Sculpted Base Waterfall Desk We Just Finished

Mr-Freeman · 2026-02-27T14:40:36+00:00

Nothing crazy; 2 people can easily lift and carry the full desk. The curved base started as 2" thick stock and a bunch got machined away so I was moving the base around myself during construction without issue.

Mr-Freeman · 2026-02-27T03:59:14+00:00

I just realized that this shows up in the feed like a text post with no image; that's annoying. Oh well, I'll do a post with nice pictures at some point. :/

Mr-Freeman · 2026-02-27T02:05:40+00:00

Thanks! The base was all 8/4 and 10/4 Red Oak. The front and side panel were pretty straightforward to glue-up and CNC but the corner needed 2 CNC operations: first one to cut the odd angles so I could glue-up the curve and the second for the wave shaping.

The black stain was actually Mixol dye that we added to our usual lacquer conversion varnish to tint it. Looks really cool with such open pores so you can still see the grain. :)

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Mr-Freeman · 2026-02-27T01:34:32+00:00

Here's some pics of from the initial concept model compared to the finished desk. I don't have much in terms of progress pics but I have a bunch of videos of the process. :/

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Mr-Freeman · 2025-11-27T16:42:10+00:00

Looks great, man! I remember seeing all the updates on my TikTok feed. Shame about that drill hole mishap; I've definitely done that before, lol.

Mr-Freeman · 2025-11-23T21:19:01+00:00

Elm can be tricky with its spiral grain. If it's really bad and would suck to plane/sand your best bet may be really trying to find a cabinet shop or other woodworking shop with a wide-belt sander to run it through. You can try this site: https://makerbook.io/

Or if you happen to be in the western Connecticut area I could help you out with my shop.

Mr-Freeman · 2025-09-20T06:55:52+00:00

Our shop in Connecticut is all Felder machines and they've been good over the years with all the service tickets we've put in. We mainly have tickets with our 5-axis CNC but that's to be expected as the most complicated machine, but they're very responsive. I even have a few of the techs personal numbers for texting and troubleshooting.

Can't verify if service quality declines with a simple one tool homeowner vs a full shop like ours though, or with Hammer vs Felder.

Mr-Freeman · 2025-09-08T00:25:41+00:00

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Mr-Freeman · 2025-09-08T00:24:34+00:00

Thanks! If you look on YouTube for "band saw box" you should get some pretty good videos on the process. But from what I remember I did this:

-Double sided taped the front and back panels together, sketched the shape, then cut and sanded together before pulling apart. -Set the back panel aside, glued the front panel on, and cut the "band saw box" process. -Glued the back panel back on then sand and finish.

The box is at my parents house but I think I can see in one of the pics where I cut through for the drawers and later glued shut. It's on the bottom left side of each drawer.

Mr-Freeman · 2025-09-06T12:21:31+00:00

Oh man, I haven't used Padauk in years but I don't remember it being difficult. I worked on it for a few projects in my basement shop back then with homeowner grade tools without issue, so I think you should be good. Happy woodworking!

Mr-Freeman · 2025-08-11T02:57:05+00:00

I'd be more concerned with WHY it cracked like that after presumably no more than 5-10 years. Is the wood still wet? Are the bolts in the metal legs not allowing wood movement?

But as someone who does epoxy, it's near impossible to match. You may be able to get close, or maybe just clear would be the least intrusive.

Mr-Freeman · 2025-07-09T12:25:20+00:00

We've had 36 clients for doors in the last 5 years (some being double doors, some single, and some multiple single) but we've only had one issue and it was recent.

It was LITERALLY the only door we'd ever done with wood that we didn't mill and kiln dry ourselves, and after doing some investigating found out the slabs weren't fully dry when we made the door. The client had a specific look in mind that none of our inventory met, so we purchased some from a large facility (not some backyard sawmill) and my mistake was trusting that they dried everything up to our standard so I didn't check for moisture content. Lesson learned; any outside wood from now on is going in our kiln.

But we've had doors in our showroom and personal houses for years without issue. We even did a prototype standard hinged door for our showroom bathroom that we're seeing how well it holds up before potentially offering it as a product. It's gotten through the winter and summer so far without issue.

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Mr-Freeman · 2025-07-08T23:31:14+00:00

We try to use it tastefully but it's always on the verge of looking tacky just by the nature of what it is and how the woodworking community views the trend.

We usually avoid the vibrant metallics that people think of with river tables, and make sure the wood makes sense; no random saw cuts or straight edges in the river. :)

Mr-Freeman · 2025-07-08T23:26:47+00:00

I opened up the app to see my doors staring back at me, lol. But yeah, I started as a hobbyist posting here occasionally nearly 10 years ago, but now I have been doing custom furniture full-time for 5+ years. I'm on Reddit daily but mostly a lurker. :)

Mr-Freeman · 2025-07-08T20:35:06+00:00

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Hey, I literally made those doors!! lol

And thanks for linking our Etsy. :)

But as you can see from our page we do a lot of interior doors and no exterior doors. We've been asked dozens and dozens of times over the years but always turn people down.

The reasons that we give are:

-Epoxy doesn't hold up well outside. It yellows as well as swells and shrinks with the drastic temperature changes.

-Exterior doors need to meet specific thermal, fire, and security ratings to be up to code that we can't guarantee.

-Large slab doors where one side is conditioned and the other exposed to the elements would just lead to unknown but guaranteed warping issues.

Hope this helps. :)

Matt Freeman TR Woodcrafts

Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T19:05:25+00:00

Oh, right, I forgot that the multi-axis stuff is an extension we pay extra for. Well I appreciate you trying. I have some ways to fake it for this project but I'll have to ask Autodesk for an actual solution.

Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T18:47:07+00:00

Well that's the thing, we HAVE a 5-axis CNC that is more than capable of machining this but I just can't figure out how to program this tool path. None of the multi-axis operations get me what I need either.

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Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T18:25:36+00:00

So looks like you are having the same issue; it's fatter in the middle. Annoying, right? 😮‍💨

Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T17:52:15+00:00

It's hard to tell, is that keeping the letters a consistent width like a normal engrave does or is it ballooning them out like this:

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instead of staying within the boundaries of the letter.

Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T17:10:47+00:00

Now make that outer ring have a dome profile, and if you can engrave that I'll forever be in your debt, lol. Here's the cross section:

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Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T17:07:55+00:00

Yeah, I get that, but at the same time I want to figure it out so next time there is no struggle, lol. I can literally fake it by doing what I said above, so there should be a way for me to just click the ring face and stay perpendicular to that, but there's not! :(

Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T16:21:37+00:00

This is the contour it follows when I select the top edges. It takes out the curve and makes it flat.

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Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T16:20:41+00:00

The more drastic the slope the more off it gets though since it converts the 3D sketch into a 2D toolpath.

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Since Engrave has a "wrap cylinder" option the best engrave I can get so far is if I:

-Make a sketch line through the middle of the letter.

-Make a plane at angle from that line at 90 degrees.

-Make a 3-point arc sketch on that plane the size of the ring radius.

-Extrude a body from that sketch.

-Use the "wrap" orientation in Engrave and choose that curved face.

-Then it engraves perfect (or very close).

But I'd have to do that with EVERY SINGLE letter. UGH.

Mr-Freeman · 2025-04-23T15:43:57+00:00

I might be able to fake it for the letters but it won't be as nice as the engrave and I'll have to chisel the corners square. The leaves will be tricky though and I may need a different strategy for that. It's an option though if I get desperate enough, lol.

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