Cutting boards

[Matt Stiegler]

I made a slew of face grain cutting boards as holiday gifts for relatives from pieces of sycamore, maple, cherry, and black walnut. Below are photos of the 2 I liked best. The quartersawn sycamore (2nd photo) in particular was very striking, not sure the photo does it justice. It was tear-out prone, though, so I got some practice with cross-grain hand planing and card scraping. I finished the boards with mineral oil applied hourly for a day and then daily for a week and included a 2 oz bottle with care instructions.

[Chris S Anderson]

Very nice. What method did you use to make the very thin pieces? I really like the wood that you used. You had some very nice 'scraps'.

[Matt Stiegler]

Very nice. What method did you use to make the very thin pieces? I really like the wood that you used. You had some very nice 'scraps'.

Thanks, Chris. I was just admiring (envying, really) yours.

I cut the thin pieces using a technique I learned at the Philadelphia Furniture Workshop. You set the fence close to the blade, then you push the wood through with a sacrificial pusher while your hand rides along the top of the fence. (Sacrificial because, being wider than the piece, the pusher gets a kerf cut into the bottom by the blade as it passes; but it can be used many times). Easy and safe. If you want to cut strips so thin that you're worried about damaging your fence, you can use a sacrificial fence too.

I have to admit, the wood was not scraps. Being a newbie, I didn't have lots of nice hardwood offcuts to use, so I bought the walnut and cherry specifically to use for the cutting boards, and he threw in the sycamore for free.

[Chris S Anderson]

Those thin strips do make them look really nice. I want to make a few boxes, and there is an interesting technique in this months Fine Woodworking, and I'd like to try to add some thin strips the way you made them. I really like the look of ebony gaboon, but it's $150+ for a 1x4x24. If I ever do use it in a project, it will be accent only, and making thin strips like yours would stretch that expensive board as far as I could make it.

[Matt Stiegler]

Those thin strips do make them look really nice. I want to make a few boxes, and there is an interesting technique in this months Fine Woodworking, and I'd like to try to add some thin strips the way you made them. I really like the look of ebony gaboon, but it's $150+ for a 1x4x24. If I ever do use it in a project, it will be accent only, and making thin strips like yours would stretch that expensive board as far as I could make it.

Sounds like a great project. I was about to suggest that using a bandsaw instead might waste less of that wood to the kerf, but a part of the reason this technique works, it seems to me, is the glue-ready cut you can get on the tablesaw. (I used a freud glue-line rip blade and a ZCI). I'm not sure if you could get a glue-ready cut from a bandsaw, and removing blade marks on a thin strip would be misery.