Wainscotting question

[David Huston]

Wife wants me to put up some beadboard wainscotting up in our breakfast/dining nook. I haven't sat down to make a sketchup drawing but I will very soon. I would like to to have the top and bottom of the beadboard covered by some 3 or 4 inch wide stock with the bead board sitting in a rabbet. If i do it that way the baseboard will stick out past the door casing. I was thinking about just putting a 45 on the end of the baseboard and returning it into the casing. Doubt this make any sense without a picture. Will try to get one done tomorrow. Just would like some opinions on how it will look. The main reason I dont want the beadboard sitting on or in the baseboard is that I am planning on getting new hardwood floors in the next few years and I dont want to have to rip up the wainscotting when i remove the baseboard.

Thanks for any help

[Dave Richards]

How about rabbeting the beadboard, too? this will allow your base board to be thinner--no thicker than the door casing probably. The other thicng is if you only rabbet the baseboard, you'll wind up with all these little black holes on either side of the beads that will do nothing but collect dirt. You won't need to rip out the beadboard when you do the floors. If you know you're going to do that anyway, let the baseboard sit up off the floor by the required distance and cover the gap with a base shoe or quarter round.

Quickie sketch.

[David Huston]

Thanks so much for the help. I hadn't thought about rabbeting the bead board too. I think that will look better than trying to fill the voids with caulk. I will probably have to take the baseboard up when I replace the floor since the rest of the base is put directly on the floor without any base shoe. If i set this baseboard higher for a thicker floor the height of the baseboards won't match. Anyway, if I have to replace the base latter on that will be fine just have to be careful to not gouge the beadboard.

I have a Freud super dado, but was thinking it might be easier to cut the rabbets with a router, especially for the beadboard. Any thoughts on that?

[Lee Schierer]

The rabbeting idea is good, but will be a lot of extra work. I put in bead board wainscoting in our dining room 2 years ago and so far I see no sign of dust accumulating in the beads at the top of the baseboard. Where our base molding reaches a door casing, I rounded the end of the base molding on my router. The attached photo shows what it looks like up close. From a distance it is hardly noticeable.IMG_0019.jpg

[Sam Murdoch]

Are these bead boards or bead board panels? Cutting rabbets in bead board with a router can be a problem as the router exits the bead it can blow out the unsupported edge of the bead. For that reason it is better to make at least the top cut with a table saw or guided circular saw. Then run the router along a straight edge. You can also cut the entire rabbet with a dado head on the table saw.

As for how this all lands into your door and window casings - if you are only doing one wall or if you don't have all that many casings to contend with it looks real nice to add a back band to the casing to make the casing appear thicker. This back band can be a simple 1 x 1-1/4" stock rabbeted butted to the side and around the case or rabbeted over if the case is not overly profiled. The back band can also be a more profile molding but the important thing is to project past the thickest part of your wainscot assembly so that all the applied moldings, baseboard and or shoe base land without needing to do awkward self returns. Doing this helps to visually balance the extra "weight" of the wainscoting as an architectural detail. You can then add a cap molding on the top rail that will give the panelling a more finished and intended look.