On 3/30/2010 8:47 PM, Upscale wrote:

I'm fully familiar with gluing up planks for width such as table tops,
but I was wondering about gluing up planks for thickness. I'm sure
they still exist, but it's been a long time since I've seen hardwood
planks 1-1/2" thickness for sale.

Considering the cost of thicker hardwood, I'm wondering about gluing
up 3/4" planks to increase thickness. Have you any experience with
that? If so, how invisible do the edge glue lines turn out?

I know I can add a layer or more of plywood and use some veneer edging
to give the same appearance, but I'm considering something that's all
hardwood.

I've done that quite a bit on table legs, and also on chair rails, where
it's often hard to get the thickness required to cut a suitable arc
without compromising the integrity of the wood due to grain direction.
I've yet to have a problem.

I've also "laminated" the sides of casework with two thicknesses of wood
with what I think is success, but it may take another 100 years to prove
that.

About the only caveat I would recomment is to consider trying to match
the "cut" of the wood ... i.e, flat, rift, quarter, etc.

Mind you, this is my experience and I like to experiment, but in that
experience, as long as you stay "long grain to long grain", with roughly
the same dimensional instability characteristic of your stock, you
should be fine.

This should keep you in the ballpark on the latter:

http://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/documnts/fp...tr113/ch12.pdf

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Last update: 10/22/08
KarlC@ (the obvious)