I am buidling Glen Huey’s PA Desk Secretary and want the desk lid to be perfect. I know I need to pin the middle of the breadboard ends and pin the ends with a slot to allow movement on the ends for expansion of the desk lid. However, seems to me I will need to route the ends of the breadboards before assembly as I will need to factor in expansion . If I cut them even now they’ll expand and it will look misaligned later.
So do I calculate the amount estmated for expansion, then cut the breadboard ends at that length. Routing them un-assmebled to the desk lid proper? With my pieces being constructed in a dry basemanet my table tops and lids ALWAYS expand a significant amount a month or so after completion and finishing.
Laslty, I am concerned about the breadboard extensions at the bottom of the desk lid as I only have a few 32nds of an inch ( width of folded business card) away from the desk front when the lkid is down and resting on the lid supports. I do not want the breadboard ends to be too big on the bottom as it will hit desk front and then not drop properly.
hen
Replies
Breadboard ends do not necessarily get fastened in the middle. You do this only if you want the movement to occur equally on either end. Often, you have a critical edge that you want to keep stable, as in your case. In those cases, you pin that edge and let the other float. If I was faced with your situation, I would acclimate the wood to the room where the desk will be, and then cut and assemble it. Breadboard ends are like a broken clock -- it's in perfect time twice per day. Otherwise, it's off.
Mike Hennessy
Pittsburgh, PA
Yes good point, I can pin solifly the botom of the desk lid . The expansion would then be limite dot the top of the desk unfortunately right where everyone notices.
I think I will build the lid and breadboard ends, assemble dry, then bring into my house for a few weeks to get the expansion, then go back glue up and finish.
Thank you for your time.
"expansion would then be limite dot the top of the desk unfortunately right where everyone notices."
I actually like it that one end moves. Few people actually notice it (other than the builder) and I think it shows off the maker's skill and foresight in dealing with the inevitable movement of wood. Proves that it's solid wood and not a photograph of wood glued to particle board!
Regarding your idea to assemble dry, etc., I don't see any reason not to glue it now. Just make sure the whole thing is a bit long and trim it to size after it finishes doing its expansion thing. If you don't glue the panel first, you'll never get a good take on it's real final size. As for gluing the breadboard ends, I never glue them anyway. The only place you could glue them is at the fixed pin, and that little bit of glue area won't do much for you anyway.
Mike HennessyPittsburgh, PA
great tips will do just that
Glad I could help out. Now, post some pics when you get it together.
Mike HennessyPittsburgh, PA
spitfire,I disagree with the advice to bring the stock to the humidity conditions of the environment in which it will be used and your plan to let the wood acclimate to a room other than your workshop before glue up.Stock should be acclimated to the place where it will be worked and assembled - your work shop. Acclimating it to another environment, then bringing it to he workshop for any part of the job makes no sense at all. That's a recipe for movement during construction, which is the most unwanted situation possible.For any furniture, design the piece to accommodate reaction to changes other than the workshop environment (you can never predict how the final environment may differ from the work environment), bring the stock into equilibrium with workshop ambient humidity and work under that stable condition from start to finish.Rich
Been there and done that and have come to the conclusion of cutting it exactly as the width of the panel, because it'll never be exactly right anyway; the panel will expand or contract and it never quite matches up. IOW, I don't sweat it anymore.
Are you going to put the hinges on the bb ends? I think you have to. I just did this and I made everything flush there. You absolutely need to hard pin the bottom (near the hinge line) or the desk will push the hinges off. This happens to many old pieces.
I always wondered what they did when they mitered the bb. I wanted to do this, but ran out of stock. I suspect they pinned all joints hard.
Adam
About 20 years ago, I read somewhere, that at one time the Shakers used a breadboard technique that I have not seen discussed any where since. The technique was very simple. Use a doweled butt joint between the breadboard end and the remainder of the piece. I tried it on a drawing board at the time . The board is about 24" by 48" and made of 3/4" poplar. The joint is doweled about every 6 inches with 3/8" x 1 1/2" dowels. The glue was either white or yellow. No finish was applied. I just checked the board, about 20 years from the time of construction and it is fine as opposed to a cutting board I made of birch using tongue and groove joints that fell apart not long after it was made. Why hasn't this technique been used more?
Might your observations not be drawn from circumstances of use rather than construction? The Shakers as far as possible managed their environment, believing in the benefit of fresh air in warm times and the dry heating of spacious rooms in winter. These practices may have led to the survival of their artifacts.
In your case the drawing board may have had the benefit of stability, whilst cutting boards are subject to varying conditions. Just a guess of course.
You are correct about my drawing board being kept in a stable environment. However, I live 20 miles from a former Shaker community and it is cold in winter and hot and humid in summer. The Shakers used stoves to heat their rooms in winter and had no air conditioning in summer. I have used a woodburning stove in my house and grew up in a house heated by coal stoves. In winter, furniture becomes loose jointed and the wooden doors have cracks around them from the dry heat. In the absence of air conditioning and dehumidifiers in summer, the chairs and tables tighten up and the doors and windows stick because of the high humidity. The Shakers had to live in these same conditions. I am just curious as to the extent that they used the doweling method and why it is not used more today.
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