Chris, a friend of mine is redoing his stairs. After installing a few Oak treads from Lowe's, he decided he didn't like them very much, especially not at that price. So he asked if I could help him fabricate some. First "external" project, whoohoo!
Jeff was going to get me some 5/4 lumber a couple of wood runs ago, but he accidentally brought 4/4. Which turned out to be a blessing in disguise! After learning I wanted to make treads, he offered up some BIG, MASSIVE Oak slabs. I had planned to just glue up boards to get the right width, but I couldn't pass this one up.
These boards were 10' long, 2' wide, with a thickness varying from 5/4 to 6/4. Big boys. Good thing Scott (NCScroller) was around with his truck. Here are a couple of pictures of the rough material:
The first thing I did was trim them down by cutting some of the sapwood and bark off the sides. Anything to get them more manageable. I also figured it would help with acclimating. Hot and dusty work!
After a few weeks of acclimating in the shop, it was time to turn lumber into stair treads. Now, my shop is pretty small. With all the stuff I have in there, handling a 4x4 sheet of plywood is a challenge, let alone 10' slabs. Even after I cut the boards to rough length using a circular saw, it was still tight.
First step was ripping the sides parallel. Cutting the bark and sapwood had left the boards extremely wavy, so jointing was not an option. I attached each board to a piece of MDF (letting the crooked edge hang over the MDF edge a bit) with some hot melt glue, and ripped one edge straight. Then popped off the board and ripped the other side. With boards this size, a helper is handy (still gotta build that outfeed table...).
(BTW, my little saw ripped through the 6/4 oak like it was hot butter! It's all about the blade...
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Since my jointer can't handle anything wider than 6", I used a planer sled. It's nothing more than a bunch of laminated sheets of MDF, and a stop. I shimmed each board with playing cards to make sure it wouldn't rock, then attached it with more hot melt glue. A few passes through the planer and one side was flat. Well, quite a few passes actually. You can only take off a VERY small amount with 12" wide boards! After that, pop off the board, and plane the other side parallel. Again, a helper is invaluable, that planer sled is HEAVY. And with an oak slab on top, it's HEAVIER.
After getting everything straight and flat, I let the boards acclimate further, and brought it down to 1" in stages. I did not want any warping at this point!
The next step was putting a bullnose on the boards. I set up my little router table, even added an auxiliary fence, but it wasn't working. The board was simply too wide for such a small table, it kept shifting. So instead I set up a jig on my workbench. The extra rail provided solid support for the router.
And yes, occasionally, I do have sawdust on the floor! Actually, this was after the first board, the place looked like a disaster area after the last one, dust EVERYWHERE. A router table would have done a better job managing the dust...yet another reason to build one. But the finished treads look great, a little sanding and they'll be ready for installation. I plan to do the final trimming on-site.
Working with slabs is not easy. You waste a lot of wood getting it flat and straight, but the result is very pretty. And you don't have to worry about matching the grain
The whole ripping and planing process took an entire afternoon. With larger equipment, it probably would have taken an hour. But, this is a hobby...no rush. The same goes for the routing, with a decent table I could have put the bullnoses on in no time. But it was cool figuring out how to build a jig for this. Certainly very satisfying, tackling large projects with small tools. I feel sorry for Travis, he'll never be able to appreciate this.
Woodworking is typically a lonely business, it was a lot of fun working on this together with my buddy Chris. Also a lot safer.
I 
Aloha.
That looks like days of work for me. 
With all of jigs and setups I think you can add millwright to your talent listing or at least Joe Scharle has competition for title of resident jigmeister .gif "Drogar Laugh(DBG)")
" I get knocked down but I get up again" - Chumbawamba 
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