Good Afternoon All,
I haven't been on this site for quite some time so I apologize in advance if this has already been covered. Long story short, I've been building some cabinets for my basement over the last couple of months and have been using 3/4" oak plywood for the cases. I was using some left over plywood from several months ago to start with, but had to purchase some additional sheets to finish the job. All of it was purchased at my local Home Depot in Cincinnati.
First, the quality of the sheets has gone down significantly. They are "wavy" and bowed. Even shorter pieces in the 24" to 36" range have a significant bow after being cut. This makes it very difficult to build cases that are really square and true. You really have to get creative with clamps and shims just to work with the material.
As if this weren't bad enough, I noticed that there were sparks flying off of the blade of my circular saw when I was rough cutting the last sheet. After I finished the cut, I found that there was a metal shim or something embedded in the middle thickness of the sheet right where I had cut. I was lucky that it stayed in the wood and didn't go flying.
I shot a note to the Home Depot email address on their web site just to let them know what was going on. I see that the sheets are clearly marked "Made in China" on the edge, so I suspect that this may have something to do with the quality problem. I don't know if they have changed suppliers or what, but the quality has gone down significantly from what they used to carry.
I'm done with Home Depot plywood. I'll buy my next sheets at Lowes. I don't know if the quality is any better, but it's hard to believe that it could be any worse.
Thanks. I feel better.
Charlie