I’ve just built a room divider that has three levels of open shelves. I built the face frames first and then built the carcass to “match”. I’d say it’s about 95% good fit, but with all the dados, the undersized plywood, a million clamps,etc., there are a couple of places where the plywood is slightly proud of the FF.
When faced with a project like this what’s the trick
A) to fixing the area around the protruding plywood
and more importantly in my mind
B) avoiding this issue altogether ?
Are you oversizing your rails or moving them 1/16″ high and then trimming them flush after its attached to the case, or does everyone’s stuff just line up perfectly?
I really go overboard to mill straight stock, assemble ff’s square, etc. Yet no matter how hard I try I find myself in this position often enough to warrant a new process.
Any help would save me from burning my shop to the ground.
Thanks
Replies
Unless you can sand the two wood surfaces to match you will never get them to line up exact. Really close but never spot on.
Better to make a feature of the seam. Go to a high end furniture store and check how they did it.
This is why you get a 1/4" overlap on face frame kitchen cabinets, a small groove where the seam is on some cabinets.
You only need to do the areas that show but sanding flush is the only way to get it to blend. I would not use a router for this, knowing my luck it would tear out at the wrong moment!
When I'm building cabs where the edges of the face frames must be flush with the sides, I never pre-build the the face frames. I always build the cabs first, and then make the face frames, one side at a time, to fit the cab.
Never forget that it's wood, not metal. It moves despite your best efforts to mill to exact tolerances. So you need to allow for it.
Mike Hennessy
Pittsburgh, PA
4/4 ,
Please don't burn the shop down ,,,
Relax , take a deep breathes count to five thousand .
First off most commercial shops including mine build face frames first before boxes .
You didn't say where the plywood was off , is it the finished end or on shelves ?
If you are going to paint the piece sanding and filling would work on the visible areas .
Creating accurate face frames is dependent on correct measurements of the entire job . I can't stress enough how important careful measuring is , really it is the key to things coming out right and fitting .
Depends on what type of edge or Vee groove you do on the finished ends whether we leave them wide or cut them exact , I'm doing a kitchen now that has a beaded edge with a slight Vee also very busy you don't trim it just line it up . For a normal flush edged face I do tend to leave them a hair wide then trim with a router and then sand out .
Also when assembling you need to constantly keep the warped plywood where it is supposed to be , start on the areas of importance , on a cabinet with 2 finished ends make the face 1/16th at least wide overall .
regards dusty, a boxmaker
When I worked in a commercial shop. We built the boxes first and the frames separate and slightly overs-sized. When they were joined, the face frames were flush trimmed with a router and sanded.
Yours is probably the best approach I know of... but even so, there is likely to be wood movement of the solid FF vs the ply carcass. I would probably leave a reveal if possible.Glaucon
If you don't think too good, then don't think too much...
In my world a pre-assembled face frame must be planned to fit at least slightly proud in all directions, and usually much more. multiple flush pieces out to be applied later rather than pre-assembled. It's really just edge banding at that point. Does that make sense?
Brian
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