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Thread: Salvaged my attempt at a nelson bench

  1. #1

    Salvaged my attempt at a nelson bench

    First time post so I guess it's apt that I start off with asking for help with a project that probably due to my lack of skill is close to being ruined. So a few weeks ago I took on the famous George Nelson Bench and like a dummy decided to use the actual oddball measurements of the original which Herman Miller provides through a sketchup file. Planing and dimensioning the boards went ok but I did end up with some wood movement during ripping of the slats in the hard maple I'm using so that was the start of my troubles as the nelson bench basically requires 36 pretty precise half-lappish joints. Fast forward to my sloppy dado cuts and my poor excuse for a glue-up and I ended up with a bench top with lots of gaps at the joints and with slats that are not flush with the center cross brace. I have already taken a track saw to the ends and squared those away but I'm still left with a mountain of planing/sanding, wood putty filling and more sanding. My question is would it be ok to take the entire bench top and run it through a 20" planer to help remove most of the material in the top of the slats to get them level with the cross braces or will the spacing between the slats be bad for the planer? I'm in a co-op shop so I wouldn't want to damage the equipment obviously. Should I just avoid the planer and sand everything flat and even, wood filler and then keep sanding? I'm going to be building this bench again and again until I get it perfect so I can also chop it all up and make a bunch of cutting boards as gifts but I'm wondering if trying to salvage this bench top could prove educational. Suggestions?

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    Last edited by Ray Rodriguez; 08-30-2017 at 7:22 PM.

  2. #2
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    If the planer hits the top of the cross members, it is likely to chip out the trailing edge badly.

    You might just forge ahead without fixing the top. Try making the legs and fastening them on. Call the whole thing a learning experience, or a prototype. Then, having learned on serial number 0, you can do a good job of building the next one.
    Last edited by Jamie Buxton; 08-30-2017 at 8:39 PM.

  3. #3
    I would remake the three cross pieces. Pull the slats together and make sure they are perfectly the same and then plane the three cross pieces to match. Take it from there and you shouldn't have too much trouble salvaging your project. It still has the potential to be very nice. On further thought make the center crossmember and the ends as one wide piece then rip into three separate parts. That should help reduce error as well as only needing eleven half laps.
    Last edited by Bob Leistner; 08-30-2017 at 8:50 PM.

  4. #4
    First, welcome to The Creek, Ray!

    You can certainly sand it flat by hand or in a drum sander. If you have access to hand planes, that's better still. (Using a hand plane is a skill worth learning for exactly times like this.)

    That joint is pretty gappy. It almost looks like you could inject some glue and clamp it up to close that gap. Can you?

    If you can't, I'd say make cutting boards and start over. It will be hard to fill that gap well enough to make it look "right". Filling it with thin strips of maple is better than using putty, but I think you will always see the repair.

    Let us know what you decide.
    Fred

  5. #5
    Join Date
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    Can you call some cabinet shops and seek out a wide belt sanding job from them?
    Glad its my shop I am responsible for - I only have to make me happy.

  6. #6
    Thanks everyone for the suggestions. I was worried about tear-out running through the planer as well but I think the problem here is that I just didn't make the joints to the tolerances required of this kind of piece. I had this uneasy feeling as I was cutting down to final dimensions and cutting the dado's and now I realize it's because I knew my process was not good enough to produce repeatable accurate cuts for the kind of joints I needed. I think I'm going to chop this top up and make a bunch of nice cutting boards with the maple and some nice African mahogany off-cuts I've got lying around. In the meantime I've got a bunch of ideas on how to improve my process for the next go around:

    1. Cutting the dado's out of a single piece of wood for the cross members and then ripping to final width for consistency as as has been suggested.
    2. Leaving the rough hard maple in the shop for a week or two to adjust to the temp/humidity to see if I can prevent as much wood movement as possible during ripping even though that might be impossible to completely prevent.
    3. Ripping down the slats a bit bigger and doing final width and height using the jointer/planer to account for movement.
    4. Switching to more standard measurements like 3/4" instead of 25/32" which hopefully will simplify things as I work.
    5. Switching to 8/4 boards to rip the slats to width instead of to height.
    6. Cutting the dado's in the slats in three groups of 4 slats taped together to again try to achieve some consistency with the cuts. Also cutting the dado's narrower and doing final adjustments after for as tight a fit as I can get.
    7. Not doing a massive glue-up all in one shot but instead starting with the outside slats and maybe a middle slat to ensure I am square and then taking my time gluing up the rest of the slats over the course of a day or two. Probably would help with cleaning up the squeeze out.
    8. Possibly switching from using a dado blade to just hogging out the dado's with a regular blade and finishing with a chisel. Thinking it might give me finer control for now.
    9. Going slower and taking my time to get everything right.

  7. #7
    Just a quick note, I would suggest leaving the wood a lot longer than a week. I've had issues with maple in the past and now aim at a month+ sitting in the shop with controlled environment.

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Sebastien La Madeleine View Post
    Just a quick note, I would suggest leaving the wood a lot longer than a week. I've had issues with maple in the past and now aim at a month+ sitting in the shop with controlled environment.
    Will do. also should I joint and plane the rough boards then let them sit to adjust or just let the rough lumber adjust for a month or so in the shop? This maple is the first time that wood movement has played a factor in my project so it's an entirely new variable for me to understand.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Sep 2014
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    second the recommendation to check local cabinet shops. I was able to find 2 places (out of 4 that I emailed) that had wide belt sander and were willing to run the top through for me. Ended up costing around $100 and was well worth it

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by Mike Walsh View Post
    second the recommendation to check local cabinet shops. I was able to find 2 places (out of 4 that I emailed) that had wide belt sander and were willing to run the top through for me. Ended up costing around $100 and was well worth it
    There is a brand new cabinet shop opening up near my folks place. Not sure if they have opened yet but I'll see if they have something like that available for future projects.

  11. #11
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    Your new plan looks like a good one and I would suggest that you add in a " dry/test fit/fine tune each (marked) joint prior to glue up. Your idea of using hand tools to fine tune as opposed to sanding is a sound one but it will (if not already) entail gaining new skills, not the least of which will be sharpening your hand tools. Chisels and hand planes are outstanding at fine tuning behind bulk machine work but do require a sharp edge for maximum effectiveness. Your idea of using the powered jointer/planer equipment for final dimensioning after allowing the wood to adjust to your shops humidity is good, but, on a project such as yours with the long, narrow slats and exposed half lap joinery, any subtle wind or twist in the slats will create gaps in the joinery. Sometimes, when using powered jointers and planers, a subtle twist is only temporarily flattened out when passing over the blades and springs back up after exiting the machine. This is where using hand tools for a final joinery tune up can work well. Making sure that all parts are fully square when fitted together also helps for overall consistency. I applaud your decision to go at again and look forward to photos of the finished work.
    David

  12. #12
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    Just saw one of your questions re wood movement. Lots of folks allow for two periods of wood adjustment after purchase - when first buying the wood, they sticker it in the shop and let it rest as bought for a period of time. Different folks, different periods of time - a week? a month?. They then rough dimension the wood to close to final dimensioning and allow for a few more days of adjustment before then bringing everything down to final dimensions.
    David

  13. #13
    Almost a year and a half after originally trying to build the iconic Nelson Bench I have given it another shot with all the new skills I've built up over that time.

    Here is a quick photo of what I ended up with this time around with just some final sanding to do and then finishing. All I can say is that while a simple looking piece of furniture building one of these is a lot harder than it appears. In the time since I first attempted this piece I had to learn/improve the following:

    1. Measuring accurately and repeatably
    2. Making sure my tools where properly calibrated
    3. Understanding wood movement and the steps involved in dimensioning lumber that you need to be true, square and as straight as possible in it's final form.
    4. Getting good at making half-lap joints with the dado blade.
    5. Patience in remaining calm when you feel like you have bitten off more than you can chew.
    6. Getting good at fixing mistakes as you go but also slowing down enough to not make the big mistakes you cannot recover from.
    7. The importance of working off of a flat reference surface as your primary work bench.
    8. Learning how to cut non-90 degree bevels
    9. Knowing when to plane away material versus when to sand it down.
    10. Knowing when to use a nice sharp rip blade.
    11. Understand rip feed rate and how it relates to heat between the blade and your lumber and how that can effect movement.
    12. Keeping my hand tools sharp and true.
    13. Minimizing squeeze out in hard to reach joints.
    14. Planning and being patient about a complex glue-up. You don't have to do it all in one shot!
    15. Lastly I took a lot of the last year and a half to build my own shop in my garage and it's made all the difference. (I'll talk about that in another thread I started long ago.)

    Seriously had I not spent the last year and a half getting better at all of those things I could not have gotten the results that I achieved with this Nelson Bench. It's nice to take on a project that you were terribly unprepared for in the past and be able to execute it the second go around.

    One picture for now with many more to follow once it's finished. And of course many thanks to the members on here that volunteer their knowledge and time to help other woodworkers out.

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    Last edited by Ray Rodriguez; 01-28-2019 at 2:10 PM.

  14. #14
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    That does not look like an easy piece to make Ray. It came out really nice. It's nice to see another progressing in their craft and enjoying it.

  15. #15
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    Awesome experience, and awesome result!

    I have some projects I have scrapped and started over. They didnt all turn out perfect even the second round.

    And some I just 'lived with'.

    A nice bench and in some way I imagine more satisfying than the projects that went perfectly without a hitch...

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