Help please with joining red oak quarter round (clear finish)

[Mike OMelia]

I am considering buying a little under a 1000 ft of red oak quarter round. I want to replace all painted quarter round in my house. Part of an remodel project. A seller (going out of business :( ) has the footage but in 5-8 foot lengths only. So I want to join them. Using a router bit, I think. Please suggest bits and techniques if you know how. :)

Thanks!

Mike

[James Conrad]

Scarf Joint, no router.

[Brett Bobo]

+1 for a scarf joint. It's nearly invisible and I typically add a touch of glue to the joint too.

[Peter Quinn]

Skip it, buy some red oak in long lengths and make the 1/4 round. You are talking just under $250 worth of wood. Not sure what the seller is asking for the shorts, but to me once you factor in a finger joint bit or something and the time to joint all those pieces, just to come up with lots of joints on a fairly visible molding, well, not in my house. I'd save money elsewhere. Course if you really aren't set up to process long material I guess that changes the equation, but its not a tough molding to make with basic equipment. I'd use a shaper because I have one, but second choice would be a router freehand. I'll accept some scarfs on long walls or here and there, but at 6'-8' max, you are gong to have a house full of scarfs, they never stay invisible.

If you really insist on joining all those shorts I'd consider setting up a jig to do long scarfs like a strip boat joint. You need something like a 15 degree taper. Then you can glue them up and clamp them or use pin nails, its a reasonably strong glue joint because its long grain at that point. Finger joints are tough to clamp and fairly ugly for stain grade work, butt joints with a very small domino or dowel could work, or FF biscuits plunged in from the bottom then cut off the protruding half later. Still tough to get a clamp on any of these methods. The long thin scarf you could clamp with a simple wedge jig, such as you make a plywood C just wider than the molding, glue up, place the joint over the plywood jig, knock in wedges to clamp. Doesn't sound like any great joy on 1000LF

[scott vroom]

Skip the kerf joinery. Spend the money on longer lengths, will look much better. Don't skimp on finish work, it will show!

[Jim Matthews]

While I agree that longer runs should look better, it may not be feasible to the buyer due to cost constraints.

If you do scarf joints, think about the sight lines (http://books.google.com/books?id=cSXQU0gXwxEC&pg=PA157&lpg=PA157&dq=scarf+joints+and+sight+lines&source=bl&ots=sXmsRFkOE0&sig=4hBg5JYZ90j3wCrvbmJaRc_dk7w&hl=en&sa=X&ei=xPucUMH8BcHC0QHm_oBQ&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q&f=false) in the room.
If you can match grain closely at the joints, they may be
minimized to the point that only the installer will know.

[Mike OMelia]

There are no constraints. I've decided you are correct. I will buy longer lengths.

I have a nice router and table. 3.25 HP. I can shape my own.

Mike