Wood Choice for solid Interior doors

[ChrisA Edwards]

So my wife informed me of my upcoming winter project, I thought I'd retired, but I guess I still have a Boss.

She wants me to replace all the hollow, fake panel, interior doors with solid wood doors. We had tall (8') solid wood doors, in our last house, and she wants something similar.

I'm looking at 7 doors downstairs and between 6 and 11 upstairs, if I do bedroom closet doors to match.

These will be painted.

She hasn't decided on a style yet, but I can have some influence on that.

I do have a Shaper with power feeder, which sadly has seen little use since I bought it.

Right now, I'm leaning towards using Poplar, but have reasonable access to most common hardwoods.

Thanks

[Warren Lake]

door companies ive seen use lots of Poplar. Last ubber nice home i was in all the doors were poplar and stained to look like Walnut. Whoever built them did a great job. Owner installed them and he did a great job. He also put a ball catches on the bedroom double doors at the bottom. Not sure maybe the top as well. Ball catches kept the doors lined up nicely where two sat side by side. What is your final finish going to be sprayed lac of some type?

[Richard Coers]

I like soft maple better than poplar for paint grade. Some poplar can be a little fuzzy and takes a bit more prep for a perfect paint job. What is the advantage of redoing all the doors with handmade doors when they will just be painted?

[Donald G. Burns]

Our house in California came with solid pine interior doors stained in some awful reddish color. I don't know what wood they were supposed to match, but we had them sprayed white and installed some real hardware to replace the "contractor grade" stuff supplied in antique gold. Just one of many upgrades that we did to remove the cookie cutter one of 10,000,000 appearance. The doors themselves were decent compared to the hollow core stuff. If you're going to paint them why not clear pine?

[roger wiegand]

It's a fair amount of work for a modest result, IMO. Good quality, commercially made solid doors (composite materials with inset panels) look very good when painted, the weight feels very solid, and they are stable and sound-deadening. They come in a myriad of styles. I doubt you can save any money making your own given the cost of lumber-- as I recall the slabs ran a couple hundred bucks each from Simpson. Ours have been in use for 9 years now and I've found nothing about them to complain about.

I guess I'd use soft maple for rails and stiles, with birch (or similar) plywood panels for paint grade. Clear pine would be fine, but is a lot more expensive here than poplar or maple and offers no particular advantage.

[ChrisA Edwards]

What is the advantage of redoing all the doors with handmade doors when they will just be painted?

Not sure, I think the wife just likes the feeling of the weight and the noise a solid door makes as it closes compared to a hollow door.

[Paul F Franklin]

Not sure, I think the wife just likes the feeling of the weight and the noise a solid door makes as it closes compared to a hollow door.

I'm with her...I hate the feel of hollow core doors, especially for pocket doors. That said, I have no trouble buying solid core interior doors from my suppliers. They are some kind of low density particle board inside but have nice heft and solid feel. Not to talk you out of building your own, of course, but I'd at least do a price comparison.

[Warren Lake]

If pine was a good choice then door makers would use it they dont at least the main ones ive seen in the toronto area. Ive seen a lift of 8/4 poplar sitting by the jointer a few times then walnut or some other wood if its a non paint thing.

Chrisa your wife is smarter than most people noticing what most dont. Likely best not to tell her that. The home i mentioned was probably 4 million at the time some years ago. Above average cost but not insane. Guy won the lottery and bought two homes tore them down to have a wider lot and built the home. Press board same old fake news would not have maintained the quality of the home and in fact been a downer to see them in there. I was impressed and he was happy that someone noticed and more so honed in on details and asked questions.

[John TenEyck]

If commercial doors don't meet the requirements then I'd use soft maple and MDF panels, whether raised or flat. They will have a very solid feel and sound when they close. Poplar is too soft for passage doors, IMO.

John

[Jared Sankovich]

I like soft maple better than poplar for paint grade. Some poplar can be a little fuzzy and takes a bit more prep for a perfect paint job. What is the advantage of redoing all the doors with handmade doors when they will just be painted?

You could say the same about mdf trim..

I'd use poplar or soft maple with mdf panels.

[Jacob Mac]

If painted is the decision, I would buy them. Unless you are dying to build doors.

[ChrisA Edwards]

So I'm a retiree, now hobbyist woodworker. The doors we have work fine, they open and closed are not beat up.

If they are going to be replaced, for relatively cosmetic purposes, it's because I'm going to build them, even if it costs me about the same in materials as what a commercial door may cost.

I have the tools, have justified buying some of these tools for these type of projects.

So that's pretty much where my head is at.

[lowell holmes]

See if someone has scraps to experiment with. Or buy a board or two and experiment.

[ChrisA Edwards]

I like the idea of the Soft Maple and mdf panels. I have a gantry CNC on order, so the panels might be a good test for the CNC.

[Andrew More]

My experience with buying door is that you only get a good deal on them if you're buying standard doors. I live in a 100 year old home, need some standard 5 panel pine doors made to fit, and was quoted $500 per pine door and $500 for shipping. This was about 5 years ago, before the increases in lumber and shipping. I got another quote from an online company, this time $500 per door, but only $250 for shipping.

I ended up outfitting an entire shop full of tools for less than the quoted $2000 for two doors.

[Erik Loza]

Poplar is what I see in most local shops. We have MDF interior doors in the house and I'm not really a fan, to be honest.

Erik

[Jim Dwight]

I made all the interior doors in our Pittsburgh, PA house two houses ago. I used construction lumber for the frames, planned to 1 3/8, and shelving boards for the panels. I would not do it this way again but they worked. The issue, of course, was the higher moisture content and associated shrinkage in this material. I made another door for my shop in my previous house with only one flat panel with what I thought was a pretty nice home made molding around it. The frame of this one panel door was about 5.5 inches wide, versus 3 1/4 for the four panel doors which puts the lockset much closer to the center. Bottom rail was much wider, like 11 inches. I made a nice sturdy door I painted white. The MDF panel was 1/2 inch thick.

I would not use MDF for anything other than a flat panel that will be painted. When you cut MDF, like for raising a panel, the dust is horrible and the resulting surface is very difficult to paint. It sucks up finish terribly. I used it for the louvers in a bunch of window shutters and really regretted it. I made it work but wood was so much nicer and easier to use.

I think poplar is fine for things that will be painted. It's color variation is not attractive to me. Maple has advantages but I do not like to paint it or other nicer hardwoods. Seems like a waste to me. It is harder but we found softwood doors, stained and poly finished, to be completely servicable. So Poplar should be too. Depends some on how hard you will be on them but for a retired couple I would think it would be limited abuse.

If I built them, I would probably use poplar and paint them white like my current doors. If they had raised panels they would be poplar too. But I would try to find a flat panel design I liked. It's less work and I think the doors would still have the appropriate heft (mdf is heavy after all). I would make the mortise and tenon joints with my Domino (XL). It is by far the fastest and easiest way to make mortise and tenon joints. I plan to sell my hollow chisel mortiser next week. Since getting the domino I have not used it once. I would cut the doors to final size and bevel the lock edge with my track saw.

[Tom M King]

I'm sure you'll figure out the wood, but I'm adding something else.

Build some rotisseries. I just painted a couple of doors this week, with one having natural finish on one side. Decades ago, when I was building new houses, we'd set up one room as the spray room. Now that I do such spraying outside, I'm wishing I'd made some with casters.

Also, I used to use a 5" ROS, that could be easily used with one hand. Now that I have a 6" beast, with great dust collection, I use that when I can. The two door job this week showed the need for an indexing system, so I don't have to hold the door with one hand.

The ends that get screwed to the door ends are 7/8" wide, and I think 18" long. The height in the rotisserie needs to be about an inch above what sawhorses you will set them on, before installing them in the rotisserie. With the door laying on the sawhorses, one end of one of the ends is screwed in place, and the next step requires you to lift the other side of the door, and install the other screw. When both ends are screwed on, the sawhorses can be slid out, and the stretchers installed on the rotisserie ends.

These things are great. The door ends are painted with a brush when the door is lowered back on the sawhorses, after disassembling the rotisserie. I don't even bother to look at the ends when I'm spraying.

This picture is from this week. The moving dollies required my Wife's help to keep from pulling one end off the dolly when out on rough ground. That's the first time I realized that casters would be good.

I don't keep stretchers for them, and just use what I have laying around.

[Tom M King]

I route the hinge mortises, with the door next to the sawhorses. Then it's positioned on the sawhorses, and installed in a rotisserie.

I like to install locks after the door is hanging on the hinges. I've never used a prehung door. For efficiency, painting/finishing the doors first saves steps. Once it's hanging on hinges, it doesn't come back off.

Here are a couple of pictures I took this week of my decades old lock mortising jigs. The wear edges were hardened with epoxy. These were made before template bits, with built on bearings were commonly available, so require a guide bushing. It's much easier to make a jig for template bits, because you can test fit the template with the piece of hardware. Usually, I use quick clamps for the one with the c-clamps, but C-clamps were at hand, so I used them. Quick clamps, with smooth plastic pads, don't require extra padding like these C-clamps did.

The lock strike template is held on with one screw, that will have its hole covered by the stop. The fence is thin enough to rest in the reveal between the casing, and the corner of the jamb. Jamb corners are radiused with a 1/16" radius bit.

These templates don't put a hole anywhere it can be seen after the door hanging is finished.

Find my long post on these Forums somewhere, about my method for hanging doors. They should shut easy, with one sound, and no lost motion after latched. It covers measurements of clearance, and other details. I don't hang a door, and trim it to fit. I set the jambs to work with what clearances I want for the door.

If you're making all new doors, I hope you're not going to hang them in prehung jambs that are probably there for the hollow core doors.

[Tom M King]

Here are another rotisserie picture that I already had in the Gallery here.
462445

[Tom M King]

If you have doors with separate colors on opposite sides, see my current thread in Finishing Forum about cutting the tape with a marking gauge, and pulling the tape off while the paint is still wet. It leaves an absolutely perfect edge.

[ChrisA Edwards]

Thank you Tom, I am fortunate that my shop is two story and I have setup a temporary 8'L x 10'W x 7'H spray booth. I have an Apollo Turbine HVLP that I have used with good success spraying SW Emerald.

But I really like that saw horse idea for painting. I was thinking more of a frame to hang the doors vertically, but I like you method more.

[Jim Becker]

I made a couple of doors at our previous property. I used poplar for the rails and stiles and .5" (really 12mm) birch plywood for the panels. Poplar (yellow poplar/tulip poplar) or soft maple are both excellent for this purpose, IMHO.

[Tom M King]

The pivot for the rotisserie is just a screw with a couple of washers on it so the door has a little clearance when you rotate the door.

[ChrisA Edwards]

Your comment about the Jams have me a little concerned, must admit, didn't think about those being solid enough to carry the extra weight.

Worst case scenario, I may have to do a bit of structural reinforcement.

[Keegan Shields]

I built a soft maple door with a stained glass panel about 6 months ago. It replaced a hollow core door and is doing fine. I did use longer screws to ensure the hinges were mounted solid. It has survived kids slamming it so far. It does have a nice solid feel to it and I think it will hold up better over the long run than poplar. I made some 1/4” shop veneer for the panels and glued it to both sides of a 1/4” MDF panel.

[Greg Quenneville]

My wife and I are building a traditional home in Australia. We were quoted $36,000-$39,000 for 24 six-panel doors, paint grade (all of them 88” tall, and wider than standard). I made them myself using western red cedar and mdf panels using a router table. I recommend a shaper, which I have now). For what its worth, I used router bits from Infinity Tools, and did not have to sharpen them during those long days of making 360 seperate components. Including the cost of 750 14mm dominoes, I saved around $32,000 off the high quote.

For finishing I used my Festool BS75 belt sander with frame which is a fantastic tool for the job*, finishing with the Rotex. Following an old tip in Fine Homebuilding, we stacked them vertically in a zig-zag fashioned and nailed cleats to the top to support them. This allowed me to spray both sides and edges on all the doors in two rows.

I used cedar because I could get it cheaply, the quality was excellent, and there aren’t many good choices for solid doors. If soft maple had been available here I would have used that. Cedar, while a traditional wood for doors, is pretty soft and needs a lot of stain blocking primer prior to paint. The Zinsser rep knows me by name by now.

*the Festool belt sanders may not be available in North America I seem to recall from a discussion years ago.

[ChrisA Edwards]

Interesting that you mention Cedar. the town where I live is known as Cedar City and I have a large Cedar mill just up the road. I've also got a boat load of it sitting in my enclosed trailer, I planned on building some large raised vegetable boxes, but the Body nixed that idea.

Maybe I build a prototype out of that....

[Brian Runau]

I bought doors from menards, fir. And stained them English chestnut. 225 per door could not justify the time to build them vs the price.

[William Hodge]

I used to build doors fairly often. I have found that poplar is more stable and paints better than Eastern white Pine. I like pine a lot, but the forest science people have been encouraging faster growth for 60 years. Now a lot of the clear pine will have 4 growth rings per inch. The poplar I see from the wholesalers is a lot better.

If you're going to make the doors out of wood, it would be a shame to use plastic panels. MDF is wood and plastic. However, plastic panels do work better with plastic paint, which is what acrylic paint is. The new paints glue the panels in place. Seasonal wood movement does not respect glued panel joints. Shellac primer and milk paint are not plastic, and don't tend to glue the panels in place.

[Jim Becker]

The most important thing about the lumber you choose for your doors is that it is stable...doors absolutely need to stay flat by themselves. So regardless of species you choose, pick the stuff out carefully, as thicker lumber can have more risk of movement during/after milling to size. I honestly got around that by doing a laminated door construction which made doing "really big and deep" mortise and tenon a snap since I could account for that in the lamination process. ;)

[John TenEyck]

I used to build doors fairly often. I have found that poplar is more stable and paints better than Eastern white Pine. I like pine a lot, but the forest science people have been encouraging faster growth for 60 years. Now a lot of the clear pine will have 4 growth rings per inch. The poplar I see from the wholesalers is a lot better.

If you're going to make the doors out of wood, it would be a shame to use plastic panels. MDF is wood and plastic. However, plastic panels do work better with plastic paint, which is what acrylic paint is. The new paints glue the panels in place. Seasonal wood movement does not respect glued panel joints. Shellac primer and milk paint are not plastic, and don't tend to glue the panels in place.

If you use MDF or plywood panels you can glue them into the frame. That's the whole point, actually, since neither moves much seasonally, and you end up with an incredibly strong door. It also allows you to caulk the panel/frame joints, if needed, and get a beautiful painted finish with no cracks or gaps.

John

[Joseph Montroy]

Lowe's (gasp!) had solid oak, 6 panel doors that were even pre- hung on solid oak sides for just under $200. I shellac'd them and hung them, we couldn't be happier with how they've worked for the past couple years. Solid, heavy doors that deaden sound, too. I believe they were Jeld-wen.

[Eric Anderson]

I was at my wood supplier yesterday and was asking about the cost of 4/4 popular cause I have some interior doors in my future project plans. Popular has gone through the roof. 4/4 Popular is now (at least in central Texas) is the same price as red oak or within a few cents. Every time I go prices seem to be going crazy. Prefinished birch has gone from $63 to $75 in three weeks. Is anyone else seeing a huge increase in pricing for fine lumber, while softwoods and construction lumber is finally coming back to earth.

[Jim Becker]

Eric, the price increases you are seeing may be related to transportation costs for a species like yellow poplar which doesn't grow in your geography.