Project: "Making a Harvest Table"

	Beth starts this week by unclamping the table top.
She checks to see that both hinged drop down leaves still work well.
	It is time to trim the ends so that they will be straight. She has placed a Festool guide rail in place and is double checking to see that it is square.
The table top is way too big to get to the table saw, so Beth uses the Festool plunge saw to make the end cut — it couldn't get any easier or more accurate than this.
	She double checks to see that the end cut is, in fact, square. It is.
She makes a square cut-off at the other end, as well.
	Beth is clamping a radius corner jig using the largest radius for shaping the table top's corners. She clamps the jig so that the sides are flush with the table corner sides.
Beth installs a 1/2" x 1 1/2" straight bit with a pattern bearing at the top.
	She plunges until the bearing is on the jig's white edge.
Beth carefully makes the cut. She finds that the oak wants to split off so she makes a number of climb cuts and takes the corner down very slowly.    In subsequent corners, she got the saber saw out and made the first cut with that. She left about 1/8" to get with the router. This worked much better.
	Even with taking it real slow, the corner was cut in less than a minute. It will require only a little sanding to make it perfect.
When we used the Dowelmax to make the dowel holes, we carefully aligned it with the tops of each board. With the table top done, the top is very smooth, but there are a few places where the different board thicknesses show up on the bottom side. Beth uses the Festool planer to "knock down" the high spots. Just as if she were using a hand smoothing plane, she moves across the boards working from the low to the high. This plane has such fine adjustment, that she can literally take off a small shaving at a time. And yes, she is very carefully staying away from that steel hinge.
	The belt sander with 80 grit no-load paper removes any planer marks and finishes the leveling out.
She will follow the belt sander with the Festool Rotex150 sander working from 80 grit all the way to 220 grit prior to finishing.    While the top is done and looking good, in fact, I have about 3 hours more of sanding before we can even think about starting the finishing.    I do not have a finishing room, and I don't want to tie up a portion of the shop. After the sanding is all done, we will carry the top to a screened porch which can be the "finishing room" for a week or so.    Beth and I have started the making of the table base and will show our progress next week.