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Thread: Mitered frame around a piece of hardwood.

  1. #1

    Mitered frame around a piece of hardwood.

    I am making one of those balancing wine holders as a birthday gift but I want to dress it up a bit. I have a piece of hard maple. I want to frame the maple with a .5” -.75” strip of Purple Heart around it, mitered in the top corners. The overall dimensions will be about 15” x 5.5” My question is this. The top piece of Purple Heart would be running the grain perpendicular to the maple. Is this a bad idea? Should I cross cut that strip of PH so all the grain is running the length of the piece?

    Thank you. This is my first project using solid wood besides poplar trimming.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Sep 2013
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    Carrollton, Georgia
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    If I understand correctly, the cross-grain dimension of the maple will be 5.5", right ? This is where the movement is likely to occur. Over only a span of 5.5" the movement would be minimal. You could leave a slight gap between the maple and the purple heart in the long dimension of the maple and not glue the end trim pieces to the maple but then, how would you attach them ? ..Or you could just glue it all up and you may end up with a slight gap, at times, in the mitred corners .. which may not be noticeable. It's a question of where you want the infinitesimal gap to be seen.

  3. #3
    You are correct. Across the grain of 5.5 inches.

    I just found a quick calculator online with specific coefficients for different species and moisture variances. I came up with a conservative change of 8 thousandths change in a year. Which I would assume would be close to even on both sides at that small a piece. So 4 thousandths a side. I mean, that seems acceptable, haha.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Tasmania
    Posts
    2,162
    Acceptable on paper, and you would never notice it from 20 feet away, but you will feel it when you touch it. This is an object that is going to be looked at closely and handled a lot so it needs to feel smooth. This small gap will crack the finish and that is all it takes. Make the grain of the cross piece of PH run the same way as the maple and the problem ceases to exist. Cheers
    Every construction obeys the laws of physics. Whether we like or understand the result is of no interest to the universe.

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