Altar Progress: The Home Stretch

 

After getting the plywood top laminated together, I got one last stick of oak lumber from my big box store and milled it down to make my own shop veneer, much thicker than what you can buy, to cover up the exposed plywood edges. It is 1/4 of an inch thick and when I apply a 1/4 inch radius later to soften up the edges, it should all but disappear making the entire top look like it was cut from a giant slab of wood. 

Unfortunately though, I discovered that despite maybe a couple hundred clamps, I did not have a single clamp that would work to hold the veneer in place while the glue dries. Not wanting to but a bunch of expensive clamps that I'll likely never use again, I had to get creative. Above you can see what I ended up doing after digging through my storage box of ropes, bungees and ratchet straps. Perhaps 15 years ago, while living in another town, the local Ace Hardware store was going out of business and I stopped in while all inventory was 75% off to see if there was anything I "needed". I didn't find anything but they did have a half dozen ratchet straps still left so I scooped them up thinking they might come in handy someday.

They did... 15 years later. I even had to cut them out of their plastic packaging in order to use them. They were a bit ungainly to get all in place but did a great job at doing what I needed them to do. Although I don't have a picture, over the course of a day, I was able to get all four edges covered with my extra thick oak veneer. As soon as the glue is thoroughly dried, I will have to cut everything flush to the surfaces and cut off the extra bits hanging out and get everything sanded up nicely. Then after installing some threaded inserts that I will use to bolt the base to the top, all that will be left is the finishing process. 

This entire process has reawakened in me a love of wood working that has largely been dormant for awhile as I focused on other aspects of my life to improve. I now have several woodworking projects in mind that I hope to build in the nearer future. They will all be much smaller pieces of furniture to replace/significantly upgrade some of our worn out and tired pieces we have currently. But those come later, after I get this project out of my garage and into a church.