The doors are done!!!!!!

[Terry Hatfield]

Well...tonite was the nite....

We finally got all the doors done for my buddy Lanny's kitchen remodel. This was my first attempt at cathedral top doors. Not as easy as it looks. :confused: I have made plenty of square raised panel doors, but these were a bit more work. Template work was something I had not done much of. I also usually cut the raised panels with a vertical bit. These obviously have to be done with a horizontal bit. A chunk of carbide over 3" in diameter spinning at 10,000 rpm's was a little intimidating at first, but I eventually got the hang of it.

Thanks to Steve Clardy and others here that gave me some much appreciated help along the way.

Lanny got his wood at my usual supplier, Nation's Hardwood. They have an awesome selection of wood there. Lanny chose some beautiful white oak boards for the project. Lanny has seen me do much grain matching in the past and wanted to do the same for his kitchen. Keeping track enough grain matched pieces for a piece of furniture is one thing, but for an entire kitchen?????? Whew...glad it's over, but hopefully it was worth it.

I spend an entire day just trying to match the boards that had to be glued up for the raised panels. All but 9 raised panels were able to be done from a single boards. Nations often has really wide boards, but some of these raised panels are near 20" wide, so getting the panels that had to be glued up to match well was my responsibility.

Here is some of my matched panels. I think these are not too bad!!

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Lanny did his own matching on the stiles and rails. He did a really good job keeping track of the million or so pieces it took to do this job.

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Here are some of the drawer fronts. We did a little raised panel treatment on the edges.

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Lanny helped out a lot on this project. Here he is doing a little coping at the router table.

<IMG src=http://www.terryhatfield.com/lannycoping.JPG>

And this was the pic I have been wanting to take..... :D :D :D bye bye hehehehehe

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All in all I think the doors and drawer fronts turned out great. Now if Lanny's wife thinks the same, we are in!!!!!

Thanks for looking,

Terry

[Dennis Peacock]

<B>Excellent Job!!!!</B>

I know you are glad to be done with all that!!! :)

Now....you gonna teach me how to do that? ;)

[Terry Hatfield]

Dennis,

Shoot...it ain't no thang.

You just cut a board the right length for your raised panel and then compare it to every inch of about 50 other boards 'til you find a section that looks like it's brother...well...at least it's cousin. :D Then do it all over again if you need 3 boards for the raised panel, see, simple. :eek:

Keeping track of the stiles and rails is really the PITA of this entire deal. The stiles that will be together on 2 doors when they are on the cabinets are cut from the same board, but like I said, they end up in 2 different doors, so lots of pencil marks, numbers and letters for each piece. The rails I try to match from one door to the next as well. I also try and buy wide boards that I rip the straight grain off of for the stiles and rails, especially the stiles. I think it just looks better than crazy grain on these narrow pieces.

It really is a nite mare trying to keep them all straight, but the look you get in the end product is worth the trouble...I guess, I keep telling myself it is anyway.

Talk to you later,

t

[John Miliunas]

This Terry guy is some kind of magician or something! Now, we've all seen pics of his clinic....errrrrrr....shop. If you will note in pic #5, he's shooting a guy actually *working* at one of the machines and there's *STILL* no sawdust in sight! OK Terry, give it up: What kind of hocus pocus are you practicing? :D BTW, nice job of the cabinet parts! :cool:

[Terry Hatfield]

John,

If you look closely in the pic of Lanny coping, you can see just a little bit of sawdust on one of the mats. That's all the cyclone missed from the planer after planing about 100 bd.ft. or so.:D :D :D Not magic, just a good collection.

Emptied the 52 gallon drum 3 times during this project. Swept up about a quart of sawdust that was missed. Pretty cool. :D

Terry

[Jim Becker]

Now you have first-hand experience that you can use to 'splain to people why customer built furniture costs more than the stuff at Wallly-world or any of those furniture stores with sales every day of the year!

Great job, Terry!

[Terry Hatfield]

I hear ya Jim,

Lanny and Cathy got a BIG dose of sticker shock when they priced some "ready made" doors and drawer fronts. That's when I volunteered to give them a hand. I know they saved a bunch of $$$$, and I feel certain they got a much better and prettier result. I bet those production guy's that whip these things out for Lowes do do much grain matching. :D

Lanny bought the wood, the templates and the raised panel bit. I donated my shop and labor. Lanny is a really good friend and co-worker. I can't remember for sure, but I believe the production doors/drawer fronts were around $2000 or so. These cost him and about $700, and a BIG steak dinner for me at his house when the job is done!!!! :D

Terry

[Jim Becker]

...but I believe the production doors/drawer fronts were around $2000 or so. These cost him and about $700, and a BIG steak dinner for me at his house when the job is done!!!!

Yea, this is my experience with the kitchen project. For all the work and agravation, it's still saving SWMBO and I about $30K. The good news is that as of yesterday afternoon...we have a "fully functional" kitchen again after two months of "creativity". There is still a lot of work to do, but a great amount of satisfaction towards the results so far. I do look forward to getting back to other woodworking and turning projects, however!

[Terry Hatfield]

Jim,

Glad to hear your remodel is drawing to a close. :D I bet you could not have bought cabinets and such that are of the quality you built. One of these days when we get to build a new house I plan on doing all the cabinets my self just for that reason.

Terry

[Bob Lasley]

Terry,

The doors look great! How many different sizes did you make? You are absolutely right about the grain matching. Production run doors are made out of whatever is next in the stack. I'm surprised they don't finger joint the scraps and make doors out of those.

Excellent work!

Bob

[Jason Roehl]

I'm with Bob on this--much better looking than production-run doors!! Great job, and I'm glad you got them done before the BBQ, otherwise Ken may have had to do some work. :D

Still not sure if I'm going to make it, but it's still a possibility!!

[Jim Becker]

I'm surprised they don't finger joint the scraps and make doors out of those.

They probably do...and then slather on so much "faux wood finish" that you can't see the joints... :D

[Terry Hatfield]

Bob,

There were 7 different widths, and 5 different lengths.

It was quite a project!!! Hopefully that look a little better than the , "next board off the stack" ones.

terry

[David LaRue]

Terry,

Lanny appears to be using a foot operated switch. Is he using it to turn off and on the router?

I ask because, I purchased one of these a bunch of years ago, and while I was in the shop this week end I ran across it. Up until now I have not used it. Seems like a good idea when spinning the large router bits, something I have yet to do.

Dave

[Terry Hatfield]

Dave,

Yup....I have used the foot switch for the router table since I began woodworking. I feel it is much safer and certainly more convenient than any sort of switch mounted on the cabinet itself. Especially nice for repetitive routing like doing a thousand cope cuts on door rails etc.

I bought this one at Sears for $20. Give it a try, I bet you like it.

Terry

[Steve Clardy]

Looks very evenly matched. Doors are a lot of work. I just finished a set of 40 doors, luckily they were straight tops, less work.
But-- wait till you run across someone that wants arched doors on the top and bottom rails, both upper and lowers!!! arghh, talk about time consuming. I did one set of 42 doors for a job that was that way, sprayed with white lacquer, and it seemed like the doors would never end. :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:
Steve

[Jim Baker]

Awesome job on the doors, Terry. The grain matching is excellent. Hopefully all who visit the kitchen will be appropriately impressed with your work.

Grain and color matching is a big pet peeve of mine. I try to do it as carefully as I can. Unfortunately sometimes there just isn't enough material in the shop to do it as well as I would like.

We have a lot of Amish furniture shops in our area. People rave about the quality. I agree that everything is very well made and the finish is excellent. However, when it comes to grain and color matching, most of what I've seen is very poor. In most cases, you can find straight grained pieces edge joined with crazy grained pieces of an entirely different color. It appears that they just grab the next board on the pile.

Again - wonderful job on the doors. I hope you enjoy your steak dinner.

[Terry Hatfield]

I'm with Bob on this--much better looking than production-run doors!! Great job, and I'm glad you got them done before the BBQ, otherwise Ken may have had to do some work. :D

Still not sure if I'm going to make it, but it's still a possibility!!
Jason,

I got email from Ray Saying that you, Al Crandall and Jerry Arnold are all coming together to the bbq. Boy, I bet that will be a hoot of a trip. :D Trust me, it's a l o n g way for there to here. I remember the trek to Ray's !!!!!

Looking forward to seeing you guy's.

Terry

[Terry Hatfield]

Steve,

We did arched uppers and lowers, 26 in all. I could not imagine arching the top and the bottom of each door!!!!!

See you in a couple of weeks,

t

[Terry Hatfield]

Thanks, JB...

Once you start doing it, you can't stop. It just doesn't look right to me any more if I don't try and match the grain as close as possible. Lots more work, but I do love the end result.

Terry