Help !! Repair for teak dining table??

shirleysfw99 · Post by **shirleysfw99** » Tue, 10 Feb 2009 5:18 pm

Anyone knows where to find repairer for Teak Wood furniture ??

I bought my round teak dining table from Home Merchant barely 2 years ago. 2 wks ago I noticed cracks in two of the legs and it was literally about to collapse !! The table is now essentially sitting on newspaper and I am very desperately looking for teak wood carpenter / repairer.

Home Merchant seems to have closed down (tel no. / email are all uncontactable) and I also checked a no. other furniture shops at Furniture Mall but none do repairs for furniture not sold by them !!

The table is still very new and too expensive to be written off at the age of 2 !!

Any advice will be very very much appreciated !!

sierra2469alpha · Post by **sierra2469alpha** » Tue, 10 Feb 2009 5:22 pm

Heya,

When you say it's split - is it structurally damamged - i.e. do you think it needs new legs?

How is the rest of the piece? Any other splits? Has it been exposed to rain then sun?

If you're not sure, can you put a couple of pictures up - some of the minor "injuries" to wood can be done with the judicious use of fillers and sealants and a good dose of sandpaper followed by some proper wood sealant.

P

ksl · Post by **ksl** » Tue, 10 Feb 2009 9:05 pm

Ask one of the well known antique shops to give you an estimate for repair, I do know the bigger one on Paya lebar road, does many repairs, it's normal for teak to crack if it isn't looked after correctly.

You need to keep it well oiled, it's quite easy to repair, with a couple of clamps and some wood glue, but keep it all well oiled, it cracks because it is dried out not a big job for the handy man!

Post by **sundaymorningstaple** » Tue, 10 Feb 2009 9:22 pm

First question would be, where did the piece originate from? Is it Javanese Teak? Was it imported from Indonesia or for that matter Burma or Thailand?

Second question. Is you home airconditioned all the time?

If your piece of furniture came from one of the above location, the teak used was probably green (e.g., uncured / not kiln dried) and as a result of setting in a Airconditioned home, the moisture would have been sucked out of the wood thereby causing cracks due to the stresses of the construction. There's not too much can be done for it short of filling it with filler/construction wood glue and banding/clamping it and possibly embedding some screws to pull it together. Many an expat has bought furniture made regionally out of hardwood like teak and shipped it home only to find it starting to crack once it been left in airconditioning any length of time.

Always find out if the wood was kiln dried 'before' the lumber was used to construct anything. Afterwards, when it starts to dry it cracks and warps as you are apparently finding out.

shirleysfw99 · Post by **shirleysfw99** » Wed, 11 Feb 2009 11:17 am

Thank you very much for the advices. To be very precise each of the legs (curved shaped) are made of 2 identical pcs of curved wood joined together, all four legs are connected / reinforced by a cylindrical shaped wood in the middle of the table - (it's like putting 4 "c"s back to back with the cylindrical wood in middle, each "c" is made of 2 pcs of wood)

It is the 2 pcs of curved wood which now become disjoint. So i guess it's a workmanship problem more than temperature issue... It should be Indo teak (it's 5 ft round table and costs about S$ 1800 2 yrs ago).

Is DIY advisable for this case ?? My only worry is if it's not well done it'll collapse before I notice any signs next time, and my kids (3 and 5) like to play under the table (despite repeated warnings)...

I'm willing to pay a reasonable price (hopefully not too expensive) to get a reliable repair fast, as I do like the table (me and husband spent over a year in looking for a suitable dining table!!)...

Thank you again for all recommendations...[/img]

shirleysfw99 · Post by **shirleysfw99** » Wed, 11 Feb 2009 11:37 am

KSL,

could you give me the name of the antique shop in Paya lebar ?? I did do a search in Internet yesterday on teak furniture suppliers and all of them refused to repair furniture not sold by them.

btw our house seldom use aircon as my kids have slight asthma..

thanks in advance for your help.

Post by **sundaymorningstaple** » Wed, 11 Feb 2009 12:39 pm

ksl may be referring to "Just Anthony" who is on Paya Lebar Rd. but I'm sure he'll let you know when he sees this thread again.

ScottyDayne · Post by **ScottyDayne** » Wed, 11 Feb 2009 10:04 pm

Hi there,

u might wann to check out www.rcwwfurniture.com

I've seen the restore and repair work they've done. Pretty impressive.

Cheers!
Scott

p.s: sorry mod if website link is not allowed. I wanted to just pm her, but i just register so I can't.

thanks for ur kind understanding mod.

ksl · Post by **ksl** » Thu, 12 Feb 2009 10:47 am

sundaymorningstaple wrote:ksl may be referring to "Just Anthony" who is on Paya Lebar Rd. but I'm sure he'll let you know when he sees this thread again.

That's the one "Just Anthony" he has several repair men working in the yard, it's quite a big place and i'm sure they can correct the fault. Problem with DIY is having the correct tools to do a good job.

It sounds fairly straight forward, the difference in humity and temp, may have cause some movement, to make it unstable, all the weight being on top, balance is easy displaced on the legs of that shape. Don't have the telephone number, but i may pop by their today.

shirleysfw99 · Post by **shirleysfw99** » Thu, 12 Feb 2009 11:13 am

I managed to call up "Just Anthony" this morning, they don't do repair themselves but they referred me to someone who repairs antique furniture. I'll be getting a quote fr them...

Checking out repair costs from RC Wood too....

Thank you guys ! Hope I can get rid of that stack of newspaper supporting my table soon !!

sierra2469alpha · Post by **sierra2469alpha** » Thu, 12 Feb 2009 11:23 am

Good luck with it...glad that it appears you can egt it sorted out...Mr.P

ksl · Post by **ksl** » Fri, 13 Feb 2009 12:05 am

shirleysfw99 wrote:I managed to call up "Just Anthony" this morning, they don't do repair themselves but they referred me to someone who repairs antique furniture. I'll be getting a quote fr them...

Checking out repair costs from RC Wood too....

Thank you guys ! Hope I can get rid of that stack of newspaper supporting my table soon !!

For anyone else that may need the number it's 9692 6348 Willam Goh.

He does all kinds of repairs & restoration of antique and modern furniture. I called in to "Just Anthony" today because i needed some doing too.

Crikey the prices are out of this world compared to UK antiques, although while i was in Taiwan I picked up a nice piece, talking him down 80%. In these economic times i expect they will be glad of the cash!

So the consumer has bargaining power these days.

Just got to be a little up front some times

shirleysfw99 · Post by **shirleysfw99** » Mon, 16 Feb 2009 11:51 pm

It's done !! S$150 for fixing up 3 legs (by William Goh's brother). Think it's very reasonable price given that he (& his wife) actually spent 4 hrs on the repair (incl 1 hr waiting for glue to dry)....sounds a little excessive (as the job seems quite straightfwd to layman like me) but they did it with great care I can see...

So glad to have my table back to shape again !!

ksl · Post by **ksl** » Tue, 17 Feb 2009 12:03 am

shirleysfw99 wrote:It's done !! S$150 for fixing up 3 legs (by William Goh's brother). Think it's very reasonable price given that he (& his wife) actually spent 4 hrs on the repair (incl 1 hr waiting for glue to dry)....sounds a little excessive (as the job seems quite straightfwd to layman like me) but they did it with great care I can see...

So glad to have my table back to shape again !!

Thanks for reminding me to buy my own tools

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Help !! Repair for teak dining table??

Help !! Repair for teak dining table??

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