Project: Oval Table

At first glance, oval tables look pretty simple. But it's only when you start building that you realize there's more involved than meets the eye. Laying out and preparing the top and the curved skirts smoothly, for instance, can make you scratch your head. And fastening the skirts to the legs isn't the same as on a regular table. But since I've already figured out all the hard stuff, your work will be easier and more fun.

Make the Tabletop
Begin by edge-gluing enough 3/4"-thick stock to form the 20" x 26" tabletop blank. Got a thickness planer? You'll find lamination easier if you edge-glue pieces of wood up to 12" wide (or whatever your machine will take), then run these through the planer to clean up the dried glue joints before completing the final lamination. This way you'll only have one central joint to sand smooth.

You could draw the oval tabletop outline directly onto the wood you've just prepared, but there's a better way. Even if you're only planning to make one table, I recommend you draw and cut out a template that you can use to quickly reproduce the oval shape later. You'll probably get requests to make at least one more table, and a template will save time and fuss. You can also use the template to finish off the edges of the tabletop with a router. More on this later.

I used a piece of 1/2" x 20" x 26" plywood for my template (MDF or particleboard works well, too). Whatever you use, divide your wood in half both ways, with pencil lines, to find the center of the template stock. Next, measure and mark two points along the longer axis, each one 7 1/2" out from the centre point, then drive 2"-long screws in each. These will form the focal points around which your oval will be drawn.

Next, mark the width and length of the oval on your template, in this case 19" x 24". It's now time for some string. Choose a piece that isn't stretchy, and tie it together to form a loop that extends from one screw, over the other, and up to the opposite 24" point on your template. By putting a pencil into this loop, then tracing around the two screws (while keeping the string taut) you'll get an ellipse, just as they taught you in grade 12 geometry class. Just be sure to keep the pencil straight up and down for accurate results. When you're done, cut around the outside of the outline with a bandsaw or hand-held jigsaw, then sand the template edges back to the layout line.

It's now time to cut out the tabletop. Begin by sawing your tabletop blank about 1/16" beyond the waste side of the oval layout line, then tack the plywood tracing template to what will become the underside of the tabletop using four finishing nails. Adjust the height of the flush trimming bit in your table-mounted router so it rides only on the edge of the upward-facing template, as shown in the plans, then run the workpiece across the spinning tool.

Curves and Skirts
One of the challenges of any oval table is making curved skirts that follow the shape of the top. The classic approach is to cut the skirt parts from solid wood, steam them for about an hour, then clamp them into a shop-built bending form. It takes a week or two for the skirts to be dry enough to use. Another approach, the one I used, relies on kerf-bent pieces of 3/16" pine-veneered plywood, glued and clamped together within a bending form created by gluing together enough layers of MDF to get a 4" x 6" x 10" block. The inside and outside edges of the skirt profiles are drawn onto this block using the edge of the tabletop template as a guide. Just draw a line 1 1/2" from the edge of the tabletop onto a piece of tracing paper, then transfer this shape to your MDF. A bandsaw is ideal for cutting the MDF block to form the inside and outside curves that you'll need. The trough-shaped half can be screwed to a 3/4" x 10" x 10" piece of melamine (the factory finish resists glue), while the crowned MDF is left free to be clamped to it during use. Lining the working edges of the gluing forms with masking tape stops stray glue from sticking.

When it comes time to cut kerfs into the plywood strips, use a tablesaw set to cut halfway through the thickness of the wood. Orient the outermost three of four strips with their kerfs facing in, towards the centre of the table. The innermost plywood layer should have its kerfs facing outward, so they're concealed within the completed skirts. Expect to see some glue squeeze-out and misalignment of the skirt edges when they come out of the form. That's normal, and it's why the skirts are made over-width to begin with. Even though these parts are curved (and made of plywood), their edges can still be trued with a jointer or sharp hand plane, then trimmed to final width on a tablesaw.

When the skirts are done, lay them on the skirt outlines drawn on the tabletop template. These show where the skirts need to be trimmed before fastening them to the legs. Cut the skirts, then set them aside for now.

Tapering the Legs, Adding Skirts and Finishing
The tapered shape of the legs makes the table look more graceful, so it's important that you don't skip this detail. The taper starts 4" down from the top of each leg, widening to remove 3/8" of wood at the foot end. You could build a tablesaw tapering jig to do this for you. Or rough-cut the taper along layout lines with a bandsaw, then plane each face smooth. A jointer can also be used to do the entire job if you're handy. Any way you do it, the tapered leg faces need to be even and smooth, with slightly eased corners.

Since this table is small, I joined each leg and skirt joint with a #8 x 1/4" pocket screw. A pair of #20 biscuits would work well too. Pine has a tendency to absorb stain unevenly, making the surface blotchy. To smooth the final colour of my table I applied Minwax pre-stain wood conditioner, followed by Minwax penetrating stain in Golden Oak shade. My wife Sandy added a touch of decorative paint, before protecting the entire project under three coats of Minwax Wipe-On Poly, sanding very lightly with 240-grit paper between coats.