Question from the peanut gallery

[Greg Ware]

My wife wants me to build a shelf for the family room we just finished in our basement, she would like it to match a built in desk and fit on the wall above the desk. So far so good. She would like it to be a narrow shelf to hold pictures and knick knacks. Ok I think I could do that. But, she wants it to be the length of the wall. The wall is just under 10" long. That's where I have my questions. I'm using alder to match the desk and the nailer is 1 X 3 and the shelf is 1 X 4 , with crown molding under the shelf. So what is the best way to glue the joints end to end. I have glued edges before and have used bisquits but this has me a little baffled. The shelf and the nailer pieces probably need to be different lengths so the joint on both pieces are not in the same place but do I use a bisquit or ?, and how do I clamp something this long. Any advice is greatly appreciated

Greg

[Terry Sparks]

I'm sure you will get as many different answers as you do replys but one option is to cut 5 or 6 45 degree blocks that are nailed to the 10' nailer and then either (first choice) glue or (second choice) nail your crown moulding to the blocks. You could also do the same on both ends and cope as you would an outside corner. All that left to do is attach the nailer to the wall and then attach the 10' horizontal board to the bottom assembly and enjoy.

[Jeff Bratt]

You can join together pieces to make a 10 foot shelf using lap joints (hope the ASCII picture shows up OK) [ ┌-----┘ ], so you won't need 10' long clamps. Gluing end grain doesn't work very well anyway. An overlap between pieces of at least a couple inches will work just fine. Additionally, you could fasten one or two of the lap joints with screws instead of glue if you want to be able to disassemble the shelf.

[Frank McKinney]

Another option might be to use a scarf joint, or a combination of scarf and half lap. Just a thought.

Frank

[David DeCristoforo]

As you will undoubtedly discover, there are numerous methods for joining boards end to end. But I am wondering... why don't you just get a couple of 10' long pieces of wood? Alder is certainly available in 10' lengths and even if it were not, you could use cherry and get the same basic tone (much nicer wood to boot). For the project you are describing, you would not need much wood so it's not going to "break the bank" and the end result will be better not to mention vastly easier to make.

YM

[Greg Ware]

Thanks guys, those are some good ideas. I like the idea of a lap joint, I think that would be a good fit for what I need. I have not been able to find alder in over 6' lengths. that was my first choice but no one out here has it and I cringe at the thought of shipping 10' pcs. If it doesn't look to bad I will post pictures when it's done.
Thanks for the help.

Greg

[Lee Koepke]

I sorta have been commissioned to do a similar project. Dont get mad, but mine will be much smaller and probably painted !!!

The half lap joint would be the strongest, but if you are using crown underneath (and do it properly ) that will support your shelf very very well.