Wood Planning

Wood Moves

...an Update

Two years ago I built a trestle table for our home and I incorporated bread board ends into the design. When building with bread board ends its vital for the main cross grain surface to be able to expand and contract, moving freely within the bread boards. Last February I posted a blog showing how the main surface had shrank in its width by 1/4"! (you can see that original post here:
http://blogspot.com/2009/02/wood-movesget-over-it.html
At that time I mentioned that my hopes were the table would expand back to its normal size and the bread boards would keep everything nice and true.
Well Im happy to report that the surface has indeed swelled back to its original width ( God knows it should with all of the humidity here in Southern Ontario) and all is right in the world of wood movement.



















The table was built in the summer so when I originally posted the picture in February it had really shrank back. Heres a another great example of wood movement from one of the pieces I built this past winter for my book, Made by Hand.
Its some Cherry wood and the same bread board procedure was used. Its interesting to see the opposite happening from a piece built in the summer to a piece built in the winter. The top of this piece has also swelled but because I made it in the winter, its now substantially wider than the ends.






















So my point to all of this?
Wood moves...get over it!