Need advice on laminating

[Matt Ocel]

I am building a set of interior doors for my workshop to garage area (and hopefully enter them into the Freud door contest) using re-claimed red wood decking for the raised panels.

I will be needing 2 raised panels that will be 25" wide, with one at 40" tall and the other at 25" tall, and 1 3/8" thick.

I am milling the decking to 1/2 thick and edge glueing them together.

I then will laminate the panels onto 3/8" thick plywood, to get to my 1 3/8" thickness.

My question -

What glue, and what procedure should I use?
I have no vacuum press.

I was thinking of using contact cement,

or

Use yellow glue then have a pacaderm sit on it for a couple of hours.

Any and all suggestions wanted...

[Peter Quinn]

I am scratching my head here wondering how thick the tongue on your panel is going to be for a 1 3/8" door set. If the tongue is 1/4", or even 3/8", you may mill into the plywood when you raise your panels. I also worry about gluing wood 1/2" thick to a plywood substrate. That is not veneer at that point, it may still behave like wood. The plywood won't move, the glue ups will and it may warp/crack.

If you can I would be more inclined to float two 11/16" panels back to back to make your 1 3/8" thickness if your stock will allow. A few dabs of silicone may help keep the panels together during door assembly. Another option is to use an actual wood filler between the redwood pieces. Use a species with properties similar to red wood or some extra red wood pieces, make a lamination sandwich of reclaimed redwood, 3/8" filler wood, and the other piece of red wood. Glue the thickness up first, then joint and edge glue these blanks to make your width. No need for a vacuum press this way, or even a veneer press. Gluing the thickness as a lamination is easier if you glue up all your blanks in one big stack with 3/4" plywood or MDF cauls top and bottom and plenty of pipe clamps.

If you must use a plywood substrate consider adding a 1" solid wood edge banding using the same species as the skin to all four sides of the plywood so that in the event you mill into something during the panel cut you will have wood at the deepest part of the cut, not plywood.

To be honest I would limit your veneer to 5/16" skins and increase the wood edge banding on the substrate to form the tongue and the beginning of the panel profile to the outside, with the reclaimed material of the best figure forming the field. For instance, use 3/4" MDF substrate, edge banded with 1 1/2" redwood strips mitered at the corners (which will form the tongue and the beginning of the profile), skin with 5/16" reclaimed redwood, using a shop made veneer press of MDF, heavy cauls and pipe clamps reversed to act as spreaders in the center to apply pressure. Or an elephant, even parking the car on it may work. I'd try the pipe clamp trick first.

This last approach will give you a stable panel that won't go wild down the road.

Good luck with the contest. Love to see picks of your door.

[Peter Quinn]

Oh, I'd use tite bond III, let the glue ups cure for several 4 days before milling so it is fully cross linked, but you can use the glue of your choice, what ever you feel comfortable with. The vacuum press looks like a great way to work but is not a necessity for either flat panels or curved laminations. For flat work the size you are considering, definitely not necessary. A few bowed cauls and some MDF top and bottom to press on the center may even be enough.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Jh8N2JyNBE basic idea you can make your self.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_n-aI2wOXzo&feature=related even more basic idea that works well.

[Matt Ocel]

Peter -
Thanks for the reply.
I am going to be using the Freud 98-302 door cutters. I have not picked them up yet (looked at them at Woodcraft last Tuesday and should have biught them then, instead waited until Today and went to Rockler, they didn't have them) but it looks like when milling the panels I should be ok with not milling into substrate.

The re-claimed redwood after milling would not be thick enough to achieve the desired 1 3/8" to match the rail and styles which by the way are from re-claimed fir and after milling looks fantastic.(both the redwood and fir came from a deck renovation off a Frank Lloyd Wright looking lake home).

If you think the laminating onto ply is not going to work very well, I do have enough 2x stock to use as an edge banding and use fillers in leu of ply. If I do use fillers, should it be solid or should I use strips with spaces in between?

[Brad Shipton]

I agree with Peter. Essentially, what you are doing is making stave core rails and stiles. You can find lots of great ideas about clamping up the edging and face veneers on the woodweb. I would be inclined to limit the face thickness to a little less than Peter suggested if the aim is stability. Many building stave core doors do not use a face thickness greater than 3/16". I have made stave core without a vacuum press. Lots of clamps and a bit of patience. The thick face veneers tend to want to slide around as you are tightening the clamps (I went to a vac press to get around that since my earlier ones). For the cores of the rails/stiles many use engineered lumber, plywood and MDF. I am not sure I would be too comfortable with Plywood, but maybe in a multiple layer glueup you can get it straight. A thin face veneer will not give you much room to fine tune after the glue-up.

If you do stick with thick face veneers, be sure to match the edging very well to the face. That joint will show, particularily if the rails/stiles are cope/stick. I know my last doors I ended up with some select or better cherry for the edging and that turned out to be a nightmare since select can have much more sapwood.

Good luck.