Thread: Outdoor Slab Table. Help needed!

Regarding question #1 There are woodworkers who make furniture using green timber. I am sure someone will know more about it that me and being an outside piece as to whether it should be dried for a particular period of time.
When I first started making some furniture for myself, I knew very little about the nature and forces of timber and built some of my furniture with freshly cut timber, which was mostly Pine. I guess ignorance is bliss because I never considered movement of the timber or anything like that. Strangely enough though, the furniture that I built is still as good as the day I made it some 15 years ago and more. That includes chests of drawers, Library cabinet, Coffee tables and various other projects.
I am sure I did all the wrong things by the book but hey! the pieces I did are still intact and going strong.
I am not the kind of guy who can sit around and wait for 3 or 4 years for the timber to dry but I do have more respect for the timber these days and allow for movement and stresses in my construction methods.

1) Year per inch is the rule. You can ignore it, but then you enter the lottery. I've gotten away with it in the past, but I haven't tried to make a table from freshly sawn logs either...

You could hunt around to see if you can find a timber business with a kiln that would take it. That would speed things up for you, I agree 3.5 years is a long wait.

2) Be careful! You could build a frame to support it out of pine and use slings and snatch blocks to lift. Can your garage roof support the weight?

3) This depends on your desired result and how flat the table is already. Normally, tabletops are put through a machine that makes them flat - its like a router on a frame that passes over the whole surface removing high spots until its dead flat. People have made their own jigs for this and used a standard router. Alternatively, if you go down the kiln route, you may also find someone capable of machining the surface for you.

4) Coach bolts, I think, and some sort of T across the top of the leg. This could be timber or steel.

5) Either idea sounds fine to me. I wouldn't worry too much about this, you have plenty of time to think about it while you work on the rest of it.

6) Belt sanders are nice, but be aware you can make a nice mess with one pretty quickly. 6 inch random orbit sander would be a good thing. Plane depends on how much material you need to remove. Macrocarpa is pretty soft...

What finish are you planning for the table?

How are you going to treat the live edges?

Does the timber have voids in it? Are you going to fill them?

Photos would help...



woodbe.

Thanks for the replies. I really appreciate all your help.

Here are some photos I've taken. There are some blotchy spots along the surface which I assume is just sap coming up through the wood.

I've stuck up one of the end so you can see the grain and a couple of the sides so you can see the thickness. I've also added one of a split in the bottom corner that is going through the lighter edge wood. Any ides how to stop this split or is it a case of just chopping it off. It is just on the corner after all. Lastly there is one showing what I think is the biggest hole in the wood. It goes down maybe an inch/inch and a half, not right through, and is about 2 inches across.

Its good to hear I'm not too crazy going for green wood munruben. That was my biggest initial worry. Finding a kiln might be a plan though. That way I get to start just as soon but on more stable wood.

And you're questions are mine too woodbe! Before I started posting here I wrote all my questions down on a sheet of A4 and covered it! I then just stuck my top ones on here. With regards to finish, I'd really like to keep it looking as natural as possible, rather than staining it a darker colour etc. I hear linseed oil is pretty good, but I need to do some research before I begin I think. I'd hate to make an ace table and then ruin it with a poor finish!

I was thinking of leaving the voids as they are, but if there is a way of filling them in that looks particularity cool I'm open to options.

Not sure how strong the garage roof beams would be, but knocking up a sturdy frame definitely wouldn't hurt.

Thanks again guys. I'll let you know how I go. If you've got any more wise words, I'm all ears

Well timed i have been dressing a Redgum slab today. What i do is use my planer (which i picked up for around 90 bucks ) to take off about 3 or 4 mm's then i hit it with the makita belt sander (which was around $300) then i give it a really light sand with the orbital. this takes a bit of elbow grease and some pacients but works a treat
cheers, Jordan

Hey Jordan, cheers for the heads up. I think I'm going to go with something similar to what you did.

Its my birthday next week so that means new tools! Going to get myself an electric planer and a random orbital sander. My boards are already pretty smooth, so I think I'll plane and move straight to the orbital sander. If its still quite rough I have a mate I can borrow a belt sander from, but I'm hoping I wont need it. When I was in the hardware shop at the weekend I bumped into a guy whos brother makes slab tables for a living. It was lucky, and he gave me a run down of what brackets etc I'll need.

I also got a couple of mates over and stripped the bark off the slabs and cut the legs to size. Looks really good, although it was pretty hard work. I only had a hand saw, so cutting 4 inches thick for 600 mm 3 times takes a while! The edges without the bark look awesome, I can't wait to get it up.

Can't wait for next weekend, going to cut the top and start planing it. Photos to follow soon

Going to need to start to think about the finish soon. Any ideas?

Apologies for the double post.

I figured I'd let you all know that I've finished the table after much work and many new tools! After planing the legs (I got a bit carried away with one and made a bit of a wedge shape... ) and sanding them down nice and smooth, I got a mate round to help me with the top. After cutting it down to size, I decided to plane and sand the top surface, and leave the bottom rough, as nobody will see it.

I used 8 steel brackets to hold the legs to the table, putting 4 coach bolts right through each leg and held them to the table with 8 coach screws each. I sprayed them black and finished the table with some outdoor decking oil. Its ended up a really nice golden colour and I'm very proud of myself.

Only issues are with it being so green, the top ended up with some deep (yet thin) cracks down the center, but it doesn't look too bad and just makes it look more weathered. Hears hoping it slows down now its out in the elements. We've had 6-12 inches of snow here and then 20C sunny days, so its had quite a lot of temperature changes!

Without further ado, here's my table

Hey Stoobs, That's a great table. Nice and simple, and functional. Love the knarly piece on the front of the leg, great character......it may not stay that way but hope it does. You could always put some butterfly inlays in the top to try and stop the cracks from spreading. Cheers, Ian