Mill before resaw?

[Rob Burch]

Greetings.

Thought I would seek your advice. I am remodeling our kitchen and that entails a cabinet facelift. My solution would be a sledge hammer and all new cabinets but I lost in a 1-1 landslide vote. So new doors, drawers and drawer boxes (along with sliding shelves) it is. We are keeping the boxes and repainting them. Did I mention I lost 1-1?

Anyway….I am using 5/4 poplar rough stock I have had for years so it’s considered “no cost” to this project. I plan to make all the drawer parts with 1/2” stock. I will flatten one side on the jointer and then resaw to a fat 1/2” on the bandsaw with the jointed face against the bandsaw fence. Then final thickness to 1/2” on the drum sander.

The stock I have is pretty flat already so I should not lose too muck thickness on the jointer getting it flat. Once I get it flat and cut it to a fat 1/2” on the bandsaw I should have an off cut that is probably about 3/8 (ish) of an inch thick with a bandsawn side and a rough side.

I am not sure what I will ever use that much 3/8” stock but I am just against turning it into planer shavings. That said. I now have a 3/8” board with two rough faces. (Sawmill rough on one side. Bandsaw rough on the other).

This was a long way to get to my question but…… would you folks run the stock through the planer after you face jointed it flat (before you resawed it) so the off cut has one flat face from which you can flatten the other. Alternatively I guess I could just face joint the off cut but I’m not that big of a fan of jointing thinner boards.

Ideally I could get it flat quickly and split it precisely and get two 1/2” pieces out one board…..but it isn’t going to happen for me so the next best thing is to make a usable off cut.

Any thought would be appreciated.

Thanks
Rob

[Matt Day]

I would. That way if you need some thin stock you have a flat-ish reference face. Jointing 3/8” might get a little sketchy.

Or, if you think you won’t ever use it make it firewood and don’t worry about planing it.

[Eric Schmid]

I would flatten/square one face and edge on the jointer, then run the opposite face and edge through the planer. That way you, hopefully, just have one face on each resawn board to run through the planer after resawing. I find it easier/faster to prepare four reference surfaces when I’m going to make use of the off-cuts.

It’s always a good idea to test a couple first to make sure your popular is going to stay flat enough after resawing. I usually go thicker on the test pieces at the resaw until I know how close I can cut them to final dimension.

[Brian Holcombe]

Resaw first, and frankly I don’t think that will work out to 1/2” stock flat enough for draw parts. Resawing in 1/2 (as opposed to resawing for veneer, 1/3’s etc) will leave the boards to bow outward in many cases.

[Rob Burch]

Thanks folks. I appreciate the input.

[Jim Becker]

My general practice is to always create additional stock from the off-cuts that result from resawing material. That thinner stock comes in handy for a wide variety of things...it pained be GREATLY when during our recent move I had to cull a substantial amount of that stuff and I'm already missing the utility it provides. I have to build up my "collection" again. LOL I do run the material through the planer (or drum sander if really thin) so I have two clean surfaces and generally dimension it to something I know I'll use, .25", .375", 6mm, whatever...and I mark it for future quick reference. I also hate to throw out stuff so creating usable material from slices remaining from resaw work is the solution.

[Matthew Hills]

Resaw first, and frankly I don’t think that will work out to 1/2” stock flat enough for draw parts.

This would be my concern, as well. I'd recommend testing feasibility of any plan with one of the boards to see how it behaves.

[johnny means]

Getting two pieces of half inch from 5/4 is going to be problematic. I do a lt of resawing with a pretty nice resaw and it's pretty much mandatory to cut a 16th thick, even more from wide boards, which will cup instantly.

[Jim Dwight]

I built 10 dining room chairs earlier this year, mostly of cherry. I needed 5/4 and 6/4 stock (and some 4/4). All I could find 4/4 and 8/4. So I did a lot of resawing. Most of the wood went into the back legs which were to be 1 1/8 finish thickness. To make them, I cut lengths an inch or more long, jointed a face flat, resawed to about 1/8 thicker than I needed (reduced as I got more confident in my resawing). Then I planned both the piece I wanted and the other piece. I then used a couple of the offcuts, glued together, to make a few of the back legs. I still have other offcuts. I will make something of them. Cherry is too nice to waste.

Most of my back slats are poplar which I stained black. They are shaped to match the profile of the upper portion of the back legs so they were made like the legs out of 8/4 poplar. So they were done the same way.

I'm not saying this is the best way to do any of this but it worked well for me.

[Jon Endres]

Earlier this year, I resawed some very old (20+ years in dry storage) 5/4 walnut to make some 3/8" thick door panels for a spice cabinet my father-in-law was building. Mine started out at a full 1-1/4" thickness already planed, so I figured I'd easily get the two pieces out of one. I did but just barely. My resawing technique was not perfect, and the wood cupped enough to make even the finished 3/8" a near-miss. I would resaw first and then let it sit for as long as you can, stickered and weighted. Poplar shouldn't move a whole lot, but be on the safe side. The thin stock works great for drawer dividers if you're building kitchen drawers. Plane it to a finished 1/4".

[glenn bradley]

I joint a face and an edge and plane the opposite face. That way when I resaw I have two pieces with a reference face on them. The keeper gets dimensioned for the project, the spoil goes in the rack.

[Mike Cutler]

I would go straight from the jointer to the bandsaw.
Flatten a face , joint an edge, run it through the bandsaw set for 9/16" to 5/8", and then to the planer.
This is all assuming that you have a bandsaw capable of resawing efficiently, and consistently. If you don't, then off the jointer and through the planer.

[Steven Woodward]

Rob, I did that same thing with our kitchen: kept the carcass and Corian counter top, but made new drawers and doors, applied new iron-on edging, new kick plates and crown moulding, new MDF shelves, and applied T&G to exposed cabinet sides, The only time the carcass is seen is when the doors are opened. Painted the inside of the carcass with Tremco semigloss white using a foam roller, which looks like new melamine.

A possible use for your 3/8 inch cut-off is to make panels for the doors. My door panels are 1/4" thick and the rails are 3/4" thick.

I hold off jointing and planing until I am ready to use the material in a project, that takes care of any warping over time.

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[Rob Burch]

Steve,

That looks great.

I appreciate everyone's advice.

That said, over the weekend I started. My first observation was that the boards I thought were pretty flat, were not quite as flat as I remembered once they were out of the wood rack. Trudging forward, I face joined one face flat on all my stock. That left me with most boards just a smidge under an inch thick. I then re-sawed one board to a fat 1/2" (more like a skinny 5/8") and as someone predicted, the boards began to bow. Perhaps it was just my luck and that would have been the only one...but I did not take that chance as I want full 1/2" sides. I took the easy way out and simply planed all the stock to about 9/16" and Ill get it to my 1/2" with a couple of passes through the drum sander before I start cutting dovetails. I wish it had not turned out that way but it is what it is.

Thanks again everyone.