Thread: curved breakfast bar

A quarter arc? Or just short of one? A quarter is 45°...

If you're going to build the top up from lengths. one way that would look trick would be to join them in a radial pattern. You need to be fairly accurate cutting the angles right for it to look good though. DAMHIKT.

1. You've got to have an educated eye to pick between Tas Oak and any of the variants that are lumped under the same general trade name. (eg. Vic Ash, Blue Gum, etc.) There's a bit of colour variety even between trees of the same species, so I'd just go down to the local timber merchant and pick pieces of KDHW that look more or less the same. Can't get much cheaper than that.

2. It'd be easiest to glue up a rough blank, then use a router on a trammel to cut it to shape.

Personally I'd use a near full sheet of MDF as a sacrificial workspace. Mark out the shape on one end of the MDF, making sure the centre-point of the circle was also clearly positioned and marked on the sheet.

That way I could screw down any clamping blocks, etc directly to the MDF. Could also drill holes thru it with a spade bit to clamp down any cauls, to keep the glue-up flat while drying.

And once it came time to cutting the final shape, it's just a case of setting up the trammel on the already marked centre-point and setting the router depth so it just trenches into the MDF.


3. Fixing to a wall? What sort of wall. Stud? Brick? Different walls, different fasteners. Is it going to be on a cabinet/pedestal? Does it need to be easily removable?

The "best" way all depends on just what you're planning to build. A "quarter-arc bar" isn't really much to go on.

Hi Skew,
thanks for the advice, much appreciated. Sorry for the lack of detail and you are right its not quite a quarter arc, being 40 degrees. The bar would be on a pedestal and one end would attach to a brick wall, therefore, would not be moved at all.
I have a question for you, you said "If you're going to build the top up from lengths..." is there a better/easier alternative? And is that how you would approach it? I'm just worried about the final look if i stuff up the the pattern (grain) of the pieces.

It would be easier and probably cheaper to by a slab and cut it to shape.

Skew's suggestion would look pretty cool and quirky, another way could be laminating thin strips around a former

A cool way would be to find a tree/log with a bend in it and mill it.
Like this.