Kitchen Table

[tlempicke]

We toured the SNCF train museum in Beaune France this Summer. In a private rail car that dated to 1910 we saw a table that I thought would make a nice kitchen table for our home. This is my copy.

The center is a piece of Mahogany that I have been holding on to for a while. I V Carved the names and dates or our family members and made a surround out of Oak for some contrast.

I learned a lot doing this and had great fun also.
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[tlempicke]

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[myxpykalix]

That's real nice. I'm geting ready to do a bartop with Marine logo inlaid in it. But i have jumped back between doing a true contrasting wood inlay to doing a seperate 3d logo and just inserting it into the bartop. Is yours a contrasting wood inlay or just filler in the vcarving? Looks great!

[tlempicke]

That's real nice. I'm geting ready to do a bartop with Marine logo inlaid in it. But i have jumped back between doing a true contrasting wood inlay to doing a seperate 3d logo and just inserting it into the bartop. Is yours a contrasting wood inlay or just filler in the vcarving? Looks great!

I found a product from TAP plastics online that is a two part casting plastic. It goes off in about 90 seconds, and by the next day is hard enough to machine, say for screw threads or some such.

I tricked the program into cutting the lettering just a bit deeper than normal. Then I filled the trenches with plastic and sanded off the excess.

I learned pretty quick to do a good job of masking and work as neatly as possible to save a lot of time sanding.

[myxpykalix]

What is the name of that product? Where did you get it? I think it would look neater as an inlay (filler or wood) rather then just a insert of a 3d part but when merging the two parts in an inlay you never know if it works till you get it done. With the filler i'm sure you could see it right away and if you need to patch any i'm sure you could just add some to any void right?

[tlempicke]

What is the name of that product? Where did you get it? I think it would look neater as an inlay (filler or wood) rather then just a insert of a 3d part but when merging the two parts in an inlay you never know if it works till you get it done. With the filler i'm sure you could see it right away and if you need to patch any i'm sure you could just add some to any void right?

It is called Quick Cast by TAP plastics.
Here is a link http://www.tapplastics.com/product/mold_making_materials/casting_products/tap_quik_cast/74

It goes a long long way when you are doing this. I bought a one quart kit and used about 15 percent of it. Here is what I did

Carve the letters .020 deeper than normal because you will loose some wood to sanding. What I did is to zero the Z axis and then move it off the work piece so that I could take the bit to -.020. Then zero the bit and take it to 1 inch above the material. Don't forget to set your minimum height to allow for the fact that the bit is going to be .020 closer than the machine thinks it is.

Carve your image. If it is a little rough in the bottom don't clean it up - that will be a good thing.

Carefully mask the area you are going to fill. You need to be about 1/4 inch away from the fill area but the closer you get the less sanding you will have to do.

I bought small drink cups from the party section of the local food store. Clear plastic poly carbonate. I think designed to serve wine. Pour equal parts of side a and side b into two cups.

I used a tongue depressor to mix and spread the plastic. (cheap and rally useful to have in the shop. Over the years been used as spatulas, shims, props, anything but depressing tongues)

Minute 0 to 1
Pour one cup into the other and stir. Be careful to pour directly into the center of the cup and not down the side. You don't want to get bubbles into the plastic but you also need to get the job done.

Minute 1 to 2
Pour the plastic carefully over the carving. Spread it with the TD on it's side. Make sure you have a convex area over the carving. Scrape as much excess as you can off to the side on the masking.

Minute 2
The plastic will start to get white and be the general constancy of snot. Resist the urge to putz and leave it be.

Minute 8
You can just about dent it with a fingernail. Take off the masking but be careful not to lift straight up. Tear it off on an angle so that you don't lift the plastic off of the wood.

Minute 30 to 45
Sand off the excess. I used a Black and Decker Mouse with 120 grit paper. Sand till the letters or artwork is nice and clear and you have no white that you don't want to have on the wood.

Later on
You will have a piece of wood with white looking clouds where you have sanded against the grain. I used a straight line sander (Harbor Freight $37) and 220 grit paper to final sand the piece. A four foot by 15 inch piece too just over an hour to get nice.

The plastic really hangs in there. In the construction of the table it got handled a good bit and even survived No 1 grandson picking at it with his fingernail to see if it would come loose. Grandson did not survive without minor damage.

[Brian Harnett]

It looks great, did you allow for wood movement in the design? that may become an issue with seasonal weather changes

[myxpykalix]

Thanks for that explanation. The top currently has a epoxy finish over top of it and i'm thinking it might be good to vcarve the surface before i sand off the epoxy?
Then do my filling, then use the bot to take .10 off the surface or just sand it down taking off the old epoxy coat and the filler waste? A friend has a Festool sander that she swears by, telling me it will do the job in half the time of other sanders, and i can use that.

[tlempicke]

It looks great, did you allow for wood movement in the design? that may become an issue with seasonal weather changes

Sure did. The legs are held on by a wooden version of standard clips used for the purpose.

[myxpykalix]

Tlempiicke....I see you are in South Carolina. Where did you buy your TAP products? No one local sells this stuff i can find.

[tlempicke]

Tlempiicke....I see you are in South Carolina. Where did you buy your TAP products? No one local sells this stuff i can find.

I bought it on line directly from TAP plastics

[myxpykalix]

I ordered the quart size (pint of A, B).So it will be about a week so we'll see how it goes!