Making cabinet doors

[Bob Huddleston]

I am getting ready to begin making doors for the cabinets I am amking for my workroom. The carcasses are 3/4" melamine with oak face frames. Has anyone used pocket screws to make the door frames? I do not have the router jigs needed to make "normal" doors, but I suppose I could do it on my tablesaw. Just looking for ideas, I guess.

Thanks!

[Ralph Barhorst]

I have done it and it worked fine.

[Jamie Buxton]

Pocket screw the door frames? That is, you'll be looking at the screws every time you open the door???

[J.R. Rutter]

I think that for you the main consideration will be how much you want to hide. If you dado grooves for the panel so the back of the door looks nice, you will have the grooves showing at the butt joint top and bottom. Mitering the corners will hide the grooves, and let you do any sort of inside edge detail you want to dress them up. If you rabbet the panels into the back of the door, then you have less attractive backs.

Biscuits - works for either mitered or butt joint corners.
Pocket screws - ditto.
Splines - for butt joints, will fill in the groove. cut matching dado on rail ends with same grooving setup used for rails and stiles.
Sliding dovetails - groove parts, then rout a female dovetail into ends of stiles, male on ends of rails, slide rails into ends of stiles. Very cool.

Good luck!

[Jamie Buxton]

You can make nice frame&panel doors with nothing more than a table saw, and they're pretty quick.

There's five pieces of wood in the door: the panel (probably hardwood-veneer plywood in your case), two rails, and two stiles. In this design, the stiles run the full height of the door. The rails run from rail to rail. Start by using the table saw to cut dadoes on the inside faces of all the lumber. The dado is the same width as the plywood is thick. It will probably require two passes with the saw. Then cut tenons on the ends of the rails. They'll be as long as the dado is deep. Then cut the plywood to fit. When you assemble the door, the tenons fit into the dados on the rails. If you use plywood for the panel, do glue it in; there's no need to let it float.

[Eric Shields]

Bob,

I just completed a couple of sets myself using just the table saw. I ran a 1/2" deep, 1/4" wide groove through the inside edge of my 3/4" rails and stiles. My panels are 1/2" ply that are cut to the same size as the opening plus 1" (compensating for the grooves in the frame). I cut a rabbit on all four sides of the panel 1/2" wide, 1/4" deep. I mitered the corners of the frame and assembled so you get a nice flat back and a railes panel front. You can dress up the front of your door with a routed edge. Pretty simple, pretty quick, and no rail and stile bits needed.

Eric