Bought this black walnut cookie off of Facebook marketplace for a good price. The only catch is it is warped, cracked, cupped, and twisted. It's about 4 in thick and that's plenty of material to make a coffee table, but I need some advice and guidance on making a router planing jig please.
A hand plane removes the same thickness of wood wherever you run it, so getting something flat (that isn't already flat) is a challenge.
A router sled/jig (not sure exactly what to call it, I'm not an expert either) acts as a flat reference.
I'm no expert, but I've seen better people than me getting boards to nearly flat with only a hand plane.
They're usually the "back to pre-power-tools woodworking" types.
It could work, but there are still a few considerations. First, even a fairly conservative setting on the router sled will remove material more quickly than all but the most aggressively tuned Jack planes. Second, while there’s no way to make this quick and easy, using a hand plane takes time, muscle, and skill that we don’t all have. Finally, a cookie is going to be 100% end grain, which is particularly hard on hand tools and more likely to tear out.
I've used a hand plane to flatten out a cutting board as a complete amateur. It works surprisingly well but something larger like a tabletop would take a long time
Yeah, I think the biggest thing is that a cutting board will already be "kind of" flat when you start, where this giant cookie looks like it will need a good 1/8" or even 3/16" removed everywhere to level it out if you want to clear most of those grooves and checks. Best solution is probably a router sled followed by a hand plane.