Resawing Bookmatched Panels

I love the look of Bookmatched Panels. Here is how I make them.

First, lets talk about grain selection. There are a lot of ways to select grain. Some things I have learned
Here is a hard maple board. I have selected some grain to fill an end panel. This panel will not show predominantly in the piece but I still want it to look good. My reasoning The board is plain sawn and contains a cathedral I excluded the "Bullseye" to the right I just liked it
Here is what the board looked like after I opened it up. I blew it when I took the picture, it is upside down. I will point the cathedrals UP in when I make the panel.

Here are some other examples that I have made.
A figured Maple cathedral placed side by side in two door panels.
Two figured maple boards edge glued together to fill one door panel. I guess you could call it a bullseye but the result is very interesting. It reminds me of a winged insect or maybe a monkey face. There are some tiger stripes that I put together in the center of the panel to reflect each other.
Two figured maple boards edge glued to fill one panel door. The first picture shows the boards in a different orientation than I ended up using. That is part of the fun of this thought process. I didn't want to waste that beautiful tiger stripe on the rail side so I edge glued it together to form that wonderful striped reflection.
A white oak cathedral in a double end panel. White oak has nice cathedrals. Choose the bottom of one and point it up so it looks like it is growing out of the bottom stile. Don't choose bullseyes like the second picture.

Now that we have selected some boards, it is time to set up the saw. Unless you are a hardcore galoot with a saw pit in the back yard you are going to need a band saw. Here is how I set mine up for resawing.
I made this resaw fence from plans in FWW #159. It is fairly straight forward and works really well. It is important to note that the fence ends right after the saw blade. that gives the board somewhere to go if it needs to bow out after the saw has passed through it thus keeping the board flat against the fence.
The fence has three faces of different hights. One is bolted to the fence depending on the hight of the work you are doing. The idea is to keep the guides as close together as possible for accuracy.
Here is a picture of the back so you can see how it attaches with wing nuts.

Now that you have a fence, you need to set up the saw guides and align the blade with the fence.
Here is the top guide and blade. The blade is a 3/4" 3 tpi. The guide is the stock Jet guide. Note the fancy guide blocks. I have had very good luck using hardwood blocks. When they wear out, I just sand them flat and smooth again. When they get too short, I just throw'em away. Steps Center the blade on the wheels with the guides backed off and the tension set Move the guide back or forward so the blocks are just behind the blade gulletts Move the outside block in till it touches the blade then just a little more. This takes any bow out of the blade. Move the inside block in till it just touches the blade. Move the bearing in till it is just a hair behind the blade. Repeat these steps on the bottom guide
Here is a shot of the guide blocks. They touch the blade lightly to keep it from twisting.
Now we will align the blade and fence. It is simple; just tilt the table till the fence and blade are perfectly parallel.

Almost ready to cut wood. But we need to find the center.
The wood I buy is called 4/4 but it is always 15/16. I just mark the center with a pencil and then move the fence till the blade is on the pencil mark.
Now turn on the saw and cut a little groove in the end. Flip the board over and see if it still lines up. Make any adjustments. Don't get too anal; you are going to plane that board anyway.
Now clamp the end of the fence to the fence rail so it won't flex.

Now you are ready to cut wood! (Don't be a dunce like me. This is a dusty operation. Wear a dust mask.)
This is a 10" wide piece of hard maple. The saw has no trouble cutting through it.	Keep the work against the fence and lighten up if you hear the blade start to chatter or slow down.

Now its time to finish by jointing and planing.
If you are lucky, you will have two nice flat pieces of bookmatched wood. In the case above, the pieces cupped. Since I couldn't run cupped wood through the planer (even though I tried), I had to rip the pieces in two, joint the kerfed side, plane them and edge glue them together.
Here is the finished panel in it's frame. It has not been finished yet but you get the idea.

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