Today I knocked out the other required ostrich tail and routed the corresponding groove in the skirt. At this point it was time to try a dry-fit to see if the "floating tongue" idea would work. Here's a picture that may give you a better idea of what's going on here:
I actually routed the skirt groove maybe 1/32th of an inch lower than the benchtop groove. This will leave the skirt a tiny bit higher which I will later plane flush. I did this because there are always going to be little variations in alignment and it will be easier to trim the skirt down than to bring the whole benchtop down.
I'm pleased to say that it appears that the floating tongue concept does work pretty well; the skirt did force the benchtop to be much flatter. However, it did require a lot of force to wrangle it into shape. After all, these are some thick pieces. Here's an "in progress."
Originally I tried to do it all at once. This wasn't going to happen: the non-alignment of the skirt and benchtop prevented everything from coming together. I found what worked was starting at one end, using clamps to bring that little section together, and then leap-frogging the pipe clamps down the length of the bench. This worked like a charm. Finally I had this:
Now things are coming together. I'm not sure what I'm going to do about those plain-jane squared-off skirt ends there. I guess the next step is to take it all apart, figure out those ends, drill the holes in the skirt for the vises, then glue it all together again.
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