Thread: dressing hardwood for benchtop help?

For my build I found the hard part was cleaning up for the lamination stage. To my surprise flattening the laminated top by hand was relatively easy. What hand planes do you have? Have a look at this How to build a workbench - (Part 2) Planing and preparing the top - with Paul Sellers - YouTube

Fuzzie,
Looks like Mr Sellers is soon doing it easy there with his wood - I'd to see him with some 50 year old 'north coast select'...

Yes the cleaning up will be painfully slow but doable with help from my little neighbour annoyer. I expect lots of interlocked grain in the old house framing timber that I have. My krenov style with hock blades will handle it fine, but I expect I can do more productive things with the time it takes to dress it down as I don't think my thicknesser will do a very good job. I'll already be doing a lot of hand jointing to get the lamination done.

You could try an electric plane to do the majority of the work, then finish off with a hand plane or belt sander.
Good luck with your project.

Alan...

Do you have a jointer/thicknesser to get the individual boards fairly close to same dimension before laminating??

If you use some sort of registration aid along the edges for glue up (e.g. domino or biscuit joiner), the top should come out reasonably flat.

If so, final flattening can be done with a big drum sander. We have a timber flooring guy locally who will put benchtops, tabletops, etc. through his for a small charge. Maybe you can find the same near to you?

Of course, if you are unable to dress the boards before laminating a sander will be too slow to remove bulk material.

Originally Posted by elver

Fuzzie,
Looks like Mr Sellers is soon doing it easy there with his wood - I'd to see him with some 50 year old 'north coast select'...

That's what I thought too when I was building mine out of 30 year old Ironbark decking joists. But you might be surprised like I was.

Attacking the top with a plane was A LOT easier than trying to get the individual pieces flat, straight and square.

...+edit

Also the weight of the assembled top might become unmanageable. My top was 100kg.

What about laminating it into 2 or 3 section under 12" then it should fit through your thicknesser. Should get you at lest part way there?

yes technically my machine is a 12" jobbie. Just it can't dress hardwood that wide, the motor just isn't up to it.
and yes I can do it in little bits, but I'm just trying to save time.

I will use biscuits for alignment too.

Another reason to try and find a local industrial drum sander - no matter how carefully you line the boards up, there will likely be some sections of reversing grain in the finished assemblies. Unless you have a thicknesser with helical cutterhead, you'll likely get some tearout from these sections. This won't happen with a drum sander....

Not only can you expect a better finish, but around here it's easier to find a shop with a suitably sized drum-sander than a 18"+ thicknesser!

Hi Elver

I have a 400mm jointer and a 500 mm thicknesser ( 3 phase ) if that's of any help. Haven't got a drum sander.......Yet
Have to tell you up front though that I'm a noob. Just getting started.
I'd also like to build a bench, so I'll trade you use of my machines for some guidance on my bench.
Hows that for a deal.
Of course if we hit nails that will be on your shoulders.

Cheers

PM me if you'd like.

build a jig and use a router with a wide planing bit.

best part - you make the jig as wide as you want and re-use it for table tops

barterbuilt,

will pm. sounds like a geed deal! Thanks.

Originally Posted by enelef

build a jig and use a router with a wide planing bit.

best part - you make the jig as wide as you want and re-use it for table tops

Interesting Idea. Got a pic of a jig?

enelef - ignore me. found pics.