WIP: oak occasional stools

[Luke Kelly]

Well I've been teaching myself woodwork with the aid of a small set of inherited tools, some Axminster purchases and a book by Nick Gibbs. I'd got to the "occasional oak stools" project and obtained the wood. It just happened that when admiring the beautiful oak I realised that, due to minimum order size, I had just enough oak to squeeze two stools out. Cue lots of cutting, chiselling and all kinds of muppetry; the end result of which was me this afternoon wedging the tenons in the second stool.

What can't really be seen in this photo is, lurking in the shadow, a very small crack. I knew the oak had some splits in it, but as I was using every last board foot there was no way to avoid having a fair few of them in the second stool. I had thought all would be okay but...

A horrible crack opened up. What do I do? They are distinctly rustic and so aesthetically it should be possible to deal with, although I'm not sure how. Sand it smooth and leave it? But is it going to result in catastrophic stool failure? And if it is, is there any way to reinforce it and prevent it falling apart after a couple of months of occasionally being sat upon/stood on/pushed about?

 

[PeterBassett]

Butterfly reinforcement across the crack to hold it together? Not sure you have enough wood for that though.

Fill the gap with good glue, take out the tenon and clamp it up and try again?

 

[MikeG.]

Oh I wouldn't worry about that in the least. Pop the top off, wedge the cracks open from the underside (to avoid obvious damage), and get some glue in. Push it around with a piece of paper so that it gets into all of the crack, clamp up and away you go. You'll never see the join!

The glueline will be stronger than the surrounding wood.

Lesson learnt!

Welcome, incidentally!!!

Mike

 

[Luke Kelly]

Cheers for the welcome, I've been lurking for a while and the competition drew me out of the shadows. I shall try reversing my wedging!

 

[OPJ]

Ideally, your wedges should be positioned so that they are at 90° to the grain direction. Not sure of what you're overall design looks like so, this may not have been possible anyway.

 

[Night Train]

I always advise my students to place their wedges as close to cross grain as possible to prevent any splitting loads on the timber.

A diagonal wedge may have been better in your case.

Here is a method for ensuring glue squeezes into a split.
Stick masking tape on both sides of the split edges to protect the timber.
Squeeze a bead of glue over the split.
Cover the glue bead with a wide strip of masking tape and seal it all around to leave a bubble.
Slowly press the bubble of glue into the split.
Repeat as required until glue appears elsewhere and has filled the split.
Cramp up and then clean and remove the tape.

 

[maltrout512]

One thought about your tenons would have been wedges at 90* to the grain on the seat. That should if it was possible cure any splitting.

 

[Luke Kelly]

Phew. With a lot of persuasion the leg has been removed. Got no time this evening so glueing up the crack will have to wait until tomorrow morning before work.

It's a three-legged stool and so not all the wedges could be at 90* to the grain. On reflection maybe a four-legged stool would have been better, partly for this and partly for the disturbing air of instability that three-legged stools possess. There are certain angles at which it just doesn't look plausible that it should be standing up.

 

[OPJ]

Good thing about a three-legged stool is that it will sit on an uneven surface much better than a stool with four legs! :wink: