How to Question

[Cody Colston]

In the gallery section of Tage Frid's 3rd book: furnituremaking, there is a picture of a mahogany cabinet on stand. The cabinet doors and back are frame and panel but the top, bottom and sides are solid stock. The sides have been relieved to look like a frame and panel. The cabinet methods of construction are not detailed in the book.

How would one go about creating that frame and raised panel look in solid stock? I'm not actually interested in building that particular cabinet but am curious about the faux raised panel method and would like to use it in a cabinet I am planning.

[Charles Wiggins]

Is this it on p.1 of this article? If so, the side does not appear to be solid to me. It appears to be constructed in the same manner as the doors.

[Brett Luna]

Agreed. If that is indeed the piece at Charles' link, then I think it would be much easier to build additional framed panels (since you're making two for the doors) than to use a completely different and probably more difficult technique just to make them look like panels.

[Cody Colston]

That is indeed the cabinet but the sides are solid wood, not frame and panel. I'm wanting to use dovetail joinery to attach the top and bottom to the sides. A solid top and bottom with frame and panel sides will not work due to movement of the top and bottom with the fixed dimension sides.

The caption accompanying the picture in Frid's book specifically states that the sides are solid wood and are relieved to create the raised panel profile. I have a good idea of how I will do it but thought I would solicit the advice of those here.

[Doug Hepler]

Cody,

I have the book and I looked at the photo. You are right, it says that the sides are solid wood, but if you look closely the sides have raised panels. As I think about this, I want to question the accuracy of the caption.

If I were to make that I would make frame and panel sides, as Bret suggested. It appears to me that the risk of wood movement is just as great for the sides as it would be for the doors (i.e., they are roughly the same width). To make this of solid wood, you would rout out the border and then glue a frame to the surface of the solid wood, which is going to be almost as much joinery as making a frame and panel construction, but not as durable.

Doug

[Jamie Buxton]

Is this it on p.1 of this article? If so, the side does not appear to be solid to me. It appears to be constructed in the same manner as the doors.

The piece in that article is very close to the piece Cody cites, but it isn't the same. The panel-raising profile is different. There's beading on the sides in the article, and not in the book. And the sides are different; the grain direction on the rails is horizontal in the article, and vertical in the book.

[Cody Colston]

Cody,

To make this of solid wood, you would rout out the border and then glue a frame to the surface of the solid wood, which is going to be almost as much joinery as making a frame and panel construction, but not as durable.

Doug

What I was contemplating was to rout out the panel area, leaving the "frame" and then glue a raised panel onto the routed (relieved) section.

[Jamie Buxton]

I've looked closely at the photo in the book, and I'm willing to believe the caption. It is unusual enough construction that the caption writer must have been specifically told by Frid about it.
I'd build the panel in either of two ways.
A) Start from a full-size solid panel, and router out the recess. I'd probably make a template to control the router. Probably clean up the corners with a chisel. To my eye, the recess is flat-bottomed, so this wouldn't be too difficult. The biggest challenge might be sanding the bottom of the recess.
..or..
B) Glue up the panel oversize. Rip it into three pieces, then cross cut the middle piece twice, so you get five pieces of wood -- the central panel, two stiles, and two rails. Mill the raising profile on the middle panel. (Sand the profile easily here.) Run dados in the stiles and rails. The panel is going to slide into the dados, so as they stand the stiles and rails are a bit too long. Trim them to length, and glue all five pieces back together. You can glue the panel into the frame; they'll all be breathing together. Pay attention to the grain patterns as you glue it up. You want the final piece to look like it was cut out of one board.

I *think* that Frid did method A. Notice that there's no beading on his side panels, unlike the doors. This would make it easy to place the router on the face of the panel to mill the recess.

[Charles Wiggins]

I've only seen the one in the article and the resolution on the photo of the cabinet is fine enough that I could enlarge it quite a bit, enough to see miter joints on the corners of the frame and very distinct variations in wood tone between the pieces that make up the side. Given that, I'd make the cabinet from the article rather than the one in the book.

[Rick Whitehead]

To make that panel from a solid piece, I would just rout the recess using a router and edge guide. Then I would use the router and edge guide to cut the simple profile (a chamfer or round-over) on the edges of the recess. I would set the edge guide so that if the router slipped, that it would pull the bit away from the edge.I would carve the inside corners to match the profile.
This seems to me to be the simplest way to do it.
Rick

[Cody Colston]

Thanks, Rick. Finally an answer that addressed the question.

[Pat Barry]

Cody,
I
I have the book and I looked at the photo. You are right, it says that the sides are solid wood, but if you look closely the sides have raised panels. As I think about this, I want to question the accuracy of the caption.

If I were to make that I would make frame and panel sides, as Bret suggested. It appears to me that the risk of wood movement is just as great for the sides as it would be for the doors (i.e., they are roughly the same width). To make this of solid wood, you would rout out the border and then glue a frame to the surface of the solid wood, which is going to be almost as much joinery as making a frame and panel construction, but not as durable.

Doug

I agree with all that Doug is saying here, in fact, I think it makes no sense to be "solid wood", and that to do otherwise than make this with frame and panel is fought with issues.

[Robert Engel]

Two ways come to mind: I hope I can explain it coherently.

1. Make each board in the panel separately then glue up.

The stiles would be ripped to width and remain full thickness.

To make the recess, I would resaw on the center boards, leaving the top and bottom rails full thickness.

Glue up panel except for the stiles, and clean up the recessed panel area and inside edges of rails.


2. Separate boards as above, but make rails by cutting top and bottom off full thickness boards, then resaw panel area and reapply rails using a deep rabbet.

[Lou Ortiz]

i suppose you could do this in a number of ways, but if you use a solid panel, but seems to me the bigger question would be, "why?" You're reintroducing the wood movement issues that the frame and panel are intended to avoid and complicating the construction without significantly improving the look of a piece. Interesting effort tho.

[Robert Engel]

i suppose you could do this in a number of ways, but if you use a solid panel, but seems to me the bigger question would be, "why?" You're reintroducing the wood movement issues that the frame and panel are intended to avoid and complicating the construction without significantly improving the look of a piece. Interesting effort tho.

With solid panel construction, the movement of the side panel does not conflict with the top or bottom as they are joined with dovetails (think of a giant drawer turned on end). It is a traditional construction method for dressers, for example.

Although I did also ask "why?" when to achieve the look, you could just apply thin strips to simulate the raised panel.