Bullshit. I did lots of shelves 50 years ago which I filled the edges of with filler and painted with white water based paint and it has lasted fine.
The massive great kitchen benches are chipboard with laminex on the upper surface and I was careful to paint the bare ends with estapol and that has lasted for more than 50 years too. Still as good as when new.
Rather later I got some mdf faced chipboard to use in extra shelving in the kitchen pantry and that has lasted fine too.
With chipboard the only thing to ensure is that it doesnt get wet.
Didn't find your answer? Ask the community — no account required.
N
nothanks
John, Is your "softwood lippings" a typo? Hardwood edging is much more robust and (IMnsHO) looks better.
J
John Rumm
No, I meant softwood. See the link to the build for the bookcase above. Same for projects like:
formatting link
You are right the hardwood edging will often look better on things with a translucent finish (oil, varnish, French polish etc), but keep in mind this is in the context of painted furniture, where ultimately you can't see the type of wood.
Sometimes I might go for sheet materials, with softwood lippings, but then use real hardwood for accents like drawer fronts:
formatting link
Something like this:
formatting link
was built from various offcuts of sheet goods, including some quite rough shuttering ply, but with some oak stain, and a small amount of real oak to do the edges and drawer fronts, it looks significantly better (IMHO) than the sum of its parts. (that also has a softwood back, but that was deliberately left on display to make a feature of the colour difference, and the extra "lightness" inside the cabinet)
As for robustness, then yes a dense hardwood will be generally harder to dent, although it does depend on the species of wood in question (e.g. Balsa is a hardwood). So choose based on the application and likely environment.
A
Animal
those aren't the usual cores of veneered chipboard.
damp doesn't cause that. Melamine does hoever like to swell & look terrible after it gets wet the nth time, where n is a random unpredictable number. If you want to build your furniture out of such tat, I'm not concerned. Just letting the op know the downside that large numbers of people experience every year.
A
Animal
I seldom respond to the troll, but there is a point here. Of course some veneered chip does last 50 years. But IME most does not, and I've dealth with a lot of water damaged veneered chip furniture. And keeping it clean yet not getting it wet is an interesting combination. What do you clean it with, petrol?
4
4587Joey
We'll see...
I wasn't talking about VENEERED chip board.
Bullshit.
See above.
I use a damp sponge with the MDFed or painted shelves and the laminexed kitchen benches. No water gets anywhere near the chipboard.
A
Animal
I've condemned a lot of furniture made of chip with veneers of wood, plastic or melamine impregnated paper. Water damage is a major cause, the veneer joins swell horribly. The styles available among the condemned make it clear that this stuff seldom lasts long term. 60s &70s stuff I rarely see now, even 80s stuff is nearly all gone. It simply isn't a long lasting class of materials. Among real wood furniture otoh I still see plenty of 1930s stuff ,often in sound condition.
4
4587Joey
Not hard to avoid water damage with furniture, stupid.
It lasts fine if you dont get it wet, stupid.
Bullshit if you don't get it wet.
M
Max Demian
Anything big (bookcases, wardrobes, chests of drawers) that came in flat pack form is immoveable as it just isn't strong enough to transport assembled.
J
John Rumm
Are you particularly bad at assembling flatpacks, or do you just have really clumsy removal firms?
I seem to recall several examples of each of those successfully making the trip last time we moved.
Join the Discussion
Have something to add? Share your thoughts — no account required.
Didn't find your answer?
Ask the community — no account required
Report Content
You are reporting this content to the moderators. They will look at it
ASAP.