Building a dining table: Medieval style.

[Cluricaun]

@SparrowHawk

You can make a small blast furnace at home. A friend of mine, who homeschools her kids, made one, about 18 inches high. Fired it up with a dozen charcoal briquets and made coins in a mold carved from cuttlebone. I think they were bronze? I’d have to ask her because, though I did see the furnace and the mold and the coins, I know nothing about it myself.

Oh sure it can be done, and it’s not all that expensive either. However it is an intensive and somewhat hazardous hobby to undertake especially if you’re just looking to do a one time shot on the table. It’s not usually a casual hobby, there’s a lot to know about smelting something in your back yard before you decide to just whip up a 2300 degree furnace and start tossing copper plumbing in.

[Oslo_Ostragoth]

@Acid_Lamp

Update 3

I’ve know got the main panel down to a sandable level of finish. My hands are all blistered up from planing so much but it is worth the effort. Test oiling reveals that the natural color will vary from a light white/maple to a deep oxblood in the heartwood. The grain has a lot of iridescent lacing in it as well. I’m still not certain how to fill the bore holes and cracks though.

Norm Abrams did the kitchen cabinets with mesquite on a This Old House series somewhere in the southwest. He filled the voids with a pourable black epoxy. The result was, of course, beautiful.

[fifty-six]

@Acid_Lamp

I really need to fill those holes with something, but i wont a decent inlay, not some cheesy putty. Maybe carved bone…

There is an artist here in town that works with burls and does some interesting things with the natural grooves and pits.

I am not entirely certain what he does but I was examining one earlier today so it is fresh in my mind. He takes what looks like crushed jade or some other colored stone or metal pieces in some cases. It looks as if he colors a sanded grout or filling of some sort and packs it in there. It looks at first glance that it is a carved jade, some other stone or metal metal inlay. It is stunning, at least on small scale but a really nice crushed stone inlay like this may be nice.

[Acid_Lamp]

Thanks for the ideas. I’ve worked with pourable epoxy plenty of times, but hadn’t considered tinting it down. There already is some black spalting n the wood so that might follow.

There are two types of holes. Bore holes which look like someone took a drill bit on a slight angle to the slap, and large trenches left from the bigger grubs. I like the beeswax idea.

[Shark]

You wouldn’t have to leave the grub trails in their natural shape if you don’t want. You can enlarge the holes into a variety of shapes, and make a matching plug out of wood of the same shape to fill it. This way you don’t have an irregular shape to fill, and can even design several templetes and jigs to cut the holes and plugs with good precision. This is/was done commonly with butterfly inlays in woodworking, and you can even buy templetes ready made. http://www.woodpeck.com/butterflytemplate.html

If you had a piece of metal, say a coin, that you wanted to inlay, you could just enlarge the hole until the coin fit snugly. Same for any other size or shape of metal that you can find. In other words, make the hole fit the metal, not make the metal fit the hole.

Can’t wait to see the finished project