Bench #2: Started

The top of the bench is made from reclaimed maple church bench seats built in 1937, that was acquired a few years ago. What was interesting was that seats had been positioned in the round, each of them had a inside and outside radius that would have to be cut off so I had straight edges to work with. Each section was 15” wide x 1-1/16” thick and about 8 feet long. I wasn’t sure what the finish was on them and I didn’t want to damage my planner blades, so I ended up sanding down to the staining. That was when I realized that they were glued up from separate parts and not full width. They were random widths and I thought about just using the widest ones and cutting the tongue and groove joints off but it would of created a lot of scrap so I decided to live with the joints to get the best yield.

After re-sawing and planning they finished out at 1” thick by 5-1/4” wide. What amazed me was that in one piece I counted over 70 growth rings in the 1-1/16” thickness. My guess was that the tree it was milled from had to be at least 3 feet in diameter and at least over three hundred years old ( will try to get that verified). I was just blown away when I saw that. Needless to say it kinda looks like a bowling alley.