Decorative wood patterned coffee table

Projects
1

My existing coffee table is far too big. It’s also 15 years old and battered around a lot so it’s time for a new one.

It will (it will!) look something like this:

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It’s about 3ft wide. The top is 6mm (I reckon) slices of pre-sandwiched hardwood of 4 types. I have a bag full of 18mm floorboard samples which I think will be enough for the triangles. The border and trims will have to be bought or found.

The legs have a taper and a rounded back face.

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They’ll be connected with a bolt at each corner of the support frame, which will pull the foot of the leg inwards, keeping the shelf tightly fixed between them all, and allowing for disassembly when moved/stored.

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The shelf will be nice ply.

I figure it’ll take me a year. I’ll store all the parts at home wherever possible.

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2

Think you’re missing a trick by not doing something like this in the middle:

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3

Well the central panel is removable, so there could be a range of modules :smiley:

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Parts needed. I’ll assemble the green red and blue diamonds as “fat” pieces and then take 5mm slices off with the bandsaw.

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I’ve got a bunch of these solid timber flooring samples, which should just be enough. Oak, Black Walnut and Ipe.

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I’ll need to find something else to do the trim and triangle centre pieces.

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I like it. As well as the documentation.

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Tonight I started on a test piece, using some excess Ipe.

I :heart: this saw

what a finish!

This part is supposed to be 77.57mm wide.

Close enough

Wedge-tightened gluing jig: (thanks @stefanoromano for the idea)

When it’s dry, I’ll take some slices and tesselate them…

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what a great word tessellate is

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tteesseellaattee

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Next time if you use the yellow foamy glue will be set in 15/20 min…
Use gloves tho, that thing does not come off your hand EVER!

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What colour does it dry? I’ll be exposing the glue when I cut across to take off the slices.

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Good point, it dries yellow but every time I use it the joint was clamped enough that I did not actually see the joint line

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I’m not in a rush :smiley:

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If you clamp its invisible don’t worry.
Have a look at mark’s turned stuff its done with that glue

It does save quite a bit of time, 20 mins after gluing its solid enough to work on

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Couple of hours was enough for Mark to turn it…

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I need a more reliable jig for taking an accurate slice off, but i think this is going to work :slight_smile:

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Why do you need a gig for slicing? Stop block and makita dropsaw?

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Yeah, on the drop saw, but it has some specialised requirements. The stop block must be perfectly parallel to the blade. The triangular shape has to be clamped and the narrow slice has to be retained (rather than catapulted into the sawdust as they were during my test)

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Sorry, I may not understanding but I think you are over thinking this…
The stopblock could be potentially be a pin, a mathematical adimensional point… the squareness is given by the fence, not the stop block itself… hence doesn’t need to be parallel with the blade, a simple narrow strip of 3 mm ply could do…
For the piece flyng off is a matter to cut in one slow fluid movement and take up the blade only when Is totally still!

Clamping could be difficult, (but not impossible) I would just hold it by hands making sure that the piece is long enough!

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Will any @woodtechs be around Tuesday evening? I’ll need some pieces put through the planer. (About 350x250mm each)

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I’ll try to be but I’m not sure!
My gut feeling tells me that those pieces are too small tho… especially for the big boy…
I may be wrong, is difficult to say without seeing!