Underside Flat

It took nearly 8 hours and about 2 dozen passes with a 2 inch surfacing CNC router bit but finally, this large live edge walnut slab has a flat underside. Sitting at about 8 ft in length and 47 inches at its widest end, it's been an interesting challenge, when it was first dropped off I noticed a twist in the upper corner where the tree split into two, the branch off was like a whale fin out of water waving at you, I believe it was a nearly 2 inch rise compared to the rest of the slab.

So what do you do? You set heavy blocks on the raised area and wait for mother nature to do it's thing. Nearly 3 weeks later, sure enough, the branch off had settled back down close enough with the rest of the slab to start flattening.

And after hour hours and approximately 1” of removal we have a flat underside. Did I mention there was about 3 large black lawncare trash bags stuffed full of walnut shavings!

We've nicknamed the project, “The Beast”, and today we begin flattening the topside where when it's finished it'll sit at a height of around 1-3/4” inches in total thickness. It'll recieve and sanding of upwards to 220 after it's nice and flat and once the live edges are clean led we'll take it indoors for the final finishing touches.

Ash bowties will be added to the splits and then flat black epoxy to fill the rest of the split voids. Ash is a white, bright looking wood for those of you who don't know, and against the walnut and the black epoxy, I believe it'll be a game changer.

We're looking forward to the outcome of this project, and our awesome clients who brought this piece in have no idea just how awesome this desktop will become, they'll be a perfect match for each other awesomeness 😉

Leave us a comment with your opinions, we will post an update early next week once we have the bowties in place.

Enjoy the weekend everyone!