Project   —  "Solid Mahogany Vanity Top"

   Can you believe that I actually started on this project way back in March (yes, 2006)? It is a solid top to a bathroom that my wife and I transformed at that time.
   My helper is brand new to the shop. She is Marieanne and very Scottish. She has such a wonderful brogue that I can't understand half of what she says, but it is fun trying.

   She is holding the template I had made way back in March. The white paper cutout is the pattern which came with the basin.  I  just want to refresh my memory and double check to see that it will work.

   Now comes the fun part — maximizing the grain pattern of pieces of mahogany that  have been earmarked for this project.

   The boards are clean but you can see that they will need some jointing before she can even think about gluing them up.

   Readers here know that I prefer to do edge jointing at the router table even though I have a very good  long bed jointer.
   She inserts the two black bars in the special grooves of the outfeed fence. With these in place, she can do edge jointing here at the router table.
  

   Marieanne uses a straight edge to align the outfeed fence with the pattern bearing of the straight bit.

   She shows the rough edge of the board. For the upper edge, she will run the board with the face side (chalk mark) up. For the lower edge, she will run the board turned over. This way, if the fence or bit is at all other than at 90o to the table, the "error" will cancel each other out.

   She uses her left hand to keep pressure on the board on the outfeed side. Her right hand is used to propel the board through the cutter. The amount removed at each pass is about 1/32". She will make multiple passes. She will know when the board is jointed when she makes a pass and it removes something the enture length. The cutting sound will tell her this the best.

   I am not sure how good my "macro-photography" is but this little curve is where the straight bit just cut. The edge on the left is the outfeed side and on the right, the infeed. With this CMT fence, the spacer bars could also be installed in another set of grooves and this minute amount would be greater. I prefer removing this tiny bit, particularly when it is edge jointing for glue ups.

   This is where it counts. These boards touch all the way along the joint with no clamping pressure required. If it is not perfect, Marieanne can simply walk back to the router table and take another pass or two.

   Surprise, surprise — the back side of my line gauge has metric. This board measures 21mm. Marieanne has laid a Domino tenon that is 8mm X 40mm.

   Marieanne uses a center finder to mark the center of the board. In truth, we can skip this step, but this gadget never gets used, and I was feeling sorry for it.

   It works and now I will return it to the pegboard where it will just cause visitors to ask "What's
this?"

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