GE Silicone II - the sealant for indoor/outdoor use. I've used it to adhere glass to plastic, rocks to wood and plastic and glass, glass to glass, ceramic and porcelain to wood and plastic and metal, etc. You name it, I've used it! I used it on a piece which I mosaiced and placed outside and forgot to bring in for the winter. The porcelain pieces are still stuck to the wood, but the wood warped and the grout has broken in some places. Tried to pry some of the pieces off yesterday, but they are on there for good!

Would you put one piece bark side up, the next bark side down? Depends on how the table top is mounted to the supporting frame. A large flat piece glued up with no re inforcement to prevent warpage would be growth ring up/growth ring down/up/down/etc. If the table top will be attached to an apron then it really doesn't matter so much. I would orient the material to get the best surface pattern for the table top. If in doubt it mite be better to just use the up/down/up/down method. Ideally, you could use rift sawn lumber and not have to worry about warpage in the stock. Rift sawn lumber is a lot more expensive than flat sawn. I have never seen rift sawn stock commercially available. Only way I know how to get it is to make it yourself. I bought my jointer 20 years ago from Big Lots. Same jointer you now get from Harbor Freight. All I had to do was put the stand together and square the fence. I haven't had to sharpen the blades yet, so I don't know how hard it will be to reset them. I do have a magna-set tool. For narrow lumber I run it thru the planer on edge to joint it. I don't recommend doing this to stock wider than 2 inches. I can glue up 12 inch wide pieces then plane them to thickness. Then glue the 12 inch wide pieces together to get wide boards. but have a planer blade for the table saw that I was planning to prepare glue surfaces with. You can set up a router table to use as a jointer. I have cut glue joints with a planer blade in a table saw but blade flexing can be a problem on the lower end saws. Larger diameter blades flex more than the smaller ones. And it can be hard to find small diameter planer blades. The shop I used to work in had to have them specially made. We ran 6.75inch blades in a 10inch PowerMatic table saw cutting 15/16 hard maple 8 hours per day using a power feeder. Had to have the blades specially made to get that size. But the smaller size cut better and the saw didn't have to work as hard. Pooh Bear

No. Making a tabletop out of several pieces of wood fastened together requires clamps and cauls---clamps to get the boards together tightly and cauls to make sure those boards are all even and flat. It also requires a bit of knowlege and skill in positioning the boards----alternating grain direction for pattern and strength. The table top has to be fastened to the skirt to allow for movement also. Breadboard ends are more than decorative, they help prevent splitting of the ends of the boards. You could glue and screw boards together and make a table like you proposed, but it will not stay together and will split in a lot of places, leaving you with a very expensive pile of splitting lumber shaped like a table. There is a way of making a simple rustic table that would be right at home in a one room log cabin setting. Ash is a moderatly dense wood that is fairly inexpensive. It is an open grained wood---often substituted for more expensive oak---however. It stains much more easily and more evenly than soft maple, which is the other wood close in price. Using 1/2" thick stock, layout the boards for pattern and size---then turn all the boards upside down, keeping the layout as done. Cut---(have the lumberyard cut) a piece of 3/4" BC plywood about 2"-4" more narrow and shorter than the layout dimensions. Center that plywood over the boards and screw through the plywood into the boards. You will need to figure out a way to clamp the boards as tightly as possible as you screw them to the plywood. Do not glue the boards together as that will allow them to move without splitting. Install the apron by screwing to the plywood---those can be glued. You can then install the 4"x4" legs---which can be made by gluing pieces of the wood used for the top together---as long as those pieces are clampoed for 24 hours---if the clamps are not used, the glue will not hold. Taping with duct tape is NOT a clamping alternative. C clamps, pipe clamps, or bar clamps can be used. Screw through the apron to fasten the legs and also make an angled support piece that in screwed to the side and end aprons and touches the leg on the inside. Screw that support piece to each apron piece and the leg. You may have to fill gaps in the table top---wood filler will work but there will be cracking eventually. There is a product called Stain Putty---I get it at HD and Ace Hardware stores. It is a powder and is made into a paste by adding the stain used on the project---so the color match is very close.

They will say that it is a site related issue - that is what they are saying - "CLIMATE" - which they may claim they have no control over, only the homeowner is responsible for that. Wood has predictable behavior. They should, since they are professional installers, have all of the documentation regarding the ambient air conditions before and during installation as well as the rh/calcium chloride test results (whichever one they performed and you paid for - hopefully) and ph of the concrete - most professionals include that documentation or report with the final invoice to the end user and kept as long as the floor is under the manufacturer's warranty. Technically, if you wrote 2 checks, it is your responsibility to make sure that was done.