DIY WOOD COUNTERTOP

[Music] rental bringing tools on today's episode if you want to learn how we made this 19 foot long counter countertop that's made of solid white oak we'll keep on watching let's get started this is our solid white coat that we'll be using for this project and if you don't know what these stand for right here let's go run through it 54 stands for five quarter this is what the thickness is wo stands for white oak sl i believe stands for just solid lumber and then four is actually the board feet and board feet is different than lineal feet because you're taking the thickness times the length times the width and times in it all together and that's what gets you your board feet so if you want to do a fun little math problem with me you take 5.5 inches time or excuse me divide by 12 then times that by 7 feet long but then you have to times that by 1.25 which gives you your board feet four four now let's get to cutting now when you're doing a lot of rip cuts i highly suggest getting a magnetic angle gauge finder because it makes it a lot easier to evaluate the fact that you have a perfectly straight blade in your table saw now all this material is s3s which means it's sanded three sides inevitably just means that you have three very straight sides however that means we have to cut the fourth side in order to have a perfectly square and even boards that we can laminate together now i'm using a diablo ripping saw blade and you actually want to look for one that's specifically designed for ripping in this application because they actually have fewer teeth yes fewer teeth it's not a finished blade because if you're trying to rip a lot of material it's very difficult on the saw blade if you have more teeth with less teeth you have a larger gap between the teeth and therefore it's able to reduce the blade from seizing up as well as you're able to get rid of all that sawdust that it's creating quicker which could potentially increase longevity of your saw blades just keep that in mind now after you have them all ripped up and accounted for i cut the ends off and i start putting them all together now the dimension of this table is going to be approximately 32 inches deep by 18 feet long now that is a long table which is why we're going to be gluing up two sections and then splicing them together in the field i mean obviously i don't have room for an 18 foot long countertop space which i'm sure most people wouldn't be able to do either however i do find it somewhat comical thinking about trying to strap an 18-foot long countertop to the top of my four-banger truck yeah anyways guess what brent got a new tool to show off and that is a biscuit jointer yes i've gotten so many comments on my dining room table as to the reason why i didn't use a biscuit joiner but inevitably i did on this project and i must say it did come in quite handy now biscuit joiner does not add any strength keyword does not add any strength to your joint however when you're trying to laminate pieces of wood together and makes it much easier to do so because you have a biscuit that you can pinpoint exactly where the boards need to line up and be placed and that way you don't have to worry about trying to even out low spots or high spots while you're gluing up all the boards and trying to clamp them down at the same time now as you can see all this thing is really a circular saw that is designed to do plunge cuts on a horizontal axis now it's beautiful in its design and its element because it's simple it's easy all i had to do is mark a line on the top of the boards on both sides so i know exactly where i can pinpoint my cut i cut on that exact center line then i go about gluing up the entire board i make sure i evenly distribute glue on the entire surface on both sides of the board in order to guarantee that i have even coverage over the entire surface now that may be a little overkill but i want to ensure that i have proper adhesion and these boards will never come apart now after i apply the glue and insert the biscuits i then proceed to pressing both boards into each other now sometimes it's very easy to fit in sometimes it needs a little bit of a love tap but you know what a love tap never hurt right now as for the glue i am using titebond three now in all honesty full disclosure i would prefer to use titebond two because it dries a little lighter than type on three but with type on three you get better bonding strength as well as more working time and with a slab this size you need all the working time you can get at least personally for me okay done with this now i've learned a couple fun things about these biscuits number one specifically of course actually cutting the hole the correct size which is always very important look at that perfect secondly is actually making sure you're not going too far up and you're leaving it down towards the bottom because inevitably as this board contracts and moves because it's wood and it's going to be moving you want to make sure that there's no indentation right here where these biscuits are going i learned that from actually john peters on his channel so if you do love woodworking check him out because he's quite entertaining and knows his stuff now let the slab dry in the clamps for approximately 24 hours then release the clamps and then start the whole process over again with the second slab now the second slab again same exact process wood ripping cutting biscuit joints gluing so forth clamping there you go so you might be asking yourself why do i need a sander like this well i bought this thing about a year ago and it has been a game changer because in this turbo mode system if the turbo mode is on it's basically just rotating in one direction it's not oscillating in multiple directions therefore you're actually removing a lot more material with this type of setup versus the normal oscillating mode where it actually is moving different directions while it's spinning the turbo mode you do have more marks you have to watch out for but you can easily get rid of them with that mode now i will leave links in the description box below on where to actually purchase the sander because it is my favorite sander and i'm not getting paid for that however with the sanding portion we're going to be going from 100 grit to 150 to 220 on this entire slab so let's get to sanding and just like any good woodworking project the sanding portion is so extremely vital to the outcome of the project because it really gives you the overall feel and depth that you want so make sure you take your time and do diligence on this entire slab however luckily for you if you're watching this we can just fast forward motion this entire thing because this took me a long time but on the bottom section if you do want to increase your productivity just a little bit i suggest taking a grinder with 60 to 100 grit sandpaper and just sanding off the bottom side smooth with your grinder because this is a lot quicker and a lot faster of a process and because you don't have to worry about the swirl marks on the bottom side of your countertop i highly suggest it just to save your time energy and mindset at this time i would highly suggest grabbing some fine sawdust and just putting that aside because we will be using that to fill some of our holes on the top surface because that is our best hole filler the wood itself plus a little glue now i intentionally made both these slabs about an inch to an inch and a half long in order to make a perfect edge when accounting for the thickness of our substrate now because this is a countertop and be placing this on top of cabinets you would normally have three quarters of an inch plywood underneath which we do in our case now because of that i am taking that material that i just cut off and i'm actually narrowing it down to three quarters by three quarters now after we have that we can then place it back onto the lip match up the grain and almost match up the grain perfectly you know it's not perfect perfect because you can still see the difference between each piece of wood but it does match very closely to what we just cut off which is a perfect lip for our countertop and as a general reminder please make sure you have plenty of clamps for this portion because you will need quite a few in order to ensure you have a superb edge all the way down i grabbed my large carpenter framing l and position it accordingly based upon the front edge then i'm able to rip a cut cleanly all the way across which i'm using as a guide for my circular saw and therefore i have a nice crisp square edge on both sides so i can then mechanically fasten both slabs together using this now don't feel bad if you don't know what this is because i just found out about it about a month ago and it's specifically called out as a tight joint fastener now it can be used in a multitude of different ways but specifically it's perfect for wood countertops because you're trying to squeeze both slabs together and it comes with a nice little template for you to drill your holes perfectly and consistently in any location you so choose now as for assembling and using the system one you want to make sure both slabs are even and consistent in positions that you want then you draw a line as to where you need the center to be placed then transfer that line to the back side fasten the template bracket on the side of the slab not the bottom the side of it then drill your large hole on the bottom of the slab take your screw out from the side drill a 7 16 inch hole on the side there now you want to also drill it deeper and past the hole itself because you want to ensure that once you have the length accounted for with your fastening system it can go past your hole and therefore get as tight as possible now i do apologize that this is a little wordy but it is a very unique fastening system that i wanted to explain thoroughly because i feel this would be a perfect application for any wood countertop project now at this point in time i don't tighten any of these bolts yet because it does take some time to tightening but i wanted to guarantee that i had proper alignment first before i found myself out in the field now at this point the slab is basically ready to be brought to the job site but i did want to fill a few holes that i had miscellaneous cracks lying around and therefore all i did was take the sawdust that i picked up earlier added a bit of tight bond two to the product and then let it dry sanded it down and it was a perfect little match now remember use titebond 2 if you have white oak or a lighter wood because it does dry lighter than titebond 3. now this project is for a bakery and coffee shop so i was required to cut a hole in the surface but of course if most people are doing this for their own kitchen i'm certainly sure you don't have to cut any large holes in your countertop but if you do want to see the process please let me know in the description box below because i am interested in seeing if you would like to see how i did that now at the end i did realize i forgot to add some end grain to the sides because they are going to be visible and therefore you need to make sure you have a proper lip i would highly suggest adding end grain to the ends because it blends in much better than if you just use your normal straight grain but that is just personal preference now we find ourself at the job site ready to install these beautiful countertops did fit perfectly in my truck because i did have them in two sections and these are the cabinets that we are going to be assembling onto them and as you can see we have three quarter inch plywood on top of the cabinets which is the proper way of supporting the tops now since we have them fully sanded ready to go i then apply some mineral spares to wipe off any of the excess dust and debris that was there then fit the first slab into position now i fit that one in first and then measured out where we needed to cut on one side i used a jigsaw with a fine-tooth bit in order to accommodate a nice clean even cut that can be done very easily in the field now that we know the slabs fit perfectly it's now time to fasten them together now because we already pre-drilled everything this assembly system is actually fairly quick and easy it's just more of a matter of tightening properly and it does take some time energy to just move that little ball around now the ball itself has three or four holes on the side which you can use a scratch off which is basically just a pointed screwdriver and jam it in there and twist upwards now every single time you twist you position the slabs closer together and therefore tightening the entire system together hopefully i'd say it took me approximately 10 minutes to tighten all three fasteners together but that's a small price to pay when you have such a beautiful small seam all the way down i apply a bit of masking tape on both sides of the seam then just mix up some wood filler with some leftover sawdust and wood glue apply it and spread it into the seam as much as possible go ahead and rip off the tape let it dry and then come back and sand that edge down so you have a perfect crisp even edge all the way across this point i take a tack cloth and just wipe down the entire surface thoroughly just to ensure that i have as much little dirt and debris that i possibly can pick up and now it is time for finish this armor seal general finish is something i've used on multiple projects and it is such a perfect product to use on this project because one again it's an oil-based so you get the beauty of an oil but you still get a urethane base which means you get the best of both worlds where it's actually the beauty of an oil with the strength of a urethane my applicator pad is a simple three inch foam brush that i apply to the sides first and then the top i evenly distribute the finish as much as possible over the entire area and i'd make sure and overlap when i'm spraying the finish on i apply three coats of finish to the countertop and ensure that i have at least two hours of drying time between the coats that way we have a nice even coverage and it's dried thoroughly however before i apply my last coat i do go over the entire surface with a buffing pad just to buff out the small tidbits and then apply my last coat of finish now that's something you don't have to do but it does smooth out that entire surface prior to applying the last coat now with this finish just remember that you do want to remove all the excess fairly quickly when i start at one end and by the time i worked my way to the very end i then immediately came back with some clean lint-free cloths and wiped down the entire surface i mean let's be real at this point the project you just want to release your inner karate kid and just do a little wax on wax off for this whole project because we are getting so close to finishing and this part is very important just because if you don't wipe off the excess the finish does get gummy and you will not have a nice crisp feel and that's the last thing that we want at this point so just ensure that you've wiped off all the excess finish every single time you apply it now as quick tip and side note especially with wood countertops you want to apply some type of silicone or caulking to that bottom edge because you don't want to grout it if you grout it most likely it's going to break because it doesn't have very much flexibility but if you use a color match caulk or silicone then it's able to move with the countertop and not crack over time just keep that in mind but guess what after we have that taken care of and fully applied we are done [Music] i love when a project truly comes together and this project by far was a lot of time and energy to actually fully assemble but it turned out better than i could have imagined between the wood grain and the finish against the beautiful white accent tile it just is a beautiful complement to a space that seems so mundane at first but look at that before and after now that is one beautiful sexy beast oh yeah [Music] whoops

Channel: BYOT

Views: 96,957

Keywords: byotools, diy, do it yourself, how to, tutorial, start to finish, byot, how to make, how to make a wood countertop, wood countertop, kitchen countertop, DIY wood countertop, DIY kitchen countertop, how to make a solid wood countertop, solid wood countertop, woodworking, woodworking projects, wood countertops, how to make a countertop, countertop, diy solid wood countertops, wooden countertops, building wooden countertops, how to build, how to build wood countertops

Id: Etb6fE5g8ok

Length: 18min 24sec (1104 seconds)

Published: Sat May 16 2020