Wainscoting: plywood and lumber?

[Andrew Wayland]

I'll be making some wainscoting panels in my basement from cherry plywood and cherry lumber. I'm curious, though, of how I should assemble it all?

I know different woods expand and contract differently, but I'm not sure how it affects my project.

The way I see it I have 3 options... please let me know how you would do this:

1: I simply cut the plywood to the final shape, then glue and tack the wood lumber frame over the plywood. I'm not worried about edges here: so the plywood would be the same dimension as the lumber overlay.

2: as above: I'd simply lay the lumber overlay onto the plywood; but no glue. Alternatively I could nail the plywood to the wall, and then nail the overlay on top.

3: I could rabbet the lumber overlay, and then cut the plywood to fit into the rabbet. I wouldn't have clearance for a strip to hold the plywood in, so I would have to carefully nail the assembly to the wall, so the plywood floats, and the wall holds it in place. My concern here is if my rabbet tolerances aren't right: dust will easily collect between the panel and lumber "frame"

[Lee Schierer]

Considering at some point down the road you or someone may want to remodel the room. I would advise against gluing the plywood to the existing wall. Use option #3 to do your wainscoting. Plywood doesn't expand and contract like regular wood so allowing clearance wood movement isn't a problem. Your rails and stiles will be relatively narrow so their dimension change due to humidity changes will also be very small.

[Andrew Wayland]

Considering at some point down the road you or someone may want to remodel the room. I would advise against gluing the plywood to the existing wall. Use option #3 to do your wainscoting. Plywood doesn't expand and contract like regular wood so allowing clearance wood movement isn't a problem. Your rails and stiles will be relatively narrow so their dimension change due to humidity changes will also be very small.

Sorry; maybe I didn't explain option one correctly: I was just going to glue the plywood to the lumber face frame I'm building (not sure what you'd call it). Then I'd just tack that whole assembly as one to the wall.

[Martin Wasner]

There's two ways I've done it. It depends whether you want to build them on-site, or if you want to do them in a shop.

If I do them in the shop, I just do cope and stick panels, then finish off the cap and whatever else trim goes on them, on site. I just lay it over the rock. Sometimes you have to open up a wall and move an outlet, but oh well.

If I have to build them on-site, I'll the sheetrock off to the height of my panels, minus whatever cap is going on it, and just replace the rock with ½" sheet material. Then just nail the frames on over the sheet stock. Often I'll just build big face frames in the shop and bring them on-site.

It depends what look you want to go for. Do you need a deep offset from the have to the panel for a moulding? Is it all just flat? You want to be careful your wainescoting doesn't get really thick or wherever it has to tie into the casing will look odd. Also depends what you've got for casing.

I've never built cope and stick panels and nailed them straight to the studs, that could work pretty well and keep everything low profile. Tough to trim the top out not having much to nail to though.

There's lots of options

[Andrew Wayland]

My main concern was really if the expansion/contraction differences between plywood and cherry stock would affect how I actually assemble the wainscoting panels.

I have the luxury of doing these on-site.... and actually kept outlets out of the way of my project when we roughed in the space! (For once in my life I actually took future plans into consideration!!! Can't say it for the rest of my project... but I'm learning, haha!)

[Ken Combs]

My main concern was really if the expansion/contraction differences between plywood and cherry stock would affect how I actually assemble the wainscoting panels.
)

Assuming the solid stock is fairly narrow (less than 6" probably 2-3") there really shouldn't be any wood movement issues as the plywood won't move at all.

I've done similar things. Used cope and stick to make up the panels with the top rail being a little wider. The top rail was one piece up to 10' long with the stiles coped to it, sort of backwards compared to a cabinet door.. Then routed a decorative edge directly onto the finished panel before installing. That way you can avoid a seperate cap/trim on the top.

[Andrew Wayland]

Sounds good: I was planning a similar setup: a long continuous rail top and bottom (about 4" wide) and stiles placed in. I was sticking with shaker style, only because I can't seem to find a profile I love....

the top would be covered by a continuous 4" wide shelf at the height of my bar (basically an extension of the bar-rail)

[Andrew Wayland]

I want to re-open this conversation quickly:

Instead of cope-stick method, I was just looking to route a rabbet into the cherry lumber: should I not be gluing the 1/4 plywood to the rabbet?

(basically do I float or glue the plywood in?)