Custom Redwood Slab Coffee Table with burled pine bases

It seems like we always have more than one project in the works, which keeps you on your toes. This week we have started another coffee table, the top measures  56"x33" and it will be inlaid with turquoise.

We opened the package a couple of days ago and noticed that it had warped and twisted. It worried us, not knowing if we would be able to even use this piece. Anyway we had faith and figured we would try to straighten it out. So Tim set it on the concrete, and let the garden hose set and run over it for several hours, thoroughly soaking it. We then added a few hundred pounds worth of weights to is and let it set over night.

The next morning it had flattened out, so we ran to town, purchased 2"x1" channel iron in which we will make a frame to fasten the top to so that it does not spring back and will hold its shape...

Here we are opening the package, I forgot to take pictures of the top with the warp in it, my heat sunk when I saw it and instantly went into (how do we fix it mode)......

 This is the underside of the slab, the chalk lines give us an idea of how far under the slab that the steel frame must set, that way it is not visible when the table is completed.

This pine stump was cut in half so that we could use it for the bases under the table

 Tim came up with a pretty cool idea of setting his router up so that he could make the stumps perfectly level. After he had them leveled he sat the redwood on top of the stumps to see how it looked. We decided that these particular stumps do not compliment the redwood at all. So next week we will head to the mountains to go cut some burled pine.

Well we did change out the base for this table, it is burled pine and does compliment the table.

Redwood slab top, we haven't done any sanding to this yet.

 

We set two stumps under the table top but felt that it looked to bulky.

So we tried using one base and though it looked a lot more balanced

 

The top was warped so Tim soaked the wood in water, built a steel frame and painted it, attached the frame to the slab and it is now weighted down with fans blowing on it so that it dries flat and stays flat.... Next step.... oiling the bottom of the slab then sanding the tops and sides

The table is finished, we ended up using two burl pine stumps but scooting them closer together.