Question about cross grain application

[Stephen Edwards]

I'm building several small boxes, miniature cedar chests. Simple jewelry boxes. On one of the boxes I'm doing a purple heart base trim and purple handles. The lid will be cedar.

I would like to include a bit of purple heart on the lid, which is 3/4" thick. I know that I can't wrap the edges of the cedar with the 3/4 PH without asking for trouble, the cedar lid splitting eventually.

Can I do this without risk of the cedar lid splitting:

Option 1: Can I wrap the cedar lid with a thin piece of PH, say appx. 1/16 thick (or thinner) before routing the edge profile on the lid?

Option 2: Can I route a shallow grove around the edge of the lid and inlay a very thin piece of PH without risking a split in the lid? If I do the PH thin enough am I still going to have a problem with the lid splitting because of the PH being glued on across the end grain of the lid?

Option 3: If neither of those two options will work, I suppose I can make the lid out of 1/2 birch plywood and veneer 1/8 cedar to both the top and bottom of that and wrap the edges of the whole thing with PH of whatever thickness I want. Correct?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts and suggestions.

[David DeCristoforo]

Some varaition on this. Mitering the banding and gluing only the mitered corners will allow the top and banding to "float"

113972

[Stephen Edwards]

Some varaition on this. Mitering the banding and gluing only the mitered corners will allow the top and banging to "float"

113972


Thanks David. So, if I do it as you suggest, gluing the miters only...NOW I see the reason for the small space behind the piece of trim. Got it. Thanks again!