Brass furniture legs

I am building a pine farm table that will have a finished top of 6'6" X 37". The top square part of the legs is 5x5x7.5. I am going to mill the wood, buying rough stock ripping and plaining. So my question is what size should I make everything? Thickness of top and rails and then how much reveal on the ends and sides should I allow and should they both be the same amount or do the long ends generally stick out further? Thanks much for your time! [img]https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.doityourselft.com-vbulletin/2000x1124/table_leg_130fcbc00c2f25b03144add6c4730b4ae5bc2f7e.jpg[/img]

Here's the problem: [img]https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.doityourselft.com-vbulletin/1280x960/aluminum_chair_underside_shrunk_arrows__6b81d1e1b1604f2dc991d028d57bf2cb71122e49.jpg[/img] This image shows the underside of a thin metal (probably steel) seat on an old aluminum straight-backed chair. The three yellow arrows indicate cracks in the seat. The cracks have broken through the thin (disintegrating) padding layer on top, so now they pinch whatever pants/padding weighs down on them. No doubt the cracks will continue to spread until the seat eventually fails. The brownish-yellow dots are the thin top padding, visible through holes in the seat created by the manufacturer. I think the metal must be too thin to weld. It is not even as thick as the cardstock at the back of a pad of note paper. I could try laying on a layer of resin and fiberglass cloth, on top and/or on bottom, but I'm afraid the metal will continue to flex under load, eventually breaking the resin and severing the cloth. I could replace the seat with something fabricated from plywood, but I'd like to preserve the original parts of the chair if possible. Wood also wouldn't have the contoured shape of the metal seat, and it would make the lightweight chair heavier. It would require a lot more effort (and expense, no doubt, given the price of lumber these days) compared to something like fiberglass. Depending on how I made it, it might also raise the seat height, which is not desirable. I was looking at paint-on rubber treatments. They would be more flexible than fiberglass, but wouldn't do anything to stabilize the steel seat. I'm wondering if there's a kind of steel tape or strapping that would stay attached for years, or some other paint-on treatment that would preserve the existing seat and its contoured shape. If not, is there some material that would function at least as well as plywood? My tools are basically a drill, a hand jigsaw, and a sanding block. TIA.