Thread: How to join masonite hollow doors without clamps

You can just screw it together from the back around the edges while the glue goes off

What about cheap ratchet straps to hold them together until the glue dries? Dollar shops keep them.

Sounds good and worth a try, I have 8 of the straps and strapping them while on the trailer top would be perfect.
Use several dowel joints for a little extra strength, glue and clamp using the straps.

Thanks
Owen

+1 for the ratchet straps used them many times on large glue ups they work well.
Regards Rod.

Ratchet straps are simple but I would use a couple of cauls, clamped both ends of the join, to keep it flat.
You could also use a couple of lengths of timber with blocks screwed to it and wedges to apply pressure.

Are you trying to join edge to edge to increase surface area or face to face to increase depth?

I made one 20+ years ago using a 2400 x 1200 sheet of 32mm MDF as a substrate with 200mm deep 32mm MDF vertical rails about 200mm in from the edge and 90x45 legs coach bolted to the rails (no spreaders or stretchers). Top was covered with 300x300x6.5 cork floor tiles. Very easy to pin to, and easy to adjust to level as required by splaying the legs slightly to microadjust. In storage at the moment, standing on one end, but while erected was kept within 0.25mm of level and flat across diagonals and along the length or across the width at 150mm intervals for more than 20 yrs. I suspect that the very minor adjustments required over time were caused by the concrete floor it stood on moving as it had five cracks in that room when we moved out.

Your masonite hollow doors effectively form a torsion box which should be stable, but the core will at best be a light card honeycomb, and the doors are designed for stability when mounted vertically rather than horizontally, and I suspect will be subject to sag over time when used as a table top. It will also be difficult to pin or otherwise temporarily fix items to the top, then remove the fixings without creating raised patches on the surface.

Just my ideas on the application.

IMHO the use of dowels to strengthen joints is only necessary where end grain is present.

I think you will find that the door edges are long grain ... the glue line in a long grain to long grain glue up is stronger than the surrounding wood.

Just prepare the surface with a light sanding before applying the glue ... I have never seen a glue joint fail because too much glue was used ..

Regards

Rob

First I would use dowels to align the surfaces.

After gluing some 12mm rope around the two doors and use a screw driver to twist the rope and tighten while the glue cures.

Welcome to the forum Owen.

Thanks for the help guys, all done. A perfect join now to add a sheet of the outdoors tyre floor covering to the top.

Hobby Table - 2.JPG

Looks like it will work!!

Good one.

Finished the frame a while ago and sure feels good to spread out and to be able to leave everything where you left in until next time.
Hobby Table Frame - 8.jpg