Is there anyway to apply veneer to solid wood such that wood movement wouldn't rip the veneer apart? I'd like to make some drawer fronts 15 x 6" that would be dovetailed out of maple, and then apply birdseye maple veneer to the front itself (I assume solid birdseye is very expensive and hard to work, although I haven't explored that option).
My other option is to edge band some other substrate such as maple ply but I'd rather use solid wood if possible as I wouldn't really want to cut dovetails through the edge banding.
Birdseye isn't THAT expensive where a few typical drawer fronts would kill the job. It was ~ twice the price of nice quality hard maple. On the other hand, veneer is usually made from the ultra-nice boards we never get a shot at as lumber, so you may find even nicer stock as veneer.
Last summer, I did a solid birdseye king sized headboard for a maple platform bed. If you get aggressive with a jointer or surface planer you'll rip the eyes out.
I ended up having a local sharpening shop do a custom grind on a set of jointer knives, which worked beautifully. He raised the angle of the bevel and added a small back bevel. The actual angles escape me, he chose them. I then planed the back to final thickness with my planer, and filled any torn out eyes on the back with clear epoxy before finishing with clear nitrocellulose lacquer.
Wanna' hear a killer? The guy who hired me to build the bed put a massively thick Temperpedic on it and you can only see the top 5-6" of the STUNNING headboard.
Using the same or similar kind of wood for both the veneer and backer, plus keeping the grain orientation the same, in other words avoid cross grain gluing, and you should have excellent results. Using a hardwood veneer over a softwood backer usually results in less than satisfactory results.
Should I use a glue with a little flex to it then? I've previously used urea-formaldehyde resin glue which I believe forms an essentially creep free bond; would a 'creepier' glue be a better choice say a yellow glue?
That's pretty much the opposite of the traditional way of veneering. If the veneer grain runs the same direction as the backer the seasonal movement will show up in the face veneer.
Traditionally the veneer runs across the grain of the backer. If the backer orientation doesn't agree with the preferred veneer grain direction, then a sub-veneer layer running cross grain to the backer is used and then the face veneer will run cross grain to the sub- veneer (same direction as the backer).
Essentially you're making plywood, which is the best way to deal with seasonal movement.
Yep ... it hurts, like seeing someone routinely keeping a folded blanket on the handrubbed, bookmatched, quilted maple lid of a blanket chest. DAMHIKT.
Would two pieces of veneer one front, one back be enough to counter the movement of a piece of solid maple if a urea formaldehyde glue is used? (~15x6x3/4)
Couldn't you get away with veneering just one side on a small thickish board though; I thought the backer veneer was mostly to counter stresses encountered during glue up (glue contracting and what not) which in the case of a smallish board aren't that great
He's only putting veneer on drawer fronts and both the veneer and the drawer front are maple. In my opinion almost any good wood glue will work as both pieces will be expanding and contracting the same. The "plywood" methods and veneering both sides is only necessary when big areas like side panels or significantly different wood types are involved.
I would strongly recommend that you use a cross banding, a layer of wood between the face veneer and solid core, that runs at 90 degrees to the direction of the face and core. This will pretty well eliminate problems wirth the core splitting the face veneer. The typical cross banding can be poplar or gum veneer, approximately .050" thick. Use it on both sides, like you are making a 5 ply sandwich, with the two faces and the core (layers 1,
3 and 5) running one way, and the two crosses (layers 2 and 4) running 90 degrees opposite. Keep the panels flat after pressing, under weight, for a few days, to keep them straight while the moisture from the glue comes out, otherwise they might warp or twist. If you have a way to check the moisture content of the cross and face veneers before lay-up, the ideal reading would be about 6-1/2 to 8 % for the face and lining veneer, and around 10% for the cross banding. Keep the construction balanced: face and lining veneer same species and thickness, and cross banding same species and thickness, to avoid pulling or cupping.
damian penney wrote in news:1181489155.378884.56670 @n15g2000prd.googlegroups.com:
Laminate the veneer to 3/32" baltic birch plywood. That will give you lots of stability. Then afix the baltic birch sandwich to the drawer front. Edge band both together.
Me too. A few drawer fronts won't cost you that much. I get most of my birdseye from this Ebay seller:
bellforestproducts
He has gorgeous stuff, and the prices aren't bad, if you're selective and don't get over-excited when bidding. I use this wood mostly for guitar necks and fingerboards, but some of it would make stunning drawer fronts.
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