Tray Tables - Ribbon Panel Prettification

Welcome back woodworking fans, I hope your Thanksgiving celebration went well.

Today I’m going to finish out (prettify) the ribbon panels for Tina’s tray tables.

I start by trimming the panels to finished width on the table saw.  I take equal amounts off of each side so the panel stays centered.  If I’ve dome my job well then he glue joints will be nearly invisible in the completed panel, so taking the excess all off of one side would probably be OK, but I want to trim both edges to be sure they are both straight and parallel, so I might just as well keep it centered up.  Sometimes I do put a special feature as a center stripe in the panels, making a habit of trimming he edges equally eliminates the possibility I’ll forget about a special feature and cut the panel in a way that throws it off center.

Next I use the surface planer to flatten the ribbon panels.  I take very, very light cuts on the slowest feed speed to help prevent chipping out the surface of my panels.  This can be an aggravating problem if the knives are not razor sharp – and mine aren’t right now.  And can be a problem even when they are sharp because the grain direction on the ribbons will run in different directions and when cutting against the grain the knives will lift the grain and tear out chunks.  Planing with the grain prevents this.

I do the final smoothing on the wide drum sander with a fine grade of paper.  This takes FOREVER because I can take off only a few thousandths of an inch per pass, but does help to sand out and minor tear-out.  Deep tear out, if any, needs to be filled.  Fortunately that didn’t happen this time.

That’s going to do it for this time.  Hope you have a great weekend!