Bendy (kerfed?) MDF skirting - any recommendation?

I can't see that kerf cutting will help as the cuts will be visible at the top. I found this when looking for example products

Bob

/I can't see that kerf cutting will help as the cuts will be visible at the top. /q

Filler?

Make your own skirting bendy with a circ saw?

Jim K

Or make a steam box and bend your own.

Not a silly suggestion BTW - my neighbour lashed up a simple steam box and uses it to great effect.

May be able to adapt a powerful enough wallpaper stripper or DIY with an old style kettle element and a small metal tank with a pipe leading to the steam box.

For this purpose, a bit of 110mm drain pipe should do the job - should survive a few steamings and is long and thin.

Assuming that you're going to paint it, a thin bead of decorators' caulk along the top will hide the cuts.

I'm assuming that this requires real wood - and some trial and error to get the skirting board to just the right state of bendiness.

I'm also assuming that there is a "pro" way of solving the problem which doesn't take as much time.

Although I've always fancied trying steaming and bending :-)

Cheers

Dave R

Only done it once but was surprisingly easy and effective. Standard wallpaper stripper and I happened to have a suitable length of cement/asbestos drainpipe but as others have said plastic pipe may work OK. I kept the pipe vertical to get nice uniform heating. Took about half an hour IIRC. It was the first (and, I think, the only) time my late father in law (who was a master builder and a very fine carpenter) said anything complimentary about my DIY efforts).

More effort to construct something suitable for 150 mm skirting of course.

Pro or Pro? This would the pro way in the old days - or one of them. The other is you tie your sapling down so they grow into a curve :) But I guess you'd like to do this job this year!

The "cook" time is fairy long - hours at least. You'd probably have to insulate such a long box too or the temperature at the far end will not climb.

Actually - thinking about that, you could probably form a steam tube out of plastic sheet if you could tape it in a way that survives 100C.

But back to reality - does MDF get more flexible when wet?

Could it be wetted, screwed into position and allowed to dry to take up the curve? I've heard this being done with plasterboard.

I think MDF swells, warps and then falls apart when wet.

Sadly.

Interesting - but at first look is expensive.

Wasn't expecting to pay that much. Bog standard MDF skirting comes in around £4/metre.

Cheers

Dave R

I think there is waterproof MDF. (Even if that only really means relatively water-resistant.)

Not as fast as you think - having our kitchen installed, we had temporary MDF for the worktops for a while and that got very wet around the sink. I was surprised but it did not fall apart.

Get a 3/4" board and cut your own.

You need an electric saw, a dust mask and an hand plane. Get a sharpening s tone too. Car boot sales = cheap if they can be seen working.

Saw blades are cheap enough to make sharpening them a waste of time. A good hand plane whips through mdf.

F*ck this off you idiot> > Windows 8.1 on PCSpecialist box

Ought not be that long...

Remember Fred & George? See from about 6 mins in:

Fred's steam box also looks pretty quick and easy to make

Which brings us back to the question "how much will MDF bend?"

I'm off to the builders merchants tomorrow to investigate what they have in stock.

I need about a 3 metre length to go back 170mm - giving an arc with a chord of about 2.4 metres. Doesn't look a massive bend so I may experiment. The skirting around the ground floor is chamfered MDF (not moulded) and is about 145mm high by 20+ mm deep.

Cheers

Dave R

Kerf bend it...

(54 sec in)

Scarily speeded up (I hope). That workshop is (slightly) larger and better equiped than mine.

I may have a play with some MDF off-cuts to see how bendy I can make them with and without kerfing.

I'll also have a try at finding ready made kerfed boards.

Cheers

Dave R

Yup, 2 to 3 times I guess.

Quite likely, but then again all you need is a circular saw...

Without, not very.

Yup you can get that in both planks and sheets. You can also get ply in the same form.

What a pleasure to watch a true craftsman at work! He makes it so simple.

Thanks for all the input.

A new problem!

When we had all the work done a couple of years ago we fitted out all the new/upgraded areas with chamfered skirting which came in around 18mm thick and 144-148mm tall.

Nobody seems to stock this now, and the local builders merchants (Ridgeons, Travis Perkins) won't order in small quantities as it is a special production run apparently.

Now we have a 1930s semi and the skirtings we matched a couple of years back are original (complete with pencil notes on the back) so this size - roughly 6" tall - must be pretty common.

Any idea why skirtings now seem to be just under 100mm/4"?

I suppose I could hand cut a chamfer using a circular saw but I don't really trust myself to get this spot on, and I would probably have the same problems getting the right lengths - standard sheets are 8' * 4' (in old money) and I would like a single 4 metre run for one wall if possible. You can get these lengths in MDF skirting, just not in the size and profile I am looking for.

Now trawling t'Internet to see if I can order from there.

Cheers

Dave R