Wood - reducing height?

[Mo]

Right, put osme new vinyl flooring down. It has added around 40mm or so worth of extra heigh to the kitchen.

This leaves me with 3 problems.

1) One of the doors needs a little shaved off the bottom. Fairly standard door.

2) A piece of skirting under a cupboard needs taking down by a tiny amount. Its cheap MDF and is around 150m x 15cm. Its not very thick either (around

2cm)

3) We have some draws with a removable worktop. As the floor as gone up the worktop will not go on as there is a plug socket in the way. Its a piece of highish quality wood. About 6cm thick and 40cm x 40cm. I was thinking of just repalcing this with something nicer if I could get a similar size - its a fairly standard work top design - how much would I have to work out at B and Q. Its not an actual worktop as the microwave will go on top so a nice piece of dark brown wood will do. This will be the hardest to get down because of the area, I'll have to try and get it done evenly.

I don't want to fork out for a planer - (is this ideally what i need)? I had an electric one that was CRAP.

Is there another simple, cheap way or getting the height down of all of these things?

With regards to the door I don;t want to take a hacksaw it it as I don;t really seeing me able to pull it off (can;t saw for shit)- and the amount that needs removing is very small - not really enough to do it properly IMO.

The only other thing I can think of is slowly slowly slowly sanding them down manually, lol

[Dave Baker]

Hacksaws are for metal not wood so that's the last thing you want to use. A normal wood saw is what you need. If you clamp another piece of planed wood across the bottom of the door to act as a guide you can saw alongside that and then sand down any final irregularities. If however you need to remove less than the width of a saw blade you'll have to use a plane or sander. Again it helps to have another piece of wood clamped across to act as a guide.

[John Rumm]

If it is more than a couple of mm, a circular saw guided by a straight edge clamped to the door. For less than that a power or hand plane. In extremis perhaps a surform.

Power plane or sander (wear a mask and work outside, MDF dust is nasty stuff)

Not sure I follow that since it is a little disjointed. If I understand correctly you want to reduce the thickness of a lump of real wood (i.e. not chipboard) that is about 40cm square and 6cm thick?

Firstly work on removing wood from the underside, then it does not matter if you don't get a perfect finish. Next look to see if you can get away with reducing the thickness at the edge where it makes contact with drawers that support it. Alternatively could the sides of the drawers be taken down instead?

If you really must thickness the whole piece of wood then you will need to take multiple light passes with a plane and finish off with a sander. To help start by using a marking gauge to place a line all round the edge indicating the final thickness. You can plane down to the line on each edge. Next use a straight edge across the board to work out where any high spots are and plane those away. Once you are within sanding distance you can come down through a couple of grades of paper to finish off.

For a detailed article on doing this with hand tools you could see the current issue of Fine Woodworking magazine. There is a web version available (requires paid registration):

I don't want to fork out for a planer - (is this ideally what i need)? Shame, since it is what you need.

Get a better one this time. Practice helps as well.

Not really - you could use a belt sander and various saws perhaps, but planing is the way to remove small amounts of wood and leave a nice finish. If you need to shave man made boards then a power planer is what you need.

Unless it is a metal door a hack saw is not the way to go!

Sawing very fine cuts by hand takes skill. Its is easier with a good circular saw. You can also do it with a variety of other tools (like a big router with a long straight fluted cutter).

Enjoy ;-)

[Jon]

[e-mail] declared for all the world to hear...

For the door I would use a manual plane. Electric ones are very easy to get carried away with and you could end up taking too much off.

For the skirting I would probably go for a jigsaw with a very fine blade, although this might leave the cut edge a little untidy. For neatness a hacksaw it way forward.

For the worktop - good luck! If you were planning on replacing it anyway I might be inclined to see what I could do with a sharp chisel, and cut a notch out to make it fit around your socket.

[mike]

That's some vinyl - I have heard of "cushion floor" - what's this "mattress floor"?

;-)

[Mo]

lol, i was tired.

hmm B and Q closes at 4 and I woke up at 3. and apaprently I need to buy tons of tools!

[Mo]

Thanks for the detailed reply. I cheaped out and bought a surform - it worked for the skirting as i needed a tiny bit taking off - not for the door tho :(

I'll have to get a planer tomorrow I think.

[John Rumm]

When planing the door you need to either plane in from both sides toward the centre of the door, or clamp a scrap bit of wood against the bottom edge of the door, so you can carry on planing right off the edge and onto the scrap. Otherwise, when you plane toward the edge of the door you will probably splinter the wood of the door jam (since at that point you are usually planing end grain).

[Mo]

what is the cheapest kind of planer i oculd get away with on the door?

I do not want to fork out £30+ for somethign i am using once for a few mins!

i notice there are smaller 'mini' versions out there (described as a block planer iirc) - any good?

[John Rumm]

A borrowed one probably. A decent manual plane will cost you more than a cheap powered one. A cheap manual one it a right PITA to use.

You probably don't want ill fitting skirting, doors etc either. Also factor in the cost of a new door if you mess up the current one by trying to cut corners.

You could by a nice one one and stick it on ebay once done. Chances are you will get a good proportion of your money back.

Makro will sell you a "budget" branded one for £15.

Or Hire one.

Not really much good on a door, but would do the skirting ok. These are designed for planing smaller wood items. In common with most hand planes they are not nice to use on man made boards.