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| by:
Jerry Weber
photos: Christopher Campbell
illustrations: Len Churchill |
DARK, RICH, FULL-BODIED |
| For
those who like it strong and robust—a coffee table with
substance |
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| The
gravity of the situation—a room that needed solid,
formal furniture—demanded a table with the blue-blood
pedigree of pedestal tables and the classic good
looks of dark-stained oak |
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As a professional
furniture maker working with clients, I’ve learnt that it’s
the quality of relationship I have, almost as much as the quality
of what I build, that keeps them coming back. The idea for this
project came from a client who had very specific ideas of what
he wanted. Someone else already built a large wall unit for
him—a beautiful, dominating piece of furniture that was dark,
strong and stately. While this fellow was very happy with the
end result, he hadn’t enjoyed the process of working with the
builder, so for a companion coffee table he came to me. He knew
he wanted an oak pedestal coffee table that expanded with a
table leaf, and he wanted it as strong and massive as the wall
unit. He also wanted a silky-smooth, hidden drawer at each end.
We collaborated on the design, step by step. I started with
sketches, then a cardboard model to get proportions right, and
then a model in cheap pine to settle all the details.
This careful planning process
yielded a table that met his criteria. From the 1 1/4"-thick
top to the 6" octagonal pedestals, it’s nothing if not substantial.
It’s not difficult to build, but demands a good tablesaw, jointer
and thickness planer because of the robust parts involved. To
make the drawers exceptionally smooth I chose mechanical slides
that are completely concealed and have a spring action that
actually pulls the drawer in as it closes.
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| On The Pedestal |
There
are different ways to make table pedestals, and I chose to laminate
solid stock for mine. It’s the easiest way to get flawless results,
with no chance that joints will open up later, as hollow, coopered
pedestals sometimes do. Solid construction also gives the sturdiest
results.
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| Good
hardware is a real workshop timesaver. Turn the
table over for a look at the hidden drawer slides—an
easy solution for smooth, quiet, self-closing drawers |
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I dressed enough boards to make a 6 1/2" x 6 1/2" blank, roughly
24" long-enough for both pedestals. I then milled this down
to near its finished thickness of 6" x 6" by jointing two sides
square before ripping each opposite side with two passes on
the tablesaw, one from each rough face. If your tablesaw blade
can’t extend high enough to slice through wood this wide in
two passes, do what you can then use a hand saw to finish the
job before jointing the sawn edges clean and straight.
The pedestals aren’t regular
octagons since their sides aren’t equal in width. The plans
show how the sides that accept the feet are 3" wide, while the
open sides are 2 1/8" wide. I drew this outline on one end of
the pedestal blank, then made a temporary fence on my saw and
rough-cut the waste before jointing the pedestal blank down
to final size and trimming to final length of 11 1/2".
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| Leg Work |
The leg shape is a condensed replica of the leg on a 1930s pedestal
table I own. For strength, it’s critical that you orient the
grain as shown in the plan. After laminating enough stock to
get the 2 1/2" leg thickness, I used a bandsaw to cut as close
to the outline as possible, then sanded the edges smooth with
an edge sander and oscillating spindle sander. Final smoothing
is best done with a random orbit sander. All the edges except
the ones that join with the pedestal are also softened with
a 1/4" radius roundover bit in a table-mounted router.
While you’re at it, cut the stretcher
that connects the pedestals, then sand and round its exposed
edges, too.
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| Make The Tabletop |
Start putting the tabletop together by edge-gluing enough wood
to make the three pieces of the tabletop, with the grain running
across the width. Once the top is glued, sanded and trimmed
to final size, continue by jigsawing a 3 3/4" radius curve on
each corner, then sand all edges smooth. I used a 3/4" radius
roundover bit with a 3/16" shoulder on top to soften the table
edge even more, followed by a 1/4" roundover bit used on the
bottom edge, without a shoulder. The plans show the profile,
though the details are up to you. Whatever you choose, rout
the top profile in several passes. There’s a lot of tough wood
to be removed, and you don’t want to overtax your router or
burn the tabletop edges.
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| Supporting Members |
Ease
the bottom edges of the pedestal slightly with 100-grit sandpaper
before setting the pedestals upright on a piece of 2 5/8"-thick
scrap. Supporting the pedestals like this raises them to their
final height off the floor and makes it a lot easier to position
and join the legs. The bottom of each leg doesn’t line up with
the pedestal bottom, but joins 1/8" up. Attach the legs to the
pedestals with glue, three screws and a couple of biscuits for
good measure. Two screws go through the bottom of the pedestal
into the legs (first drill a large counterbore with a Forstner
bit), and one screw goes through the top of the leg into the
pedestal (counterbored and later plugged).
You could also fasten each leg with four 1/2" dia. x 2 1/2"
fluted dowels, shopmade splines or two pairs of #20 biscuits.
This joint takes a lot of stress, and the stress will tend to
pull the joint apart, so it needs to be strong. In this design,
the massive feet conveniently give a large surface area for
gluing. If I ever redesign this with thinner, more delicate
feet, I’ll give extra thought to engineering this joint so it’s
rock solid.
With feet installed, join the
two pedestals to the stretcher, using a single #20 biscuit (for
alignment) and two #8 x 2 1/2" screws driven diagonally from
the top and bottom edges. Don’t forget to place the bottom edge
of the stretcher 3/4" higher than the bottom edge of pedestal.
Complete this part of the project
by fastening the table slide mounting boards to the pedestal
tops with screws. Make sure these are square to the stretcher
and parallel to each other.
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| PART 1
| PART 2 |
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