Wood Bondage, Is It Wrong?

The question must be asked!

Glue and clamps and nerves, oh my

Glue up is a special time. You have spent many hours readying your parts and now it is time to put it all together. If you goof up here it is exceedingly difficult to take your piece apart and have anything usable left. The glues I use (titebond pva types) set, depending on the type, in 5 to 15 minutes and cure in 24. If you put a part in wrong and have to remove it even after only a few minutes, the parts can tear and break if you can move them at all. This means that you should be prepared!

You need to do a dry fit with clamps to insure that all fits well and you have the clamps, cauls, and blocks you need.

You also need to think about the work and how long it will take to assemble everything. Sometimes you can assemble in sections,

sometimes you have to put everything together at once.

You should think through your method to apply the glue too. Brush, roller, squeeze bottle, spreaders, all should be at the ready. For a really big job you may need to enlist some help. It is never any fun when your parts seize up before you have finished the job.

I use several different glues depending on the requirements for the job. Titebond II is great glue. It sets quick though so is generally not the one to use for a large job. Titebond II is not waterproof. The glue line is fairly colorless with Titebond II. Titebond III is waterproof and has a longer open time. It does dry to a somewhat dark glue line so keep that in mind. I will use Titebond III on this project so I have more time to adjust and clamp. These doors are being installed in an exterior location so the waterproof quality doesn't hurt either.

I have all the clamps, glue, brushes and spreaders ready to go. Now to work!

Click to play animation of glueing up a door.

One down, one to go. I only have enough clamps to do one at a time. I'll get that done tomorrow. I will give the doors a good sanding in preparation for painting. They will be installed in the opening of my "dust house". I'll write about that at a later date here on the "It Starts  With A Tree" blog.

Thanks for taking a look I hope you enjoyed seeing how I did this.

Panels for the doors

Here one of the doors is dry fit and clamped so I can check the fit and measure for the panels.

There is a lot of friction with all those tenons. While each piece fits by hand nicely, when the whole thing is assembled it would be hard to pull apart by hand. A mallet would work but may damage the parts. To disassemble the doors I use a reversed clamp as below. This keeps from damaging the parts when there is a lot of friction. I checked the corner to corner diagonals and I am happy to say that both doors clamped up perfectly square!

I then put a combo blade on the table saw. The Powermatic PM2000 table saw has some nice features like a shaft lock for changing blades.

I do use the blade guard when I can. I still have all my fingers despite a long career in construction and woodworking. I intend to keep them too. This saw makes using the guard easy with a lever to release the riving knife. The anti-kickback device and the blade guard have push buttons to release and attach them. The easier the saw is to use with this stuff, and the easier it is to use, the more it gets used.

Good in and outfeed tables help with milling the plywood.

I use a sled to cross cut the panels. Note the extension to the fence to allow for a stop block.

I then clamped a board to the table saw fence and set up the dado head to run a rabbet around the edge of the panels. I marked the height of the cut on the sacrificial board and marked the width of the rabbet on a test piece to help with set up.

I first set the fence by lining my mark on the test piece up with the edge of the cut in the homemade throat plate. I then turned the saw on and raised the blade until it reached my mark on the fence.

This got me pretty close and with a few test cuts and final adjustments I was ready to go. I check the test piece in the groove at several locations. It looks good to me!

 I used a feather board to keep the plywood down tight at the blade.

Now to test fit the panels. Hot diggetty, it's starting to look like a door.

Now I will check every part for fit and make sure all is ready to assemble. Next time glue up, on the "It Starts With A Tree" blog.