Solid Wood Interior Doors

[Brett Nelson]

First a little background. I live in a really arid climate. Humidity is not an issue here. If I sticker my wood and set a fan on it for a week or two, I can get really low MC before working with it.

I'm looking to undertake building solid wood doors for my parents' home. Almost all of them will be paint grade. Likely poplar but I could be persuaded toward soft maple too, although it would cost about 20% more.

Obviously Just using 8/4 stock for the rails and stiles would be the easiest. Using 4/4 and laminating is obviously preferred for stability.

Gluing and laminating turns an already time consuming task into a really lengthy project. We are talking about 25 doors. Is it completely necessary, or would I be ok just drying the 8/4 stock for a couple weeks and using that instead.

They want 5 panel shaker doors. All horizontal flat panels. I know I might get beat here for saying this, but they prefer me just using 3/4" MDF for the panels. They like the stability and the face strength of the MDF.

[Jay Jolliffe]

I made 8 or 9 years ago 12 four panel doors out of 8/4 poplar milled to 1 3/8. Used birch plywood for panels with applied molding around the panel. They stayed straight & didn't warp. The wood was about 5 percent moisture so the meter said.

[brett gallmeyer]

I make custom wood doors for a liveing. if your gona make that many, do it right "stave core" otherwise u may end up with alot of waisted time and money if 20 so doors decide to move... i could also consider using lvl for the cores. would save u time and $$ over solid poplar..

just my opinion..
if u have any quesions ask.

[Tom Godley]

Make sure you price everything out before you start and then get a quote from a door company -- I have been surprised. This is especially true if you are going with a traditional door pattern.

[Peter Quinn]

I too make doors for a living, or did before the economy tanked. I'm not sold on the LVL as a necessity idea, particularly for interior doors. I've made quite a few paint grade doors using solid 8/4 poplar and MDF panels. We use 1/2" MDF for flat panels, sometimes two sided maple faced for customers that want a more "natural" look. The grain does telegraph a bit. I have four doors (5 panel poplar/mdf raised panel) in my own house that are roughly 1 1/2" (my cutters are metric) and they haven't moved a bit on four years. Solid wood doors do work, and laminations aren't necessary for average sized passage doors.

For solid wood doors I would recommend minimizing the time between assembly and priming. Prime all 6 sides quickly after the doors are fully dried. Keep them stacked and stickered on a bench or horses until installation. Don't leave them leaning on a wall in front of a swamp cooler or heater. That will take out a man made core as quick as solid stock. Mill your stiles a bit over sized, let them rest, see what warps, use these for rails, and use your best material for stiles. It winds up costing me a bit under $70 per door, and takes maybe 7 man hours per door if done in a batch, a bit more if a single door as set up tine is the same. Make sure your stock is well acclimated to your local environment, and you shouldn't have any problems. I'm in New England where it goes from bone dry in the winter to swamp in the summer, I have no HVAC, and no problems.

Once in a while we do have one go wild and warp out, but at $70 material cost, on a large job, we just make a few extras and reject any that are beyond use. Its not hard to make extra parts in the context of a whole house of doors, particularly in a paint grade product.

[Frank Drew]

I never specialized in doors but have made a number of them, all out of solid, and haven't had any issues, and the oldest are going on twenty+ years old.

But do as Peter suggests and take the time and steps to get the straightest stock for your stiles, and don't forget to paint or finish the end grain of the stiles (along with everything else) after the door is fitted.

[Brett Nelson]

I too make doors for a living, or did before the economy tanked. I'm not sold on the LVL as a necessity idea, particularly for interior doors. I've made quite a few paint grade doors using solid 8/4 poplar and MDF panels. We use 1/2" MDF for flat panels, sometimes two sided maple faced for customers that want a more "natural" look. The grain does telegraph a bit. I have four doors (5 panel poplar/mdf raised panel) in my own house that are roughly 1 1/2" (my cutters are metric) and they haven't moved a bit on four years. Solid wood doors do work, and laminations aren't necessary for average sized passage doors.

For solid wood doors I would recommend minimizing the time between assembly and priming. Prime all 6 sides quickly after the doors are fully dried. Keep them stacked and stickered on a bench or horses until installation. Don't leave them leaning on a wall in front of a swamp cooler or heater. That will take out a man made core as quick as solid stock. Mill your stiles a bit over sized, let them rest, see what warps, use these for rails, and use your best material for stiles. It winds up costing me a bit under $70 per door, and takes maybe 7 man hours per door if done in a batch, a bit more if a single door as set up tine is the same. Make sure your stock is well acclimated to your local environment, and you shouldn't have any problems. I'm in New England where it goes from bone dry in the winter to swamp in the summer, I have no HVAC, and no problems.

Once in a while we do have one go wild and warp out, but at $70 material cost, on a large job, we just make a few extras and reject any that are beyond use. Its not hard to make extra parts in the context of a whole house of doors, particularly in a paint grade product.

This is kinda what I was looking for. Was wondering if any professionals ever used MDF for panels. Not sure that I'm sold on using it for raised panels as the routed edges are still weak, but for flat panels, I've found that the face of industrial grade MDF is actually stronger than hardwood. The door would be more dense and thus much heavier also. Especially if I were to use 3/4" MDF.

If I lived in a different climate I might be more inclined to be more careful, but it really only ever gets above 30% humidity here when a storm rolls in. I've done poplar frames and MDF panels on kitchen cabs, but never on passage doors.

At my prices for poplar and MDF I figured that a 3068 door would cost $57 and a jamb @ about $15. Hinges would be about $5. A maple door would cost about $2 more. Don't know which would be better. Anyway, that is about $5 more than I pay for my hollow core doors. But if it takes me 7 hours to build each door, then it might not be worth doing it for the parents. I was hoping for something more like 2-3 hours per door if I was running them in a batch. Hmmm...

[Peter Quinn]

My estimates for time are based on using shapers with power feed, a wide belt sander, and a thorough detailing by hand with a ROS and sponges. All edges broken, ready for finish or paint. I guess you could get it down to 4 1/2-5 hours per door, but its tough to go from rough stock to finished door much quicker for me. Once you consider getting the lumber, milling, resting, final milling, sizing, joining, shaping, assembly and sanding, it adds up.

Materials are cheap, but once you add shop rate (labor, power, waste collection, etc) a basic 3'0X6'8" door runs in the $300-$425 range depending on your speed. Its such a nicer thing than a masonite hollow core, but not so cheap.

We use MD lite, the Truppan brand, for raised panels in paint grade. It is a fair bit lighter than regular MDF and much easier to mill, and it also has a less "open" texture when milled. Our cutter sets make 1/2" grooves and stub tennons on the cope and stick, so thus the 1/2" MDF for flat panels. I suppose it might take a hit with less grace than solid wood raised panels, but it performs surprisingly well in use. As you noted, its impact resistance makes it ideal for flat panel work.

[Neal Clayton]

a 5 panel door has 14 tenons, if you properly split the bottom rail's tenon in two.

pick vertical grain for your stiles and forget about it warping, with that many joints. there's no need for most of the paranoia about doors warping, especially indoors, assuming you're going to properly mortise the joints and use vertical grained stiles.

also, the panels won't be that big in a 5 panel door, if you use 5" wide rails/stiles you can get panels out of a 12" wide board. so using real boards might not cost all that much, since they won't have to be overly large.

[Brett Nelson]

a 5 panel door has 14 tenons, if you properly split the bottom rail's tenon in two.

pick vertical grain for your stiles and forget about it warping, with that many joints. there's no need for most of the paranoia about doors warping, especially indoors, assuming you're going to properly mortise the joints and use vertical grained stiles.

also, the panels won't be that big in a 5 panel door, if you use 5" wide rails/stiles you can get panels out of a 12" wide board. so using real boards might not cost all that much, since they won't have to be overly large.


Not sure I can get actual quarter sawn poplar. Could pick through it and get the best pieces I can though. Was thinking about going with loose tenons, about 2.5" deep.

[Terry Hatfield]

I built all the interior door for our house a couple of years ago using white oak. All with loose tenons. I made a jig that the router rides in to cut all the mortises using a 3/4" plunging straight cutter. Worked great but took a while. White oak end grain is tough!!. Solid 1 3/8" rails and stiles with 3/4 plain sawn white oak ply for the panels. A couple of them have moved a little but nothing that is bothering me enough to make another. Sure beats the hollow core builder special doors that they replaced!

http://terryhatfield.com/album/4/9096261.jpg

[Peter Quinn]

Not sure I can get actual quarter sawn poplar. Could pick through it and get the best pieces I can though. Was thinking about going with loose tenons, about 2.5" deep.

Good luck getting QS poplar or S. maple. They just don't cut it that way. You might find wide poplar that you can pop a piece of mostly QS for a stile, or you might go through thousands of BF in a yard to find a few QS stiles, but I wouldn't bother with a 5 panel paint grade door.

I didn't mention it earlier, but most of the paint grade doors I make, including the ones in my own home, are cope and stick with dowels. The stub tenons are 5/8" deep, the dowels are straight grain hard maple, 1/2" X 5 1/2" spirals, milled to .490" to allow room for glue. I punch the holes with a slot mortiser now, but have used a basic self centering dowel jig and a long colt brad point. I buy the dowels from work, so I'm not sure about availability on those lengths generally. Loose tennons are a great option too. Dowels are so quick and so strong I usually don't bother with more for basic doors. I can tell you that 5 panel doors are very stable and strong with all those rails and joints, like Neil said, no warping for the most part.

[Jason White]

Here in the northeast, straight-grained fir is quite common for commercially-available wood doors. It's a soft wood, but fairly stable if sealed on all 6 sides.

Jason


First a little background. I live in a really arid climate. Humidity is not an issue here. If I sticker my wood and set a fan on it for a week or two, I can get really low MC before working with it.

I'm looking to undertake building solid wood doors for my parents' home. Almost all of them will be paint grade. Likely poplar but I could be persuaded toward soft maple too, although it would cost about 20% more.

Obviously Just using 8/4 stock for the rails and stiles would be the easiest. Using 4/4 and laminating is obviously preferred for stability.

Gluing and laminating turns an already time consuming task into a really lengthy project. We are talking about 25 doors. Is it completely necessary, or would I be ok just drying the 8/4 stock for a couple weeks and using that instead.

They want 5 panel shaker doors. All horizontal flat panels. I know I might get beat here for saying this, but they prefer me just using 3/4" MDF for the panels. They like the stability and the face strength of the MDF.

[Henry Ambrose]

I'd make them from maple and maple veneer plywood. Poplar will dent and scratch in use --much-- faster than maple.

Rough out and plane your stock then give it a while to move if its going to. Loose tenons will be good.

[Henry Ambrose]

I built all the interior door for our house a couple of years ago using white oak. All with loose tenons. I made a jig that the router rides in to cut all the mortises using a 3/4" plunging straight cutter. Worked great but took a while. White oak end grain is tough!!. Solid 1 3/8" rails and stiles with 3/4 plain sawn white oak ply for the panels. A couple of them have moved a little but nothing that is bothering me enough to make another. Sure beats the hollow core builder special doors that they replaced!

http://terryhatfield.com/album/4/9096261.jpg

Nice door!

[Gerry Grzadzinski]

We make a lot of doors in our shop, and always make them from 8/4 stock. Never have any problems.

[Neal Clayton]

Not sure I can get actual quarter sawn poplar. Could pick through it and get the best pieces I can though. Was thinking about going with loose tenons, about 2.5" deep.

i missed the part where you said poplar. you could use a different wood (since they'll be painted anyways) for the stiles if you're overly cautious, but personally i wouldn't be.

there's just so many joints in a door with that many panels that it will wind up very rigid on its own.

the general rule of thumb for tenon length on a door is 2/3 the stile width. 1/2 would be a minimum, imo.

use a third hinge in the middle and don't worry about it. they'll be fine.


Here in the northeast, straight-grained fir is quite common for commercially-available wood doors. It's a soft wood, but fairly stable if sealed on all 6 sides.

Jason

that's basically the same as what we have down here. in the south we have longleaf pine, which is very similar to your douglas fir up north.