Making Raised panel doors

[Gene Bukovi]

I picked up some wide cherry boards at Ganahls tonight and was wondering if I should still rip and glueup. How wide is too wide? I am making the center panels for raised panel doors. Will I have a warpage problem?

Thanks, Gene

[Steve Clardy]

As long as the panels are relative flat after surfacing, I use the widest ones I can

[Anthony Anderson]

I go 3-4" wide, depending on the width of the raised panel and alternating the growth rings/pattern. Just me though. Good Luck, Bill

[Phil Clark]

I'm new to Sawmill Creek but here goes. I've made numerous panels for table tops, frame & panel cupboards, and for doors. Wide boards usually contain the heart where all the action is. To relieve the stresses, I cut through the heart. I don't believe it is necessary to rotate the growth rings in flat sawn boards if the stresses have been relieved. After all, if you had resawn thicker boards, how would you get book-matched boards in your glue-up with the growth rings alternated. I keep my boards to about 5 inches regardless of starting with a nice 12 - 14 inch board. I have a ten year old harvest table made of 2 -1/2" douglas fir, made as described, starting with only 2 boards - nice and flat all the time.

[Jerry Olexa]

IMHO, no need to rip...

[Gene Bukovi]

Now I am confused. I'm pretty new to woodworking. I am enjoying a break from 25 years of steel work. I really appreciate the advice. This forum has been great help for me. Thanks Guy's.

Gene

[Steve Schoene]

Boards that contain the pith or heart can be unstable. In my mind that is one of the two reasons for ripping. The other occurs when a board is already warped and planing out the warp would remove so much wood as to make the board too thin for the application.

With those exceptions I always use boards as wide as possible. I've found plenty of lumber with wide boards that don't contain the pith. I bought a 16" jointer with just that in mind.

[Jim Becker]

Like others, I never rip a beautiful wide board if it can be avoided. Wide boards are gifts and meant to be enjoyed as they are, IMHO, of course...

[Gene Bukovi]

Thanks Jim and Steve. I value all of the opinions on this board. I do have a better feel on how to judge whether or not to rip. The boards I picked up are beautiful. They were at the bottom of a pallet of boards and I made a mess to get to them. The young girl helping thought I was too picky, but at $6.59 a board foot I wanted the best possible. Again, thank you very much for the help and I will post photos once I have some completed doors.


Gene

[Jim Hager]

I make skads of rp doors and only rip a wide board if there are some issues with it when I take it off the rack. I will have some cupped boards that I rip down, joint and glue back together just like they came out of the tree. I don't usually work on things that ain't broke to begin with.