Dining Table Re-finish

It's been a busy few months - lots of different projects going on which either haven't been finished enough to write about, or in most cases, I haven't had time to write about. Our dining table is one of the former. It had an irritating V-grove around the perimeter, and there were a number of places were the veneer was loose or damaged. One Sunday morning over breakfast I started picking at the loose veneer with a craft knife.

I had to stop because it was all loose.

Late on I filled the grooves with automotive bondo and sanded the table flat. I think I forget to photograph that step. The footrest has always been loose while we've owned the table, so I took the time to re-glue it as best I could. I had to get creative with some of the clamps.

We bought a full 8' x 4' sheet of good quality oak veneer and applied it with contact cement and then I had my assistant flatten it all down with a special tool.

After suitable curing time, we trimmed round the edge with the router and the table was heaved out on to the deck and sanded down to 400 grit with my new favorite tool, by my always favorite tool operator.

We applied gel stain and wiped it down pretty quickly afterwards. Credit to the folks at MacBeath Hardwood for picking out the perfect veneer/stain combination.

We finished the table in the same way as the Walnut Desktops - three coats of flat varnish, which had a cure time of twenty-one (21) days.