More Board Building Discussion

Touching base again with a few more boards and ideas on ways to make solid wood boards as usable, and flawless as possible. 

I was scrounging around my shop hoping to find a few unique pieces to make another board or two. Hit the jackpot and found some quartersawn boards as well as the last of some tigerwood and walnut. The only downside is that the boards were a little smaller than I needed for the full 2-1/4" squares I prefer. 

To start I want to revisit something that I touched on, but didn't elaborate on, in my last "building a chess board" post. Square alignment. 

I think there is a significant amount of confusion surrounding squares being misaligned, vs poorly made. This picture shows when the square alignment is determined:

Confusing but, the square alignment is primarily determined when the files are made. When people point out "misaligned" squares it's usually only 1-2 squares in a rank, not every square in the rank. The edges of the board were properly, and easily aligned, but the files were never matching sizes so you end up with unmatched corners. Hopefully this makes sense. If not, ask any questions and I'll try to clarify!

Moving on...

These are my "scrap boards" that I played with a few new build and assembly techniques on. To see what can be done with, and without specific pieces of machinery. 

Initial glue up.

A little drama along the way. The padauk had an imperceivable flaw in it. Possibly a sickness?

The first is tigerwood and walnut. 

Second is quartersawn padauk and quartersawn myrtlewood. I was able to repair the 4 broken padauk squares. 

After a ton of time playing with machines and confirming flatness on granite slabs, I made it to the oil/wax blend. If you've never had the privilege of this step, you need to at some point in your life. It's the moment the board comes to life, never gets old. 

And the finished buffing:

I love seeing grain wrap around from face to end. 

and side by side:

I'm currently experimenting with borders that I've never seen on boards before. As well as adjustable feet, so that if you neglect a solid wood board, you don't necessarily destroy it! I'll be sure to post about those developments in the future. 

Last, I was informed by another member here that there aren't that many board builders left in the world. At least not those who are trying to find perfection in solid wood. I reached out to a woodworking forum to hear there thoughts and it broke my heart a little bit. "You don't ever make boards out of solid wood. It's MDF with veneer." I was shocked, and saddened to hear that was the consensus. I'd like to think the pursuit of building a perfect board is a worthwhile pursuit. So much so that I've invested $4000 in new tools that will arrive this summer, and another $10,000 in tools that will hopefully arrive by the fall. 

Can I make a board that meets my standard of solid wood perfection? I'm not sure, but with the new tools in hand I'm confident I'll find out. 

Let me know if you have questions and/or feedback! I'd also love to hear what you think of the coloration in the board. I like building things I don't see commonly, and was happy to find some unique woods hidden behind the more common ones in my shop. 

And.... can you even tell which 4 squares were flawed and broke in the quartersawn board???

The craftsmanship shown in those pictures is unbelievable. I remember making a jewelry box for my mom for Mother's day when I was around 7. I never wanted to do all that work again, LOL. So, I switched to polishing rocks. 

Can't tell which 4 squares are flawed in the finish product. I don't know what to look for, would the darkest squares be the clue?

One question, what effect in the long term will one see if only one layer of coating is used instead of 3?

I agree. The craftsmanship is excellent!

Astounding!

Awesome job! Inspiration for me to get back in the shop.

I know which 4 squares are broken, I can't see any flaw in them after the repair. When you think about it, the board is really just 64 broken squares glued back together. So, it makes sense that if you do a glue-up repair well, you shouldn't be able to see the fracture.

As for coats of finish:

This has 2 coats (per manufacturer recommendation) of an oil/wax blend. It's commonly used on furniture, floors, and countertops. It holds up ridiculously well, is all natural so I don't have to worry about getting it on my skin, or your kids and dog eating it. If a touchup is needed, it doesn't require any skill. A tiny piece of a white scrubby and the smallest amount of the finish you can get onto the board will touch it up. It's expensive, $50 a quart, but I like that any user could confidently repair it themselves. 

So basically after 2 coats, any coats after that is only to make it darker right?

Much appreciated for your insights.

Cool board!

A question of note to the more OCD of players. The board from my last post went to a neighbor (the hand planed with some tearout). He mentioned something that I hadn't thought of/considered much. 

Do you care which way the grain runs on the boards you play on? He mentioned that he prefers it running from player to player, as opposed to across the board. 

I'm typically so immersed in the game that I don't think much about this, but wonder if there is a consensus one way or the other? This is important to know, since as the builder, you typically know which side of the board looks best, and if you aren't planning for the grain to run a certain direction, you could build the board out only to realize the grain is going the wrong way for the requested player. 

Obviously this could be a customizable thing, but I do think that boards with more striking grain patterns it could be distracting to some. 

Not with this finish. It's a clear/un-tinted finish so you're basically just wasting oil at that point. The darkening you see here, is simply the wood going from bone dry, to having an oiled finish. Without it you can see how the board looks very.... bland? Any finish you put on will initially give that "wet" darkening. You can even get a preview at the finish by wiping a raw board down with water. It wont show the exact results, but will give me an idea as to if I want a tinted, or pure oil finish. 

With a stain finish however, yes, more coats will give a darker look. I don't ever use stains, so I would definitely not be a good source of information for that beyond this very basic concept

To answer your OCD question, I prefer the grain running from player to player. However, I can live with a board that has the grain running from a file to h file. What I cannot stand for my own board is if the grain of each wood type runs in different directions. My board from Dovetail Artistry is like that. I didn't realize I disliked that until I bought that board. 

@mch818 is that board veneered? It would be extremely difficult to build a board like that without veneering. It would also be prone to breaking apart over the years since the wood expansion would be pushing in opposite directions.

Those look beautiful and I would promptly buy one. I’m particularly interested in what you are thinking about when it comes to borders.

Thank you for the info. If I have to really stare hard and look carefully for a flaw then there for me there is no flaw. With that said I do have a type of preference in grain direction of the squares.  I prefer when the grain all goes the same direction for the same wood.  So all light squares all oriented the same direction with each other and all dark squares oriented with each other.   For example, having a1 & c1 horizontal but then have e1 vertical would really bother me.  If a board has very prominent wood grain direction like the tiger wood board you posted I would prefer both light and dark squares be oriented in same direction.  However, that is only a slight preference. The only one that would bother me would be the same color/wood being randomly oriented. 

I am not sure. Here is a photo of it. Now that I look at it again maybe the grain runs in the same direction. I think my confusion is with some of the maple pieces have what looks like extra "grain" that runs in the opposite direction. What do you think?

I see what you mean. Whether the actual grain of both woods is oriented in one direction it certainly gives the appearance of running 90 degrees to each other

Ah, I see whats going on there. 

#1 is that you have fiddleback maple in that board. The figure does appear to ripple across the grain direction, so that board, while oriented correctly, does appear funky. 

#2 The walnut has a decent amount of the softer sapwood instead of heartwood included in the board. I think that adds to the clashing of directions. 

For everyones knowledge, the easiest way to tell if your board is veneered or solid all the way through is to look at the edges. You should be able to see the grain wrapping over the edges if it's solid all the way through. I've seen a few now that are "solid wood" but when you look close the grain is running opposite direction, or no end grain can be found on the edges. At the least, that means the edges were veneered. 

I bet everyone with borderless boards are rushing to get them to check.