I am heading down to the shop this morning to start gluing the boards together.... It will be red oak for a couple reasons, availability and cost. I think I can find enough scraps to glue that are decent so there will be no cost except my labor, and most of you know what that is worth these days. I am going to go with a larger diameter... someone mentioned 7/8 to 1 and 1/4.... the fact is, most of the wood is 3/4 inches and I want the top half grain to go one direction and the lower half to go to a perpendicular direction for strength... that means 1 and 1/2 inches, but I will send the wood through a time saver several times which will take this down a bit, before cutting it with the band saw etc. I will ask a pro about the rounded edges on the spokes as yes, this wheel does have a curled edge with a bolt hole in it, and I would like to recess these a bit for strength too in the four areas where the wood attaches to the metal spokes... Time will tell... I may also use marine varnish to finish it, for durability... but again, will go with what the pro recommends.... thanks for your help... will try to take some pictures (I document most everything digitally these days as there is hardly any cost involved...)
