Tall Cabinet doors

[Jay Jolliffe]

I have to make some frame & panel cabinet doors out of poplar with 1/2'' birch plywood panels & they will be painted. I've made plenty smaller cabinet doors & many house doors but never any cabinet doors 6'+ tall & 16 -20'' wide. I'm planing on using 5/4 poplar. Any pearls of wisdom on how to make them so they're not liable to warp.

[David Werkheiser]

Switch to soft maple, it is more stable. If your locked in to poplar, oversize your stock by 1/4" and let it acclimate to the shop for a week or two. Reface and joint to straighted stock if necessary. If you have quarter saw poplar, that would be the best. I would also use magnets at the top and bottom of all doors over 33" tall.
David

[david brum]

If you're going to paint the doors, you might consider laminating the stiles in order to make them more stable. For example, instead of 4" solid stiles, you'd use 4 x 1" strips as a glue up. I am just finishing a pair of VG Fir interior french doors. In researching how they're built, I was surprised to find that the stiles are usually laminated pine or some type of stable fiber board, with veneer on the outside. This is done to keep the stiles from warping over time.

We have a pair of 3/4" poplar frame and panel closet doors in our house (which I did not build thank goodness). They provide a text book example of wood movement through the seasons, nearly flat in winter and at least 1/2" of warp in summer so they can't be closed. I plan to eventually build laminated doors to replace them.

[John TenEyck]

I built these doors as part of my kitchen remodel. They are over 7 feet tall and about 18" wide, and are made of 3/4" maple veneer plywood and soft maple stiles about 7/8ths thick. The stiles are bisquit joined to the edges of the plywood. They are attached to the frameles cabinets with 5 blum euro hinges. 15 years now and they have not warped yet, summer or winter in my un-AC'd house.


191779

[Dennis Peacock]

Thread moved at OP's request.

[Chip Lindley]

Hi Jay. Your doors will be just as flat as the part that make them up. I see the birch ply panels as your main worry. Seldom is plywood perfectly flat. Pick the flattest sheet of ply you can find.

Your 5/4 poplar rail and stile parts must be jointed flat and straight. If possible cut both inner stiles that will close side-by-side, from the same flattest board you can find. That way, any variation will be the same in both doors.

A 6 ft. tall door usually incorporates a center rail, with two panels. This will lessen the warp of one long ply panel. Dry-fit the doors together before gluing. If they lay flat on a true surface, they should be flat after glueup.