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A Three Legged Drinks Table by John Bullar. First published in Woodworking Plans & Projects Magazine
Just six components go to make this table – a disk for the top, three arcs as legs, and a tapered hexagonal pillar with a hexagonal collar to join the pillar and top together. The table it is small and light, but the solid oak construction is obviously robust. You could use other coarse-grained hardwoods with good working properties such as ash or elm so long as they were thoroughly dried.
Shaker Leg It is surprising how when you reduce a piece of furniture to its bare geometric essentials like this – a round top, hexagonal column and arcs for legs - you end up with something so much like the Shaker Style.
A common problem with old tripod tables was caused by the weight continuously straining at the joints between the legs and the pillar. These joints loosen with age and shrinkage. Old legs started to splay and this in turn allowed the top to wobble. A restorers trick is to fit a steel plate under the pillar with three arms screwed under the legs - antique tables nearly always seem to be fitted with a plate like this. However, this design, being a small lightweight table made with kiln-dried timber, aided by modern semi-flexible glue, should not experience the wobbly leg problem so long as you remember to make the joints a snug fit.
Dry Oak The oak must be dried to stability with the working environment. Kiln dried oak is ideal for use in a centrally heated home if the moisture content is around 12%, as when it left the kiln. However, timber merchants will often keep kiln dried wood in open sided sheds where the surface regains high moisture content. To be safe, keep newly purchased oak in the home environment for a few weeks after machining and before final shaping. Air dried local timber may also be suitable if you have kept it in the house for many months so the moisture content is 12% or less.
In summer, so long as timber is indoors in the workshop, the environment will be similar to a house. However, in winter the atmosphere in a centrally heated damp-proofed house is very different from most workshops. The relative humidity in the air falls right down when it is warmed indoors and this drags moisture from exposed surfaces of wood causing the outer fibres to shrink, which in turn sets up stresses in the wood, twisting or splitting it. The answer is to make sure the moisture is allowed to escape from the wood slowly and evenly indoor, exposed to air on both sides but away from any heat source before you carefully plane it flat and shape it.
Finish each component with beeswax as you make it, that way you will know you have a good surface before you assemble the table, but keep the wax off joint surfaces.
Round Top The tabletop is a made up as a 500mm diameter disk. I used two oak boards and edge jointed them to make a wide enough piece.
The disk needs to be completely flat. To guarantee it will to stay that way the oak should be ‘quarter-sawn’, in other words it is cut in line with the centre of the trunk and running at right angles to the tree’s growth rings. Even when oak is sold as ‘quarter-sawn’, the stability can vary quite a bit, particularly towards the centre of the trunk. Quarter-sawn oak has a strong ray pattern on the surface. If you cannot see it, then look carefully at the end grain to check the tree’s growth rings really are at right angles to the surface. If the rings at one edge of the board are veering off at an angle – cut this side off for another use.
After edge-jointing the tabletop, saw the disk to shape. A bandsaw, a jigsaw or an old-fashioned bow-saw would do equally well. Alternatively, you could use a router on a trammel arm, which should give a cleaner edge. True up the edge with a compass plane or spokeshave. Finish the upper and lower corners between surface and edge by shaving micro chamfers around them with a spokeshave or blockplane. This will prevent them splintering but keep them looking crisp.
Curved Legs The legs are made from quadrant shapes, wider at the top with a slight taper down to the floor to give a bit of visual lift giving them good strength and stability.
Most of the stress in the legs is in the upper section where they could easily snap across the short-grain if they were made too thin. In addition, the grain direction is very important here - look for the shortest piece of grain running (diagonally) from the inside to the outside of the upper leg. Now decide if this is going to be strong enough to carry the table plus contents. Take account of the density and quality of the wood while judging if the grain is long enough. If in doubt, make the upper part of the leg thicker still.
Shape the legs using the same techniques as you used to make the tabletop. This time you need to shave inside the curve as well as outside so if you use a spokeshave, it must have a convex sole.
Hexagon Column The hexagonal pillar of the table is quite stout at the base so that it can house three dovetail joints - large enough to guarantee their load carrying ability for many years.
The hexagonal cross-section creates flat surfaces on the three sides and the dovetail sockets are cut for the shoulders around the dovetails to sit snugly against them. There is also plenty of solid wood around each dovetail socket so it is unlikely to split. Taper the pillar slightly just to prevent it being top-heavy weight. Mark out the hexagon on both ends and down the sides. You can produce the hexagonal section simply by planing, but it will take a lot of work. Alternatively rip the triangular section waste off with a bandsaw or sawbench set to a thirty-degree angle.
You can plane the taper on each side of the hexagon in turn by running a plane in successively longer and longer cuts towards the top. With the plane set for a fine depth of cut ( around 0.5 mm), start by planing a small cut off the top end of the pillar starting about 50 mm from the top. If you make each cut 25 mm longer than the last one, then by the time the longest cut has been made, there will be a 10 mm taper on the cut.
Dovetail leg Joints The dovetails are cut first on the top of each leg. Mark the top shoulders of the legs first using a dovetail ‘square’ (not really a square at all but a fixed 1:8 angle gauge) and knife-mark the lines all around. Cut the dovetail shoulders on the legs using a dovetail saw or a fine tenon saw then use the tails as a template to mark off the sockets on the lower end of the column.
To ensure a self-tightening fit you can plane a slight taper from top to bottom on these joints after they are saw-cut. By very slight I mean about a millimetre. Do not forget to make a corresponding taper in the sockets on the column. It may sound a bother but it actually makes the job easier. You can feel when the joint starts to fit, then shave away at it with a sharp chisel, watching the tail slide further into the socket, rather than the normal – one minute it is too tight to fit - the next it is slack!
Mark out the sides of the sockets on the side and end of the hexagon with a knife. Clamping the column at an angle so you can keep an eye on both guide lines at once, finely saw a diagonal cut down each side of the socket on the inside of the line.
Next, with the column clamped flat on the bench with a stop behind the far end, pare out the base of the socket. Use a bevel edged chisel to remove shavings millimetre by millimetre. Alternate between paring the socket base and chopping out the socket end, as you chisel your way down between knife lines at the side. After a trial fit glue the three legs onto the column base.
Collar The top of the column is fitted into a hexagonal collar, glued to the underside of the tabletop. I used the same thickness of wood for the collar as I had for the legs. The central hole or mortise has to be a hexagon that exactly matches the top of the column.
Mark the socket with a knife-line using the up-turned column as a template. Drill out the centre then make the socket into a hexagon with a chisel. Alternatively, you might use the traditional cabinetmaker’s technique of chopping a series of chips along the grain. Clear these out with the chisel, then chop out another layer and so on until you reach the required depth. This method is not quick, but neither is it difficult with a sharp chisel and it gives. Gluing the column into the collar socket should not need clamps if is a snug fit, but you will need to check it carefully with a square. Finally glue the collar assembly onto the tabletop and clamp in place until it is set.
Finishing Touch People will feel the surface and the edge of a finished tabletop with their fingertips, and the underside as well, so it is important that all these surfaces are smooth to the touch. Mostly this is down to preparation. Surfaces should be shaped as far as possible with sharp-bladed cutting tools then a light sanding with fine paper will then give a silky touch. If you find yourself needing to use a more aggressive sanding technique, then make sure the machine or hand-held block behind the paper is completely flat and level. A lot of potentially good furniture is spoiled by sanding hollow surfaces and soggy edges. If you wax the components while you are making them, before assembly this will help you to check the surface quality.
The simple geometric design of this table is timeless and will match a contemporary or traditional interior. It will last for generations and always be popular, so carve your initials on the underside as a maker’s privilege. Take your time and enjoy making it.
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Tabletop 500 mm dia (19 “) 25 mm thick ( 1“)
Growth rings pass through the board at right angles
Collar 150 mm across ( 6“) 30 mm thick ( 1 ¼ “)
Legs 250 mm radius (9 ½ “)
Column 500mm long (19 “) 50 mm across at the base (2 “) 30 mm across at the top (1 ¼ “)
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