Replies

1. 
   JohnWW | Mar 16, 2004 07:52pm | #1

   If you are gluing a 1/8 in. thick veneer cross grain to a 3/8 in. thick backing you will definitely have problems with the drawer front warping badly. 

   How big is the drawer face and what type of joinery were you planning to use to attach the sides of the drawer to the drawer face?  Also are the drawers going to be flush or overlapping?

   John W.

1. 
   jpari | Mar 17, 2004 02:56pm | #4

   John,

   With regards to my spice chest drawers, the drawer fronts will be 4" wide by 3 1/4" tall. They will be joined to the drawer sides with half blind dovetails. The drawers will be flush with the face, not overlapping. Any help you can give will be appreciated.

1. 
   JohnWW | Mar 18, 2004 06:55pm | #5

   At a minimum, the drawer front needs to have balanced construction, a vertical face, a horizontal core, and a vertical back layer.  The front and back layers should be from the same species and be both flat sawn or both quarter sawn.  Both faces should be of the same thickness. 

   1/8 inch thick is definitely pushing your luck for the thickness of the front and rear veneers.  At that thickness the layers start acting more like solid wood, potentially splitting or exerting enough force on the panel to cause warpage or breaking of the glue lines. 

   For greater stability I'd suggest using a core of 3/8 inch Baltic birch plywood, which would have five or seven layers in it, with a shop applied 1/16 veneer on the front and back faces.  The finished panel will be more stable than a simple three layer construction.  As mentioned in another post, you can make the front and rear veneers thicker for the glue up and then thin them down afterward.  The face veneers of the Baltic birch core should be horizontal if the front and rear faces you are adding will be vertical.

   One final suggestion, use a slow setting epoxy for gluing on the face veneers, because the epoxy doesn't add moisture to the wood, you further reduce the chance of the getting distortion or stress in the glued up assembly.

   Good luck, John W.

    

    

2. 
   jackplane | Mar 16, 2004 08:06pm | #2

   If you milled the veneer to 1/16th or less(via planer and backing board) and attached it front and rear on the draw face, I see no problem.

3. 
   UncleDunc | Mar 16, 2004 08:44pm | #3

   If you put 1/8" veneer on the front of a 3/8" drawer front and don't put anything on the back, you're likely to have warping problems even if the front veneer doesn't delaminate.

   I don't have much veneer experience, but I do have a lot of experience reading FWW. :O) Most of the veneer information I've read suggest that anything over 1/8" is probably too thick, with lots of caveats about species, workpiece size, glue, technique, etc.

   If you're choosing the veneer to contrast with the core, as a design feature on the top edge of the drawer front, then you may not want to go much under 1/8". If not, then as a previous response suggested, 1/16" or even 3/32" will improve your odds.

   If you're going with 1/8" because your not equipped to saw any thinner, go ahead and glue it up with 1/8" and then thickness the completed front.

   And remember to veneer the backs.