Our house has had a gaping hole in it
since we moved in. There is a dining
room that has housed everything except
a dining table. I want to make one, I need
to make one… and now I will.
I found 2 pallets in the yard behind work that looked to be
planked with 2x10 hardwood timbers. Beneath the weathered grey exterior, I think I saw the prominent grain of Oak.
They were well weathered and did not appear to be pressure treated
with chemicals. I looked up the IPPC
code that was stamped, and it seems that they were heat treated but not
fumigated to kill bugs. I am not too
worried about it because I will be sealing it up once it is built, but better
to know.
The first job was getting them home, which required a reciprocating
saw and an 11 inch blade to separate the cross-timbers that tied the pallets
together. We tried to remove the nails
from the pallet all together, but they proved to be too difficult to remove. They ended up being 5” long and their heads
would just give way when trying to pull them.
We cut them into sections, removed the ends with a jig saw (they
were heavily checked and cracked) and went about removing the sections of
cross-timbers one by one, cutting the remaining nails about ½” above the
hardwood, hammering them through and then pulling them. A lot of work, but I think the finished
effect will be worth it.
I just had to see what the wood looked like underneath, so I took
one of the smaller boards and ran it through my planer. There was some heavy cracking and peeling on
this board, and it will need to be cut into smaller lengths. I, therefore, was not too worried about
milling this board without flattening one side first.
So far, what I have briefly cleaned up with a hand plane has looked like Red Oak, just like this board. There are still 6 boards that need to be de-nailed, for a grand total of 11. I have a moisture meter and metal detector
coming next week to ensure that the wood is ready to be worked. I am not sure how long they were out in the
elements.
I think that the cracks and nail holes and rough looking grain and knots will give the table the rustic feel that we are looking for.