can mess up a board very quick. Try it out on some scrap first.


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## Marc5 (Apr 1, 2009)

I use hand planes on wide boards because I wasted a top I was flattening with a belt sander when it tipped a bit and put a deep gouge in the board. Takes some time with planes but I have had very good results.


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## SnowyRiver (Nov 14, 2008)

I usually use my sander. The belt sander as Ron said works good, but you have to be careful that you dont indent the joint.


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## ghazard (Oct 16, 2008)

Depending on the size and if you have the material to lose you can use a planing jig for a router.

here is my jig to give you an idea. It works well for messy joints that might not be aligned perfectly (ie…what my cutting boards look like at that stage!).

A sheet sander worked well for me on one project. But I suspect planes are the way to go most of the time…that is a skill I don't posses yet…but hope to.

Good luck.

Greg


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## robc (Jan 24, 2010)

I used my belt sander but messed up one board. I maked line on the board and then sanded until they were gone. The middle was much lower than the rest. Maybe I glued them up wrong. I'm new to wood working and I'm leaning as I go…seem to be make a bunch of firewood.


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## robc (Jan 24, 2010)

I have never used hand planes. The board is 13 7/8 wide.


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## miles125 (Jun 8, 2007)

The trick to a belt sander is keep it moving and don't concentrate too much on just the joint but feather out across a wider area so you don't produce an indention. It is however definitely a skill derived from actual practice. There aren't really any words to make anyone better with a belt sander.


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## SPalm (Oct 9, 2007)

I have never had luck with a hand held belt sander. Using a router as Greg mentioned is a pretty nice way. Then follow with normal sanding. Here is a picture of a guy using one that I have copied in the past. Just some square channel attached to your router and two boards. Kind of like Greg's, only easier to store in the corner.

You could also find a cabinet shop in the area to run it through their wide sander.

Steve


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## Gofor (Jan 12, 2008)

How far are the edges mismatched, and what tools do you have?

A sanding block is always an option. Start with a coarse grit and then progress to finer ones. The flatter you want the overall surface, the longer you need the sanding block.

Go


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## NBeener (Sep 16, 2009)

*SPalm*: Wow!

Is that just a straight bit …. run back and forth and back and forth, the width of the bit at a time??

I'd never thought of that. It seems a great idea, really.

On my last, I DID get with a local pro woodworking shop, but … they wanted $40 to run it through their "Timesaver."

I wound up using my belt sander, then my ROS, and then a sanding block for the last passes. Worked out pretty well.










For the future, though, I've found that there are a TON of online articles about how to properly do glue-ups.

On my last one, it was my first time ever using my biscuit joiner. I simply goofed a bit, causing the ridge.

Best of luck! I'm going to 'master' glue-ups, yet! It's too core a woodworking skill for me to keep botching it up


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## SPalm (Oct 9, 2007)

Neil, yup. This is a pretty common type of router use. The picture that I pointed to is like a lot of others, but I think it is really simple and easy to store. The two outside boards that are used as reference need to be taller than the target board (duh). Yes use a flat bottom bit. And the fatter the bit the faster it will go. It always seems to leave some small ridges, but these are usually easy to sand away with a ROS or a hand plane. The hand held belt sander is a really aggressive tool, it takes a bit of practice to operate.

This concept is also used to cause curves like what is needed for a bar stool that has a dished out seat. Just make the side rails curved to match the profile that you want.

Make sure the board that you are routing won't flop around and does not rock back and forth. You can use little shims or hot glue to help with this.

This also works well with endgrain cutting boards, as it does not care about grain direction. Also great for flattening something really large like a work bench top, just clamp the reference boards to the sides by running bar clamps under the bench top.

Steve


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## craftsman on the lake (Dec 27, 2008)

Put a couple of thin slats on the bench and place the two pieces to be edge planed on top of each other and lay them on the slats. Clamp them down. Both edges to be glued should be together. Put the largest plane you've got on it's side and plane both edges of the boards together.

Open them like a book and put the edges together. The edges should be perfectly matched.


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## robc (Jan 24, 2010)

Thanks for all the tips. I think I will try to build the router planner jig. That looks cool. I do want to develop my hand plane skills in the near future.


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