In entry four of this series, I spoke of the difficulties of fitting the lower doors, now it's time to detail the steps taken to accomplish that task. Fitting the doors, was a little like driving from Boston to Philadelphia by way of Los Angeles; you get there, but man does it take a while.
The first step in this “journey”, is to plane the doors to precisely fit the openings. By precisely, I mean without gaps of any sort, but not forced into place. Of course this and every subsequent step in fitting the doors has to be done with the base unit assembled on its leveled platform. Fitted this way, the hinges can be easily laid out, ensuring perfect alignment and leaves a margin of error for the final fitting after the hinges are installed. To my horror, I found the center doors came up with a gap of almost 1/8” between them. This made necessary a few extra steps to correct that mistake, which will be explained later.
The hinges I chose to go with were the precision butt hinges sold by Horton Brasses. These lack the hand cast look of the hinges from Londonderry Brasses, but unlike the Londonderry hinges, each one is exactly the same as the next and are free from any play between the hinge pin and knuckles. That last aspect of their construction is the important one, any slop in the hinge itself, translates into a sagging door and inconsistent fits, or consistent “fits” when installing the doors, depending on how you look at it . When installed, they are not so modern looking as to draw attention to themselves. The hinges are made, so when in the closed position there is a slight gap between the leaves; a desirable feature for inset doors, but not for overlay doors. The hinges were made from such heavy gauge brass, that I couldn’t swage them in the vise, to close the gaps between the leaves. I routinely do this with the hinges from Londonderry Brasses because they have a huge gap between the leaves in the closed position. Not being able to close the gaps, necessitated chiseling a hinge mortice with a tapered bottom. I thought of making a jig to route the hinge mortices. I ended up laying out and chiseling them by hand, but I did use a laminate trimmer to remove the bulk of the waste. The hinges were installed with short screws durning the fitting process, because they will be taken on and off several times. Later during the final assembly, full length screws will be used. Even with that precaution, I tried not to use more than one screw per leaf, so each screw would have its maximum holding power.
Now with the doors hung, they can be planed to have a uniform gap. For doors of this size a clearance of just over 1/16” is appropriate. At this point I found another problem; the flanking doors struck the hinges of the center doors. It seems that although I drew it out and was confident the projection of the center section was such there would be clearance for the flanking doors to swing closed, this wasn’t the case. It missed by about 1/32”, but that’s a lot when your shooting for a gap of just over 1/16”. The reason for this is the hinges were considerably heavier than I expected and I probably should have set the center section forward of the flanking cabinets by 1/8” more. It was a little late to do anything about those factors, so I sawed a small amount off one leaf, which allowed the hinge on the face of the case to be positioned more towards the center.
This of course required re-cutting the hinge mortices in the door. This whole episode pointed out how using one screw per leaf during the fitting process is a good practice. Had I drilled all the holes, my options would have been more limited, or the fix more complicated.
With the hinges moved, everything worked as it should, I was especially happy that the center doors lined up in the same plane where they met. I had expected to have to make minor adjustments with a plane and chisel to the faces of the cabinet sides in order for the doors to meet properly. The doors may have fit properly, but they had the raw poplar core, and the breadboard ends showing. To hide that, 3/16” thick strips of mahogany where glued to the edges of the door. I thought for a long time, on just how to precisely trim 3/16” from the perimeter of the doors. In the end the solution was easy and painfully obvious; use a 3/16” rabbet bit, followed by a flush trim bit.
This would not work where the center doors came together because of the oversized gap there. With the center doors still hung, I used a strip of scrap wood planed to 7/16” thick to scribe a trim to line on each door. The strip was centered on the gap between the two doors and a line scribed along its edges. When trimmed to this line, there will be a 7/16” gap between the doors. When the 3/16” strips are applied, to both doors, this will leave a nice even gap of about 1/16”. The original has an astragal at the joint between the two center doors, but this appears to be a later addition, to compensate for shrinkage. It just looks stuck on. A detail like this isn’t in keeping with the high caliber of the Seymour’s work, but perhaps they made the same mistake I did and corrected it with an astragal (highly unlikely, I know, but it makes me feel better, thinking it could have happened). Another bit of collateral damage from the oversized gap between the center doors, was the mitered frame of ribbon stripe mahogany veneer. Because the amount trimmed off wasn’t even, the miter on the veneer no longer landed at the corner. I had to re-cut one miter and replace the adjacent piece of veneer. The miters are no longer true 45˚ but that is unimportant; what is important that the miters fall on the corner. Those who question hide glues resistance to water, should try to remove some. I think they will find it quite able to stand more water and heat than they thought possible. The last step was to take one pass with a hand plane on each edge of the door to leave a prefect glue surface.
The mahogany strips, used to cover the edges of the doors, were ripped slightly oversized from a piece of rough sawn 4/4 mahogany. Between each cut, the edge of the board was planed by hand to remove the saw marks. This planed face was placed down on the bed of the surface planer when the strips were planed to thickness and later against the edge of the door. The strips were mitered to fit neatly around the door. In theory, since I’m using hot hide glue, the strips on three edges of the door could be rubbed in place and not need clamps, but I like to use 3M painters tape as clamps, just to be sure. The fourth strip, can’t be rubbed in place so here the tape is essential. If I felt that any strip took too long to get into place, I heated the strip with an iron to liquify the glue.
When the glue had cured the strips were trimmed flush with the router. Acting on a tip I saw on Woodsmith Shop TV, the doors were clamped together face to face with two pieces of scrap between, which left a gap for the flush trim bit, and gave a more stable platform for the router to ride on. In situations like this, don’t let the flush trim bit project below the base anymore than necessary. Every fraction the bit hangs below the router base is just that much more that could dig in, should the router tip. To reduce tearout, the router was run in a climb cut fashion. Dried bits of glue prevented the bit from getting the strips flush in some areas, so I had to use a block plane in those areas.
After chiseling the waste from the hinge mortices where the strips were applied, the doors were hung yet again, and the gaps checked. I was very pleased that only a few plane strokes were needed to have everything prefect, and I was glad to finally be in Philadelphia!
Inlaying the doors was fairly straightforward. The same templates used to size the veneer panels was again laid in place making sure the veneer nails were placed in exactly the same holes as when the veneer was trimmed. This will ensure the proper registration, so the groove for the inlay aligns perfectly with the junction between the veneers. In the case of the center doors, with their quarter circle indents, the groove couldn’t be done in one continuous run. The laminate trimmer must not be allowed to run around the corners, because doing so would leave a small radius on inside corners. The only real difficulties are getting the router bit accurately centered in the guide collar, which in the case of my trimmer requires some fiddling, and seeing what you are doing with the restricted visibility afforded by the laminate trimmer and guide collar.
The inlays surrounding the crotch veneer, is composed of two 1/16” layers of satinwood, with a layer of 1/16” black dyed veneer between. I measured the circumference of the oval and added 2” to arrive at the length to make the inlay. The individual strips of satinwood were sawn from solid stock, and sanded to a precise 1/16” in a drill press mounted thickness sander. The inlay was glued together with white glue, between boards covered in packing tape. I have a fairly large collection of C-clamps, but this 62” long inlay used each one and a few more would have been helpful. The individual strips were sawn off on the band saw using a thin kerf blade to minimize waste. Before the inlay was placed in the groove one end was cut with an acute angle as the first step in forming the scarf joint where the ends meet.
By some standards 3/16” is a narrow banding, but not when it is made of satinwood and has to be bent. I sawed the strips for the ovals to about 1/8” thick. This is far thicker then normal, but getting a inlay wider than it is thick to bend is difficult, because it wants to twist as it is bent. Due to the size of the oval, I didn’t expect too much trouble, but it took considerable effort to convince the inlay to cooperate. Start by brushing the hide glue on the inlay, and then work the banding into place. The starting end had to be held in place with a clamp. Using the iron and the veneer hammer the inlay was slowly coaxed into the groove. Strategically placed clamps helped to hold the inlay in place until the glue grabbed, which wasn’t very long.
Where the ends overlapped, a line was drawn showing the angle cut on the end and a razor saw was used to trim the end. Fortunately scarf joints on both doors fit perfectly, but if they hadn’t some careful trimming with a chisel would have made them fit.
The center doors were a little more problematic. The tight radius of the quarter circles in the corners would be nearly impossible to do with straight sections of inlays, so they were made as detailed here. Also the June 2010 issue of Popular Woodworking features and article on making the bent inlays. Popular Woodworking also has a video of the inlays being installed on the center door, which you can view here
The rings were cut free on the band saw and the waste in groove where the laminate trimmer couldn’t reach, removed.
To ensure the rings fit fully into the corner a slight bevel is cut on the end. Glue is brushed into the groove and the inlay pressed into place. A clamp helps to hold the starting end in place while the ring is worked into the groove.
The end is trimmed with a razor saw, again at a slight angle to ensure it fits fully into the corner. when the glue is dry, the ends of the rings are mitered with a narrow chisel. I would have liked to miter them before installation, but they were so rigid that it proved difficult to accurately determine where to miter the ends. Mitering in place isn’t difficult but I had to be careful not to damage the groove with the chisel. The straight sections were easy. The miters were again cut with a chisel, but this time the back of the chisel was used as a mirror to judge the proper cutting angle. It usually took a couple of trimmings with the chisel before they miters fit properly. I purposely left banding long, both to give me a few tries to get the proper angle on the miter, and when left slightly long the ends will be forced to a tight fit as the banding is pressed into place. This is much like a a sprung joint employed by interior carpenters.
The banding around the perimeter of the doors are solid satinwood 3/16” wide by 1/16” thick. These are laid into rabbets cut with the router, which was again was done with a climb cut. The miters on these pieces have to be sawn, because the chisel always undercuts a bit and this would show on the exposed edges. They are glued in place in much the same way as the mahogany strips surrounding the edges of the doors and when dry were also trimmed flush like before.
The locks can now be installed. As is almost always the case, the locks weren’t exactly what I wanted. A lock with the pin set 1” away from the edge would have been prefect, but the far superior double lever locks with screwed together cases do not come in that size. There, are so called “distance to pin” locks, which are available with a 1” offset, but these are somewhat inferior to the locks mentioned above, and they don’t come in lefts and rights. Even if they had, I would have probably opted for the double lever locks. The reason for this is the doors require the locks to stay shut, so they will be used frequently and the extra durability is important. I did use the distant to pin locks on the drawers, but here the drawers do not have to be locked, so they may never be used. I’m going to provide the customer with both a right and left replacement lock, in case one would fail, down the road. When inlaying the locks you have to keep in mind that left and right configuration, so you don’t end up with a mis-cut mortice. The keyhole escutcheons are the flanged type, so they are easy to inlay .
Inlaying the drawers follows exactly the same procedure used for the doors, the only difference is the inlays are 7/64” wide versus the 3/16” used on the doors. Lacking a 7/64” rabbeting bit (do they even exist?), I used a 1/8” down spiral bit in the router table to form the rabbet for the perimeter inlay. I had hoped the down spiral bit would cut smoothly, and for the most part it did, but I had one small chip taken out of the veneer. I would have been happy if that was the only veneer/router issue I had, but that wasn’t to be. While routing against the template for the inlays in the field of the drawer, the laminate trimmer snagged on a protruding veneer nail and I routed an arc in the drawer front; it was a nicely routed arc, just in the wrong spot. You can see a video whole ugly scene here.
Once the inlays had dried, they need to be made flush. This is probably my least favorite part of the process. The scraper would seem to be the best tool, but it tends to tear the inlays, especially the curved sections and at direction changes. Taking a slicing cut with the chisel will nicely flatten the curved section and the intersections. Take light cuts to determine best cutting direction, because the satinwood is prone to splintering.
The straight sections of the inlays are planed close to flush with the block plane and then the scraper can be employed.
With the grain of the veneer and inlays running in so many directions, a sort of diagonal slicing cut usually produces the best surface. Now with the scraping complete, the doors and drawers are ready to sand and finish.
The next installment will chronicle making the fall front drawer in the center section and the pull out serving slides.
Thanks
Rob Millard
Rob,
Another great installment. Thanks.
I'm really glad you showed some of the mishaps and how you addressed and corrected them. I'm sure I, too, will eventually make a mistake one day and this could be helpful :)
I see a satin wood edge band on the drawer. Is that also a 1/16 x 3/16 band laid into a rabbet?
Frank
Posted by: Frank Vucolo | May 03, 2010 at 08:49 PM
Frank,
I'm hoping there aren't any more mishaps, but they do offer a learning experience :).
The banding around the drawer is 1/16" thick x 7/64" wide.
Thanks for reading the blog.
Rob Millard
Posted by: Rob Millard | May 03, 2010 at 08:57 PM
I found your narrative on the inlay work very interesting. Nice job!
Posted by: Philip the Router Tools Guy | April 01, 2011 at 01:11 PM