Flat Panel Cabinet Doors

[Stuart Johnson]

I'm making doors for cabinets in the shop out of White Oak railes and stiles with flat Walnut panels. The panels are 7" x 26-1/8" x 1/4". The actual opening is 6-1/2" x 25 1/2". Will I run into trouble if I use single boards wide enough for the panels or would I be better off ripping them 3-1/2" and gluing up to make the 7" width? The shop my garage and has the normal Red Oak (Dallas) swing in both tempature and humidity.

[Jim Hager]

I think you would be fine to use wider boards for the panels. I do all the time and I run 40-60 doors most weekends with none coming back to me. I usually use plywood for flat panels and solids for raised panels. Can you get your hands on some 1/4 walnut? I can get it here but some times it is not available everywhere.

[John Miliunas]

Stuart, IMHO, you should be just fine with that. 7" is not that wide and I don't believe you'd gain anything from ripping and re-gluing. I have panels like that in both, my shop and in our main bathroom, though they're wider. Mine are Oak in the shop and Maple in the house. Be sure you do seal them up properly and make sure you put some "Space Balls" or something like that in the groove for the panels to "float", especially side to side.:) :cool:

[Todd Burch]

There are a couple problems that might come up, but you can avoid them if you plan ahead.

1) Don't get glue squeeze out on the corners of your solid wood panel when you assemble the frame. You can either round off the corners of the panel so they won't jamb into the corner in the groove where glue squeeze is most likely, or, you can be very conservative with glue towards the area that would cause it to squeeze out, or, you can put some wax on the corners of the panels so the glue won't be as likely to stick to it, or you can do a combination of the three things. If you wait a minute or two after you apply the glue, more will absorb into the wood of the rails and stiles and less will squeeze out. Put glue on both pieces.

2) If the panel decides to not stay flat and cups, you don't want a big gap anywhere (middle or edge) due to the cupping, or you want to minimize the action of the cupping. You can do this by making the grooves in the rails and stiles a good snug fit for the panel. The fit can be snug and the panel will still expand and contract. You don't want to have to bang on the panel to get it to fit into the groove, as that is too tight. You also don't want to be able to stick too many playing cards (cheap spacers) between the panel and edges of the groove.

If you do these two things, you'll be in good shape.

I've never used space balls, but I think they would be good to keep panel rattling down in cabinets where they might rattle due to noise vibrations (like a stereo cabinet). For a shop cabinet, I wouldn't waste the time.

When I have tolerances that cause a panel to be loose in a groove, I would rather have a large gap at the back of the panel, inside the cabinet, than in the front. In those situations, I shoot a pin nail through the panel and into the rails/stiles to keep the panel pushed to the front. The panels will still expand and contract with the pin nails in place.

Todd