9'x4' Dining Table - Opinion Appreciated!

[Jeff Sladick]

I am building a large dining table out of poplar. Would love some feedback on my plan:

1. Table top is 9'x4' and 1.5" thick after jointing and planing. Edge gluing the main panel.
2. Plan on doing 8" breadboard ends with a 2" full width slot style mortise & tenon to attach.
3. Cutting the tenon with a guide and a router, then fine tuning with a hand plane.
4. Cutting the mortise with a spiral upcut router bit using a router edge guide and an additional piece of wood clamped to the edge to provide a larger surface for the router to move along.
5. Will glue about 4-6 inches of the center of the tenon and use dowels with elongated holes to fasten the remainder of the piece to allow for wood movement.

I guess one of my main concerns is the strength of the breadboard. Plus, any additional feedback is welcome!

Here are some detailed images/plans (in the close-up images of the M&T I hid some of the surfaces to reveal the internal design):

Table 02.jpg
Table 01.jpg
Table Plan 01.jpg
MnT Image.jpg
MnT Layout.jpg

[Dave Richards]

I'd be inclined to make the tenons longer.

You didn't ask but I think the feet look too thin.

[Jerry Miner]

I'd be inclined to make the breadboard narrower and to break up the single tenon into several individual tenons to give the breadboard itself more strength.

[Jeff Sladick]

I'd be inclined to make the tenons longer.

You didn't ask but I think the feet look too thin.

Thanks for the input. By thin do you mean the thickness of the leg or the spread of the base?

[Dave Richards]

I mean the thickness (height) of the feet. I'd make them at least as thick as the legs.

[Wayne Lomman]

Why do the breadboards? You have the under frame to control any tendency to cup. The overall design looks good. The feet look ok in my view. Cheers

[Jeff Sladick]

I mean the thickness (height) of the feet. I'd make them at least as thick as the legs.

I see what you mean. I believe that you are right. Going to increase them to 3" like the leg thickness.

Why do the breadboards? You have the under frame to control any tendency to cup. The overall design looks good. The feet look ok in my view. Cheers

Thanks for the feedback. My wife is insistent on having breadboards for the look of it. I just want to make sure they are strong enough if someone is eating at the end and leans their elbows on the table or uses the table to push themselves up.

[Jamie Buxton]

Okay, I'll ask the obvious: why are you making this table from poplar? Poplar is cheap because it isn't particularly good-looking, and it is soft. Neither is a good characteristic in a dining table that you're going to put lots of time into. I'd suggest you step up to maple or oak, which aren't too much more expensive than poplar, but are much better suited for this table.

[Jeff Sladick]

Great question Jamie. My goal is to actually build a table out of black walnut. I want to make sure that this truly fits in the dining room that we are remodeling and like the end result. We plan on using this for a few months and already have a buyer for it when we're ready to build the real thing.