Gonna have to start jointing

[BeanerSA]

So, poor naieve old fool that I am, thinking that I would just be able to go out and buy panels big enough to make cabinets or bookcases out of. Well, you can, but I don't have pockets that deep. So I trawled one of the better organised salvage yards in SA, and it looks like it is cheaper to buy old floorboards and joint them. Am I right?

Rip the tongue and groove off, and then joint the edges using a router (in my case), and then glue em. How do I finish the boards after that? Plane or sand?

I never for a minute thought that cabinetmaking was so easy that any fool could do it, but I was hoping to be able to produce nice pieces for less than I can buy them for. I'm sure I can make stuff better than the rubbish BJ's sells, but now I can see that the stuff from Meznar's is actually reasonably priced. They must have some poor bugger glueing up panels all day.

I'll stop rambling now....:?

[Wongdai]

Well, you will definitely be able to make better quality pieces than the pieces you can buy cheap. :)

The thing is, they can make furniture pretty cheap in China. Is it well made? Probably not.

If you are prepared to shop around and find some good quality second hand timber, then you can make some very nice pieces for relatively cheap. The corner cabinet I am making now I am using new timber that I shopped around for. It will probably cost me around $300 all up, BUT, it will be a hand me down family heirloom, I enjoyed the hell out of making it, and I learned a lot. Definitely a different experieince than just going out and buying one.

Floorboards are great for furniture. As you say, cut off the tongue and groove and joint them, sand them back and you will have something you can work with.

HTH.

[Arron]

Why do you want to joint the edges using a router? Assuming you're using a tablesaw to do the ripping, just rip then glue up. Unless you have a really rough saw, then the edges will be a bit furry but thats a good thing for the glueing. Dont fool for the idea that you need to use dowels or splines or biscuits or anything else in there either - unless you are doing something really strange then there should be more then enough glue surface to gaurantee a hold.

Also, getting very wide boards is not always a blessing. Wide boards tend to warp and cup - so sometimes I have bought wide boards but ended up rippinig them into narrow strips and rejoining them just to be confident I wont get cupping.

Once you are done, you can either plane or sand. If you propose to use a hand plane, make sure the grain of each strip (floorboard) runs the same way. If you will be sanding it yourself with a ROS or similar, make sure you are careful to line up each strip as if there is misalingment then the ridges are hard to get rid of, especially as your floorboards will probably be a hardwood. Best option may well be to take you panels to someone who has wide belt drum sander - get it done for minimal cost.

On using floorboards for cabinetmaking - nothing wrong with it, but I would design carefully to make sure the finished product doesnt look like its made from floorboards, which I would find a bit offputting (probably not a common concern though).

And on the price of making your own - I think each time I do a piece of furniture I'm surprised at the cost. I think its my passion for exotic timbers that is the problem.

cheers
Arron

[TP1]

When you say panels, are you referring to particleboard & MDF veneered panels? The reason I ask is that I would have thought that would be a very cheap way to go once you figure out how to get the most out of your panels.

As far as jointing floorboards goes, BeanerSA is on the money. Providing you rip it accurately and with a good blade, no need for jointing. Jointing with a router sounds too fiddly for what should be a quick and easy cutting operation.

[IanW]

........then the edges will be a bit furry but thats a good thing for the glueing.
......


Arron, sorry to be a picky old fart, but that's quite wrong. The best & strongest glue joint comes from two cleanly-cut & closely apposed surfaces (minimum thickness of glue film). So a pass or two from a sharp plane to clean up sawcuts is always advisable.

Glue works by 'wetting' the surface & forming molecular bonds. Far from the popular notion of "keying" the glue, the feathers & fluff from sawing or rough sanding just weaken the bond. This was discovered a long time ago, making wooden aircraft, which is one application where you want the strongest glue joint possible!

Cheers,

[TP1]

Blades like Freud's Glue Line have been specifically designed to leave a clean edge suitable for gluing without any further planing or jointing. These blades work particularly well for this purpose when the blade is set low - with about 1/2 of the carbide tip above the thickness of the timber.

Once I have a clean, straight and square cut from the Glue-Line blade, I am not inclined to fiddle with it further.

[BeanerSA]

Lot's of advice there. I guess I'll have to weigh up what makes sense.

Keep it coming.

[BeanerSA]

Also, getting very wide boards is not always a blessing. Wide boards tend to warp and cup - so sometimes I have bought wide boards but ended up rippinig them into narrow strips and rejoining them just to be confident I wont get cupping.

I had read and known about this and it was clearly evident when I looked at some ~200x19 pine boards at the salvage place and every single one was cupped. My project description call for jointed boards so as to prevent cupping, and I was going to bypass it because of the additional steps involved. Not any more.

[Arron]

Arron, sorry to be a picky old fart, but that's quite wrong. The best & strongest glue joint comes from two cleanly-cut & closely apposed surfaces (minimum thickness of glue film). So a pass or two from a sharp plane to clean up sawcuts is always advisable.

Glue works by 'wetting' the surface & forming molecular bonds. Far from the popular notion of "keying" the glue, the feathers & fluff from sawing or rough sanding just weaken the bond. This was discovered a long time ago, making wooden aircraft, which is one application where you want the strongest glue joint possible!

Cheers,

Ian, thats not 'being a picky old fart', its just keeping the record straight. A bit of research reveals that you are right so thanks for the correction.

However, it doesnt change my view that if the saw cuts are relatively clean you can go straight to gluing, and still have abundant strength with modern glues. I'm with TP1, if something works dont fiddle further.

cheers
Arron

[China]

Being a Cabinet maker by trade I have never seen a "off the saw edge" that I would be happy to glue up, on floor boards as said above a quick pass with a hand plane, or buzzer will make all the difference

[Arron]

Being a Cabinet maker by trade I have never seen a "off the saw edge" that I would be happy to glue up, on floor boards as said above a quick pass with a hand plane, or buzzer will make all the difference

I'm not a cabinetmaker and obviously have to defer to you on the experience side, but I've done dozens of these in this manner and really dont see a problem.

I'd like to understand your objection to this procedure is - is it a concern about the whether the glue will hold or is it concern that the finish join may not be neat enough?

cheers
Arron

[China]

Arron, I have never seen a saw blade that will give the finish I expect when I make joins, others may well be satisfied, when I join timber I require a absolute tite join with not even a tiny gap. I have seen some blades that produce avery clean cut but good enough for joining.

[bridger]

Being a Cabinet maker by trade I have never seen a "off the saw edge" that I would be happy to glue up, on floor boards as said above a quick pass with a hand plane, or buzzer will make all the difference


cabinetmaker by trade here too.
if the wood is reasonably stable- doesn't warp coming off of the saw-
and
if the saw has enough mass and power and low enough runout
and
if the blade is the right tooth configuration and low enough runout

then the saw cut will not be improved at all by a power jointer, and only slightly improved by a jointer bench plane. in any case, done right a glueline rip blade does just what it's name suggests.

note that we're talking a fairly pricey blade here- not one I'd run through salvaged floorboards, ever.

[Claw Hama]

Not a cabinet maker, some people are happy to see the joint or the glue line. I try and get rid of it if I can, if all you can see is the difference in grain you're there. Here's one I prepared yesterday :Ufor a Aust Red Cedar door. If you're using a good table saw with a good blade you may only need one or two passes, these joints were cut with a circular saw so need three:roll: well maybe six give or take a couple. All depends what level you want to work to and how good your saw is.

[Arron]

Good to see the replies from the professionals but frankly I think we're missing the point here. You guys are cabinetmakers so naturally you work to a very high standard. You work to the 'gold standard' and you have the hand-skills to get you there. Most amateurs are not in that position, but they still want to produce furniture they can be proud of and need strategies to achieve that. So if BeanerSA's takes your advice and decides that going straight from saw to glue-up is unacceptable then what can he do:

1. use a handplane to dress the edges. Hands up all those amateurs who can plane the edges of a stack of floorboards to an acceptable 90degrees. Not many I'm sure. Possibly none. In BeanerSA's case he's obviously new at this so I doubt its an option.
2. use a jointer. Results will be better then a handplane, but if Beaner had one of these he would have mentioned it so lets not waste time with this option.
3. use a router. Sounds good in theory, but if you're talking hardwood floorboards with the usual knots and grain reversals then I think chances of getting a consistently good result are small.
4. buy the saw blade designed for the job. OK, but they're not cheap and if this is your strategy each time you come to a skills gap then youre going to go broke pretty quickly.

So obviously none of these strategies is an option but with the voice in the back of his head reminding him he has to dress the edges of the sawn boards, what happens - he decides its all too hard, gets frustrated and gives up. Thats not a good outcome but its whats happening in dozens of sheds all around the country every weekend.

What we're doing is creating a culture where people believe only an expert can do the job, but expert skills take years to acquire, so you shouldnt try and shouldnt get involved.

So what is the real difference between the gold standard (neatly dressed boards) and the 'acceptable standard' (straight from saw to glue up - assuming a good edge off the saw, of course). First you might get a visible glue line. Not usually, in my experience, but more likely. Secondly, the joint may be 90% as strong as the gold standard. Still immensely strong if done properly, still strong enough to be holding together when we're all dead and buried, but not the gold standard.

So thats my point, the strategy is tailored to give an acceptable result but well within the skill level of the recipient. And thats what I meant about not fiddling with something once its acceptable. I should have said 'dont fiddle with something unless you can be confident you can materially improve it - and you're confident the improvement gained is worth the risk involved'.

ps. BeanerSA, if I've read your skill level wrong, please ignore all the above.

cheers
Arron

[Claw Hama]

Skills take a little practice, not necessarily years of endless work, with a little practice you can make realy nice furniture instead of just accepting ordinary. you can pick up an old jointer for about 70 - 90 bucks if you check out ebay or the local markets and it takes the almost the same skills to get your saw blade at 90 deg as it does to plane your board to 90 deg.

[bridger]

pro/ amateur doing better work...
a pro can justify the cost of better equipment, does the work regularly to keep up the skills.

however, an amateur doesn't have to make the tools pay for themselves, nor justify the time required to produce work of whatever standard is desired. as a professional, I can only budget so much time for a particular bit of jointery- if I can't get the parts to fit up in the allotted time I lose money, but an amateur can work on it for a week if need be- after all it's a hobby, right?

when edge joining two boards, there's no need for them to be exactly at 90 degrees- they can be off a degree or two, as long as they are both off the same amount in opposing directions. clamp the two together face to face for jointing with a bench plane and shoot them at the same time- the angles will take care of themselves.

if you're working with recycled floorboards get yourself a roughing scraper- the kind you sharpen with a file, sold for removing old paint- and clean the boards first with that before bringing any better tooling to the wood. old floorboards are likely to be full of grit and dirt.

[TP1]

I am certainly no pro but I do ensure that the boards are dead flat and the edges are exactly 90 degrees. I never have visible glue lines from edge jointing boards that have been machined on my jointer/thicknesser or have been carefully ripped using the glue-line blade. If the finish left by the blade is not perfect, ie zero markings, then I will clean it up on the jointer.

While I understand that some people prefer a hand plane, I cannot believe that this is the only method that is adopted universally by Australian professionals. I think Arron is on the money, no need to make it too hard for a bloke trying to pursue his interests.

[BeanerSA]

ps. BeanerSA, if I've read your skill level wrong, please ignore all the above.


No, you've got the skill level right, and my thought processes too. I've read this a couple of times, but I'm still not sure what your point is.

"The acceptable standard should be okay for those doing this as a hobby"?

[IanW]

...
However, it doesnt change my view that if the saw cuts are relatively clean you can go straight to gluing, and still have abundant strength with modern glues. I'm with TP1, if something works dont fiddle further.


Agreed, Arron - you are likely to have more than enough bond strength for the task, over the sorts of surface areas being talked about here, even if only half the potential glueing surface is wetted. So I was being a bit fussy, or setting the record straight, as you kindly put it. :U

Just to show I'm an unrepentant pedant, I will also question the statement "still have abundant strength with modern glues". Do I read into that an implication that 'old' glues are less strong? I suggest you compare the bond strength of hide glue with any PVA or other thermoplastic glue, & I think you'll find hide glue beats any of them hands-down. AND it doesn't creep on a hot day. :;

However, my own bench top is glued with PVA (2.5" thick Maple & 3.5" at the dog hole section), and it's still firmly stuck after 25 years, even though the wood was a bit moist when I made it. The joints have opened a smidgin long the tops as the wood dried, but deeper in has remained firmly stuck. I did take a lot of care in geting the joins as close to perfect as I could with my #6 (that was pre #7 days), so maybe that helped.
Cheers,

[Arron]

Just to show I'm an unrepentant pedant, I will also question the statement "still have abundant strength with modern glues". Do I read into that an implication that 'old' glues are less strong?


Nope. Wrong assumption. I dont have any worthwhile experience with hide glues or anything else from the pre-PVA period so arent making a comment on them.

cheers
Arron

[Arron]

"The acceptable standard should be okay for those doing this as a hobby"?

Nope, I dont feel like that at all.
Maybe I should condense my waffle down to a couple of key points:

1. There are always a variety of ways to do things. Any method chosen is a trade off between cost, time, skill level, risk and attributes of the finished product.

2. There is usually one canonical method, which gives the best result, but is typically the most demanding in terms of skill level. Its the most demanding because its adjusted for the seasoned trade provessional.

3. If you can do the canonical method, do it. If you cant because you lack the hand-skills or whatever, find a method that suits your skill level and balance it against what you may be sacrificing. In this case you are sacrificing some bond strength (a tiny amount) and the chance that a glue line may be visible enough to annoy you (also small).

4. To do otherwise leads to frustration and the sense that something is just too hard, and should be left to the professionals. Most people who are interested in woodworking give it a go but give it up pretty quickly. There are a lot of reasons for this but the one we are talking about here plays a big role.

5. Meanwhile keep striving to improve. But while you strive, you have to find a balance between improving skills and actually producing stuff - to keep your interest in the game.

I hope thats clearer.

Where you stand on the continuum between the kind of person who thinks that 'the acceptable standard is OK' and 'one should always strive for perfection' is up to you. Here is a link to some of the stuff I have done recently Flickr: arronsfurniture's Photostream (http://www.flickr.com/photos/arronsfurniture) . I post this solely so you can see where I'm coming from - where I stand in the continuum. I'm not at the perfectionist end but I like to keep improving.

and by the way, it doesnt matter how close you look, you wont see any glue lines :wink:

cheers
Arron