You must be working with an excellent, highly professional, reliable fabricator. He saw a potential problem and nipped it in the bud. Sorry about the slab, but it's kind of like falling in love with the wrong guy - painful, but you're better off knowing than you are with those butterflies. And you'll find one worthy of you soon.

Can you find other uses for the slab?

We had to buy a whole slab of marble for our fireplace surround, so then we used it in slides built into our book cases to be used as drink holders by our sofa, then I designed a pedestal for a statue in our foyer, then we used it as a counter top in Dh's study. So we got our money's worth out of the slab.

I am a fabricator.

your fabricators explanation surprises me. it's possible the slab varies in thickess but this is not unusual and can usually be dealt with by backgrinding the bottom edge of the stone to make the thickness equal across a joint. this is normally only unworkable if the stone has a thinkness variation greater than roughly 1/8". not common but it does happen.

in the event the stone is crowned such that there is a bit of a lip at the joint there are a couple of options. If it's minimal (1/16" or less)the stone can usually be set so that whatever lip is present is towards the back side. Seam setting tools actually allow the installers to bend the granite very slightly to help with this problem.

for larger lips the options always exists to grind the joint flat after install and then polish it. takes above average skill but quite doable particularly on a lighter color.

old ryder: They said the variation was 1/8" and the only way to fix the problem would be to backgrind the stone but they didn't really recommend it because the backgrinding would have been extensive and they might not be able to make it perfect. My DH went to the fabricator to look at the slab after it was cut and he said the difference in thickness between the two pieces was very obvious. I believe he said that the stone was thinner at the center than at the ends. How weird!

Annie: Since I don't have to pay for this slab since it was defective, I would rather just go back to the granite store and pick another slab. I am sure they will be able to use the stone for smaller pieces like vanities so it will not really go to waste.

EAM - you made me laugh - I did have that feeling of love lost. Yes, these fabricators seem very professional and I am glad they were honest with me even though it was not what I wanted to hear.

oldryder:

I guess I should have asked this before.

Are there slabs that are more susceptible to this variation in thickness than others or is it just luck of the draw?

We are going back at 10 am when the store opens to pick a new slab and I don't want the same thing to happen again!