Cutting notches

[harryagain]

You obviously go through life without thinking about anything and with your eyes shut. Why else would anyone create a panelled door?

[John Rumm]

Well there are several objectives when making a door harry.

Door sized trees are indeed less common, so the need for more than one plank is fairly self evident.

With any furniture project you need to allow for the natural changes in dimensions as the humidity changes.

You need something that is strong and yet light and economical. Significantly stronger in fact than would be a single door sized plank should you be able to get one. So you want long grain running in both axis - something mother nature does not often provide.

The traditional frame gives a strong and rigid start to the door without using excessive amounts of timber. The panel infill keeps the weight down but fills the holes and makes for an attractive design. The free floating panels also allow for expansion and contraction without splitting.

[The Medway Handyman]

Harryagain makes doors out of two short planks..........

[harryagain]

The panels are the workng part of the door. (They are the bits that keep the draught out.) Single piece "natural" panels can only be quite small. The frame only exists to keep them in position/join them together. When timber composites (eg plywood) became available we could make warp free doors out of one large panel. "(Flush door") When we get rid of the frame, the whole sructure can be lighter, stronger cheaper and more efficient. (There are no joints)

There are exact parallels in motor car construction, shipbuilding, aircraft construction. etc.

Frames and their associated joints are a poor fix/substitute for a homogenous structure. They are a low tech fix for problems at the time of conception otherwise insurmountable.

We only make them now as an appearance/arty crafty/traditional thing.

[harryagain]

Exactly so. But best avoided altogether if possible as the components will need to be oversized.

[The Medway Handyman]

Dagenham.

[John Rumm]

They keep the draft out, but they do not contribute to the strength of the frame (with a proper raised panel door anyway) since they are intended to float in the frame.

The frame exists to form the structural part of the door, not just fix panels together. I though you said you knew something about woodwork?

Yup, and crap they are as well.

Emphasis on the cheaper, lighter, uglier, more acoustically transparent, and exuding an overall lack of quality and class.

Such as?

I can't think of many folks who buy a new car and then replace all the doors. However plenty of people will renovate a home, strip out all the crap egg box doors and install something half decent instead.

You keep on nailing harry...

[harryagain]

Why are they crap?

Define quality and class? Security/fire doors are invariably one piece consruction, never panelled.

You really aren't too bright.

Cars were once made with a chassis to hold all the bits, Done away with when monocoque construction was devised.

Ships were once made with a frame (wood and iron) Done away with when welded construction was devised,

Aircraft were once made around a frame of wood/aluminium/tubular steel Done away with when composite structures were devised.

[Dave Liquorice]

'cause they are boring flat flush things, with no mass or sound insulation properties. Give one a good kick and you shove your foot through it.

Interesting statement considering the number of firedoors that have windows in them. How do they manage that with "one piece consruction".

My car has a chassis. You could take all the body work of it, devise some form of seat and drive it quite happily. It's not particulary old, not quite 10.