So I just picked up this 12"×6"×10' maple beam at an auction today and had to chop off two feet of it to fit it in my car. I'm thinking of making a couple end-grain carving boards for friends with what was cut off.
I'm tentatively thinking of just slicing it into 2" cookies and gluing them together, but I've never seen a cutting board like this that wasn't a collection of like 1" pieces glued together. Is there any reason not to use larger pieces when gluing up a cutting board? Thanks in advance
The only reason why cutting boards are often thin is cost. A thicker cutting board will be more resistant to warping. I encourage using thicker pieces.
I don't think I'm describing my question clearly. I'm imagining a 2" thick cutting board made up of 4, 6"×12" end grain slices from the beam.
Every end grain cutting board I've ever seen is comprised of many individual pieces from like .5"×.5" up to like 2"×2" at the largest.
Is checking the only risk from using very large pieces, like I want to?
Something you can do is to alternate the grain pattern to prevent cupping and bowing (like what is done with a table).
If you're looking at the cutting board from top down (and rotated 90 degrees):
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With each bracket representing the grain pattern.