Oak Veneer with Pre Glued Oak Edge Banding

[Jay Knobbe]

Attached are images of a counter top I am building. It is a 3/4" sheet of red oak ply bonded to a 3/4" sheet of birch ply, but not the high quality birch stuff. I am applying edge banding but am concerned since the edge banding and glue is kind of thick. I've applied wood edge banding before by applying special banding glue, heating, rolling, etc and had good results using a regular clothes iron. This glue and the thickness of the wood band has me asking for advice & tips from more experienced woodworkers. Thanks in Advance.

[Dan Barber]

Test it on some small off cuts to see what happens. I don't think you will have any issues. Maybe some glue squeeze out that can be easily cleaned up, but test it first to see.

[Kevin Jenness]

The glueline will be visible, that's the nature of hot melt glue, even with a commercial edgebander. I use an iron for heat and a wood block to press the banding down if I have to use the stuff, but I prefer a thicker solid wood band applied with wood glue, clamps and cauls for durability and a tighter glueline.

How thick is your banding? If it is much more than veneer thickness you may want to activate the glue directly with a heat gun as an iron may scorch the show side. A test will show what's what.

[Jay Knobbe]

The glueline will be visible, that's the nature of hot melt glue, even with a commercial edgebander. I use an iron for heat and a wood block to press the banding down if I have to use the stuff, but I prefer a thicker solid wood band applied with wood glue, clamps and cauls for durability and a tighter glueline.

How thick is your banding? If it is much more than veneer thickness you may want to activate the glue directly with a heat gun as an iron may scorch the show side. A test will show what's what.

Kevin, I'm leaning in that direction. The edge banding is .035 including the glue, .025, wood only. Plus the grain pattern is just ugly.
I could cut thin strips of red oak on my table saw. In your experience are 1/16" x 1.750 strips doable? I have never cut red oak that thin for the purpose of edge banding. For my application I think the thinner the better. TIA.

[Richard Coers]

I glue 1/8-3/16" solid wood as edge banding, then I can route an 1/8" round over and the seam basically disappears. No way would I try cutting 1/16". If you tried that, you would need a cawl to equal out the gluing pressure.

[Kevin Jenness]

For a single piece just glue a wider blank to the plywood, saw off the excess and cleanup the overhang and sawn face. For multiples saw your strips off a wider blank on the falloff side (not between blade and fence) using a featherboard, zero clearance insert and splitter. Joint the blank edge before each rip and glue that side to the plywood with a caul, then sand after glueup.

Your preglued edgebanding should work fine with an iron, it's not that thick.

[Michael Burnside]

I glue 1/8-3/16" solid wood as edge banding, then I can route an 1/8" round over and the seam basically disappears. No way would I try cutting 1/16". If you tried that, you would need a cawl to equal out the gluing pressure.

I recently did a book case and used 1/16 without issue. Well I used like 20 bandy clamps LOL but it was fine.

I ripped on my table saw and then final dimensioned on my drum sander before gluing. It looks perfect.