<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML><HEAD> <META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <META content="MSHTML 6.00.2900.2995" name=GENERATOR> <STYLE></STYLE> </HEAD> <BODY bgColor=#ffffff> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I think it is well accepted that a grain-end butt joint is likely the weakest way to join two pieces of wood. I have a project in my shop that required 8-foot long boards of an exotic wood. The longest I could </FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2>find anywhere were 4 feet long. So I bought two 4-foot-long boards. Epoxy man used epoxy magic to make the two 4-footers into an 8-foot long board. I simply end-butt jointed two boards together to make the longer board via the two-step West System bonding method. Picture of the end-butt joints below:</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><IMG alt="" hspace=0 src="cid:005001c70c28$505cc270$0201a8c0@DESKTOP" align=baseline border=0></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Now I haven't tried to use it as a base-ball bat or jump on it, but the joint seems to easily support the weight of the entire 8-foot length of the board (in the photo below the board on left is clamped way down at the far end only). </FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><IMG alt="" hspace=0 src="cid:005101c70c28$505cc270$0201a8c0@DESKTOP" align=baseline border=0></FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>This wood is very dense, and I can pick it up at one end and wiggle it around pretty good without joint failure. In this particular case, the joint is more for simply alignment purposes than anything else, so I don't require a high-strength joint. But this seems to be quite strong.</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Epoxy is amazing stuff!</DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV></FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2>Terry Farrell<BR>Farrell Piano</FONT></DIV></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><A href="http://www.farrellpiano.com">www.farrellpiano.com</A><BR><A href="mailto:terry@farrellpiano.com">terry@farrellpiano.com</A></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>