I am going to build some cabinet doors with a raised panel. I was looking at a few cabinets for ideas and I noticed some fundamental differences. Some had the rail run the full width of the door and the stile was the height of the door minus the width of the rails. Others had the stile run the full height of the door and the rail was the width of the door minus the stiles.
Is there a "correct" way or is this something that is a personal preference?
One other thing. Is there rule of thumb for determining the width of the rails and stiles?
Others may disagree, but it's all personal preference. You missed a couple of easier options as well- if they are paint grade, you could just route the center out of laminated MDF, or trim plywood with hardwood for stain grade stuff
IIRC, rail and style is used to allow expansion and contraction of the center panel when the panel is solid wood. If you use an engineered product for the main panel, it's just more work to do it that way, unless you need to match an existing door.
As always, I could be wrong- but that's the way we do it at work, and no complaints so far.
The traditional method is for the stile to run the full length of the door, with the rails between the stiles, and for larger doors, centerstiles between the rails, centerrails between the centerstiles.
I've never seen doors with full width rails. You could do it for a modern look, but it would not look traditional, and you'd have to watch your hardware -i.e. make sure euro hinges don't compromise your joints.
As for stile and rail width:
Same width stiles and rails look more elegant, using wider stiles than rails or wider rails than stiles gives a country farmhouse look.
Wider rails provide greater joint surface area.
Stiles and rails in the 2 1/2" range are a good compromise - looks good and offers plenty of strength, plus you can get good yield from rw lumber.
If some of the doors will be quite large, consider using wider stiles and rails - 2 3/4".
3" stiles and rails for typical size furniture pieces are definately entering the "clumsily charming country furniture" realm.
I just completed a 105" tall and 82" wide cherry entertainment center. All doors had 2 1/2" stiles and rails, and looked elegant, traditional, and properly proportioned.
Use the same width stiles and rails for all the doors on the project. All kitchen cab doors should use the same width stiles and rails. If you're building a free-standing furniture piece for the kitchen, don't match the kitchen cab doors, or your piece will look like it was made by the kitchen cab manufacturer.
Profitability-engineered production doors tend to have more narrow stiles and rails to save $$.
I agree there is lots of good advice here. I believe the advise that seemed to be the definitive was that from Slim when he said there could be a problem with hardware compromising the joints with full width rails.
With that said I will be having the stile be full length.
Regarding your question about anyone calling me Dick. No, they usually call me by my real name -- Paul. Hehehe. I saw a bogus credit card once that was in the name of Richard Cranium and I thought it would be a good nick name for the usenet. It's surprising how many believe it's my name.
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