New Coffee Table

[Daniel S]

Since there was a thread about posting more projects and build alongs, here is a coffee table I'm working on. The top is from a walnut board I had laying around and the base is made of radiata pine. The base is currently being painted barn red and soldier blue, using milk paint. I just glued the top last night and need to do some more smoothing. I was going for a mid century modern look with the design.

[measurecutcurse]

Very nice execution of the base! look forward to more details.

[Daniel S]

Thank you measurecutcurse. I've gotten the top glued up and nearly finished. There are still some spots where I need to clean up some tearout. The knots and grain changes in this wood definitely let me know that my plane wasn't sharp enough.

The top of the table looked really bulky sitting on the base to me, so I added a radius to the ends and a chamfer on the underside. I think this helped.

The top is 34" long, so I made the radius 34". I used a bow saw to cut the radius and cleaned up the ends with a rasp and block plane.

I've been using a card scraper and cabinet scraper to clean up the top. I'm hoping to get it ready for finish by this weekend.







As an aside. Don't cut toward yourself.

[Daniel S]

I applied the first coat of danish oil to the top this evening. I am still a little uncertain about what the final finish will be. I was originally going to use shellac, but have read several things advising against using it on a table top.



I have been messing around with trying to learn some CAD skills over the last few months, but I just used pencil and paper on this table. I like to use a plain sketch pad when I'm drawing for ideas, but I like to use graph paper when I am determining proportions and final dimensions. I used each square on the pad as an inch for scale.

[bennybmn]

An oil finish on walnut sure does look pretty... nice job!

[wood-chips]

Thats going at be a nice looking table when its done!

[atgcpaul]

On your two drawings (very nice, by the way) what are the two sets of concentric circles for?

[daddo]

I like it.

Always cut toward someone else.

[Daniel S]

Bennybnm, wood-chips, atgcpaul, and daddo thank you. I was showing the kids the relationship between the dimensions of the table as we drew it. The circles were just a way to have a reference size so that they could see where different parts would end up.

[Shel Jones]

Daniel S, you are doing well and this is giving a very simple and beautiful look