Depending on the makeup of your house, this may or may not fit in with the
decor...but here's what I did in a similar situation. I got some old
weathered barnwood siding and used that, mitered. It was very grey, and I'm
not sure what kind of wood it was. Cedar or some kind of fir, I think, and
about 11" wide. I couldn't get the lengths as long as I needed either, so I
had a blacksmithing friend make some straps that look like the ones here to
cover the seams. He basicall cut them out of some sheet steel, hammered on
them a bit, blackened them with some oxide process he uses, and I bolted
them on.

http://www.hennisenterprises.com/beams.htm



"BKeane71" wrote in message
...
Hello, everyone.

We've been doing some construction on our house, and I have a question for
you.
We've knocked down a bearing wall, placed a really thick beam, and now I'm
trying to dress up the beam so SWMBO doesn't mind looking at it. The
surrounding trim is just stained pine, but I was hoping to go a different
route
with this. I was hoping to laminate some sort of wood onto it, but wasn't
sure
what would look best.

The beam's dimensions are 12ft 4in long, 5 1/2 in deep, and hangs 8 1/4 in
from
the ceiling, which is textured plaster.

Keep in mind I don't have a bandsaw, so I won't be able to resaw. I was
thinking of using 3/4 inch material cut to size. Also, I know that I'll
need
some pretty big pieces as I want the laminated beam to look like a single
piece, rather than like a beam with a bunch of different pieces of wood
glued
to it.

So, anybody have some good species of wood in mind??

Thanks a bunch.

-Barry