Hi,
I’m getting more work than my small shop can handle so my techniques aren’t up to production. I’m trying to solve one of the problems on a smaller job before commiting to a bigger.
I have assembles 6 15″x10″ rail and stile panels. I used a toungue and groove to fit. They are slightly 1/32″ misaligned on several which in the past I would take pleasure in hand planing to thickness. I have a planer but the rails being cross grain going through would tear the grain or worse. I’ll be breaking out the belt sander and random orbit and cleaning them up today but am pondering a drum sander. My budget on this job is shot so more than $500 is out of the question.
Any ideas to efficiently accomplish this?
Any reviews of say the Performax 16-32 which I can save for? Or…???
Thanks,
Notrix
Edited 2/7/2005 12:07 pm ET by Notrix
Replies
Notrix,
If you use the search feature at either the top or the borrom of the index column to the left of this message and type in - Performax 16-32 - you will be directed to a plethora of posts concerning this machine.
I appreciate your problem and I overcame it by purchasing a used 6ft stroke sander which will do a whole lot of other sanding jobs besides doors. Mine is a Progress and I paid $975 for it. I have heard of others paying as little as $400. They seem to have lost some of their appeal with the advent of wide belt sanders and it was the great advice of members of this forum that convinced me to buy mine.
Goodluck
Brian
Notrix ,
If I understand you , there is some discrepancy in alignment or thickness from the stiles and the rails , correct ? A wide belt or thickness sander is certainly an efficient tool , however for a small handful of doors unless you own a wide belt , a belt sander is my weapon of choice . Followed by finish sanding and a bit of hand sanding on any edge details and such .
happy sanding dusty
Exactly what I did,120 grit on the beltsander followed by 80 then 120 on the random orbit sander. Once they're fit I'll finish up with 220. came out pretty good, took about 1 1/2 hours.These are bath vanity doors and while the idea is to make them like furniture minor rolling won't be evident. Future projects will be more exacting so I'm trying to plan on some sort of efficient method to smooth them out. Right now space is a concern. Come June I may have a shop but it remains to be seen. Besides the tablesaw and drill press everything else has to be rolled around to use. I don't think a stroke sander will fit too well but good for the shop.Thanks as always,N
Notrix ,
I tell you something that some may not realize , a wide belt sander is a tremendous tool that in 30 minutes can do more than you and I could in 8 hours and better , but the wide belt sanders do not eliminate sanding they just greatly reduce much of it while making our work more flat then we can often do with a belt sander . The rails will still have cross grain scratches on them even after going through the wide belt that need to be sanded out with hand held ROS or other types of finish sanders .
dusty from sanding
Try contacting you local sanding service or ask at some of you suppliers if they know of anyone with a wide belt sander or drumsander. Probably would cost you about $25-$50. These machines are not really worth buying for a few pieces here and there.
Check around for a cabinet shop with a bigger belt sander. Some of them will take jobs like yours for a reasonable price. It may be a good interim solution for you until you know if your needs will justify buying one of your own.
I think I would work on the alignment issue. If your stock is equal in thickness, you must be doing something that causes such a variation. Production work isn't always about having a machine to solve problems. Eliminate the problem and you won't need the machine.
Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
Yup,I was running T&G on a router table and checking the first few boards. I had 2 feather boards etc.. but evidently one of the cutters slipped a bit. Wasn't too bad. In the part, production shop environment, this is par for the course. machine and assemble everything a bit big and dimention with planers or in the case a large belt sander.BTW This was the 1st critical job I used my DeWalt belt sander on, (used mostly on construction jobs till now) the newer one with the 2 small front wheels. I used the 120 grit and dialed it down to 1/2 speed. The balance is superb and the platen nice and flat. It was very easy to land flat on the panel and wanted to stay there as I scrubbed around and evened out the surface. The job came out perfect with no digs. Dust collection more than adequate, belt tracking perfect. Can't ask for more. Excellent belt sander!Notrix
Hey Hammer,
Eliminating the problem is always a good way to go before compounding it the further we go . However with the T&G or even stile and rail details discrepancies will and do occur if you use wood . Perhaps other mediums are more true to work with thus producing less variations . But in my experience even the best milling and machining job may have some variations in thickness , also the tongue sometimes spreads the groove a bit creating variations and such . Wood is a very unforgiving medium compared to some others , but we learn and grow from our experiences and try not to continue to make the same mistakes again and again .
dusty
Are you saying that wood doesn't follow the rules of finite mathematics, Dusty? There are always a few pieces that defy our will but a tight tongue that spreads a groove is too tight. We have to constantly check our set ups. One of the big mistakes I see amateurs make is not milling enough material and then trying to make more. I've worked in production shops and I still have jobs that require several hundred pieces. The key to keeping things correct is to do all pieces with each set up and keep checking the fit. It's always a good idea to have a few extras for those pieces that won't succumb to my plan. A 1/32" is too much and sanding will alter the thickness, which can cause other problems. It's better to get it right from the start, extra work cuts profits. Cut profits put people out of business.Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
Hi Hammer,
I totally agree about the pieces of wood that defy our will and plans , but in keeping with that thought , as you know sometimes you can run 50 pieces and then all the sudden the next piece either blows out or reacts in a way different to the other 50 . What I have noticed is different pieces some harder some softer even in the same specie can absorb glue in a way that more swelling occurs , thus creating a tight tongue and perhaps causing discrepancies in seams and in the joints. After your production experience I would be surprised if you have never found one piece thicker than the other , even though they were milled exactly the same . The day this thread was posted I was doing just that , gluing up some frame and panel doors in Alder and had some sanding to do to even up the joints so it was fresh on my mind .I always sand my doors after gluing them up so to expect perfection in my case would be an un reasonable expectation . Maybe it has to do with hard and soft grain or more or less figure but have you ever noticed this unevenness before ?
dusty
my immediate reaction is to take em to a local cabinet shop, round lunchtime and ask one of the fellas out back if he'll run em through the thickness sander for 30 bucks........
someone might do it, or they might point you to the front door. which might cost ya more.
Get a thickness sander and yer on the low end of the learning curveas well as overbudget. TO paraphrase, yer up to yer #### in alligators and NOW you wanna drain the swamp.
Low end of the learning curve on thickness sanders, and you think the answer is spending a lot of cash for a tool you think is a panacea, but you could in the worst case end up remaking the doors anway. Don't do it unless you like to function under stress.
This was for a vanity? right? two, or four doors...
for the time risk and hassle to take em elsewhere, I'd be breakin out the belt sander, planes, cabinet scrapers, ROS, whatever and given the doors the works. After all, yer skill is what yer being paid for, and skill also entails the ability to cope with mistakes. And if yu was being paid cabinetmakers rates, it is assumed that you is gonna deliver. And if ya ain't being paid cabinetmakers rates, maybe next time you won't be so naive. It costs to have the tools, do the work, cope with errors etc.
Many times I has bit the bullet. Sometimes I feel like I am the only one who has been in that situation, but that just ain't the case.
The cure is just like they say in little league- just shake it off. Then get on with the job. Often times I've spent more time fretting on how to recover from a problem than it's taken to actually solve the problem. Nothing like just getting down and dirty, even if it means an ego-blow.
The other option is to fret and stew and this job don't get done til you get over it, but the next job gets delayed, clients start calling you and get irate, or at worst SWMBO starts on yer case about the lack of progress on the round-to-it list
Look at it this way, either solve the simple problem now or get sucked into a downward spiral of the results and ripple effects of this set back.
Sh*t happens, Next time you will be smarter, if you ain't already.
At least that's what I keep tellin myself.
Eric
in Calgary
a dilemma is simply the choice between two lemmas....
Hi Notrix. This won't help you this time but when I make a door I plane the rails down a little bit on both sides. After I glue up the door all I have to do is plane the stiles down to meet the undersized rails. I would think that you could apply this theory to a belt sander, drum sander etc. Hope this gives you some ideas. Peter.
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