Corner construction

[Chuck H]

Hi all. I haunt the circuit building area on this forum. I don't build any cabinets but I do need to for this project. I'm not tooled to do accurate miters on slightly bowed wood (knotty pine, no planer). So my plan is to do a simple glue joint reinforced by dowel pins. I can clamp the wood flush in this manner. Will this be strong enough or should I add a screwed/glued reinforcement on the inside corner of the joints?

Thanks

Chuck

[txstrat]

Thats exactly what I do all the time. Sometimes I reenforce the corners by driving two or three screws through the outer board into the other (in between the dowel pins). Problem here is, you got to be very careful when you round the edges with a router. I usually use a hand file in that case. I fortify the baffle board the same way and glue it to the outer boards. I then use a thinner frame for the grill cloth fixed from inside the cab with 4 screws. Never had a stability issue with my cabs.
Just my 2C

[Chuck H]

Thanks

This will be an antique finish so I can't use any visible screws. I'm using red oak dowels for contrast. I've seen it done in this way with cleats and it looks good. It should be strong enough then considering that I'll also have cross panels (face board and back boards) in place.

Chuck

[txstrat]

Sounds gorgeous. Would be nice if you could post some pics when you're finished.

[Chuck H]

I'm a painting contractor by trade. This finish (on pine) is done by treating the wood with lye, applying one coat of amber shellac and then a urethane top coat (or two) that's been tinted with yellow oxide to simulate the yellowing of old finishes. The process turns the wood a very deep honey brown with a little of that holographic effect that wood gets when it's oiled. On knotty wood it turns the knots and some of the harder grain very dark. I did this guy's knotty pine paneling in his pool room with this finish. He said "I want it to look like old bar room paneling." He loved it so much he wants the amp I'm building him to have the same finish.

I can't promise pics but I'll try.

Chuck

[RudeBoy]

I've built a couple of pine cabs using a dovetail jig to do box joints. My joinery so far isn't good enough to expose the joints IMO - still trying to manage the tearout - so I've been covering the cabs. I'm close though. Maybe the next one.

I wondered how the lye treatment would work. I'd seen it described on the Briwax web site as a way to get antiqued pine finish, though they use their brown wax on it after the lye treatment. They recommend cutting the lye 50% with water. Have you any comment on that?

I'm going to try it with some Radiata pine. That's the clear pine they sell at the local big box hardware store. Some folks have used Minwax Polyshades Honey Pine polyurethane to age tweed cabs, as opposed the amber shellac. That might be easier for me than trying an oxide tint.

I'll just have to get some pieces and try it out.

[Chuck H]

They recommend cutting the lye 50% with water. Have you any comment on that?

I think they use Drano pipe cleaner. I use pure powdered lye (4 TBSP to a gallon of water). So I don't know how the concentrations line up.

Some folks have used Minwax Polyshades Honey Pine polyurethane to age tweed cabs, as opposed the amber shellac. That might be easier for me than trying an oxide tint.

The color is critical in this app. The Polyshades product has too much brown in it and makes everything too opaque and dirty looking. You can probably get the guy at the paint store to put some yellow oxide tint in a paper cup for .50C or free. Use clear poly (already a little amber) and add a little of the tint at a time. Test on a scrap piece thats been treated like the cab.

The Briwax products look cool on line. But IME anything with that much color ultimately "stains" the wood. And with pine thats a bad thing. Pine is very soft and takes stain uneven and blotchy. The wood will look age colored, not aged.

The system I used above is the easiest way to a real aged look. It's a similar technique to one used for furnature repair by antique restoration guys and such. These guys would NEVER stain a piece of wood to "age" it because it would be spotted instantly as a botched job. Briwax and MW Polyshades either stain or "french glaze" the wood depending on the application. They don't "age" it. Not that they aren't good products in the right circumstance. But in this case it's like the difference between balogna and steak.

JMHO

Chuck

[dan stanton]

Dowels should work fine and give a good effect. Not as good as a dado. Do you have a table saw? To get that "aged" look, I usually use Minwax golden oak. Clean it with acetone first and allow to dry thoroughly.
Be careful using lye, as it is very caustic. Try any method on a piece of scrap first.

[RudeBoy]

Regarding doweling, there's this awesome tool called a Dowelmax. There's vids of it being used on youtube also. The problem is it costs about 300USD. That's a lot of $$ for a doweling jig. I found a used Porter Cable dovetail jig on craigslist - I'll just go with that for a while. There are situations where a dowel joint (or biscuit) wins. Pure butt joints for example.

[Chuck H]

Right, lye is extreamly caustic and requires gloves and safety goggles. Thank you Dan for pointing that out. The method I use does NOT require nuetralizing, BUT as Dan also stated, you should do a test sample first. Done wrong the lye can actually make the amber shellac turn sort of purple/brown. If this happens to your a test sample then go ahead and nuetralize the lye after 6 hours with a solution of 1 cup vinegar in a gallon of water. The end result won't be quite as dramatic but this is the "safe" method for consistency.

I water at the mouth when I see wood working tools. I'm just not in the market right now. Be it $300.00 or $3.00. As I said, I'm a painting contractor. And in this economy painting has been slow (stationary really). So I'm working with a chop saw, a table saw, a drill and some home made clamps. I know I could do a finger joint on the table saw but at my experience level I'd botch it some and this will be a wood finish so no tolex or tweed to cover it up. The dowel joints look really good so far. Since I'm doweling the top/bottom for cosmetics, instead of the sides, I am going to do a screwed/glued reinforcement on the top panel inside corners. Since thats the panel the handle is on and it will be carying the weight. If I doweled the sides instead I'm sure it wouldn't need reinforcing. But it wouldn't look as nice.

Chuck

[RudeBoy]

If this happens to your a test sample then go ahead and nuetralize the lye after 6 hours with a solution of 1/2 cup baking soda in a gallon of water.

Not vinegar?

[Chuck H]

Thanks, you're right. Baking soda is for neutralizing other stuff and is also a base, to neutralize another base you do need an acid. I made an edit.

Chuck

[Glass Snuff]

Cool info on finishing pine, Chuck. Thank you.

[Chuck H]

Your welcome Glass.

The project is coming along. I have nostrils full of saw dust from my router as I write this...

Something I forgot to mention in the finishing technique I outlined above... If you want a glass smooth finish you have to do a coat of sanding sealer over the amber shellac and very carefully sand that coat, making sure not to burn through the shellac coat at the wood corners. You may also lightly sand between coats of the poly finish to remove airborn dust particles that always seem to get in the work. Never sand the shellac coat itself no matter how rough it feels to the hand because you will almost surely burn through with the sandpaper and ruin the finishing process. Also, never sand the bare wood after you have done the lye treatment. The grain will raise and the wood will feel rough but don't sand it. The shellac should be applied to the treated (or treated and neutralized) wood and the sanding sealer applied to the shellac before sanding on the finish.

Chuck


Chuck

[RudeBoy]

I've finally got some materials to try out this antiqueing method. Finding 100% lye took some doing but not too bad. Red Devil was the traditional 100% people used for making soap and so on but it was taken off the market. I did find a couple of alternatives. One is Rooto 1030. This is 100% lye and was available in a 1lb container at a local hardware store (ACE in the US). Cheap too. The other is Roebic Heavy Duty Crystal Drain Opener.

Regarding the shellac I have some dewaxed shellac sanding sealer and I bought some dewaxed garnet shellac flake (www.shellac.net) for the amber coat. It may be too much - dunno just have to try it to see.