Dining Table, Part I

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.