The Technique of FURNITURE MAKING

Advantages of solid wood

1 First cost is often less than of plywoods, etc.. in equivalent thicknesses, except for the rarer hardwoods.

2 Solid wood can be jointed with ease, shaped, moulded, carved, and bent to small radii.

3 Badly fitting joints and members out of alignment can be flushed off level after assembly.

4 Edges do not have to be protected or disguised in any way.

5 Solid wood has a natural elasticity without fatigue, thus screws and nails are securely gripped and will not work loose under normal loading. It will withstand rough treatment and can always be resurfaced. It has an effective life of many centuries.

6 It responds to careful finishing and has a depth of surface not obtainable with thinly veneered or composite surfaces.

Generally speaking plywoods, blockboards and laminboards should require no preliminary treatment, as they are invariably scraped or sanded on both surfaces to exact dimensions, but certain wood species, notably gaboon, often exhibit badly plucked grain which should be filled with a glue-absorbent filler (plastic wood, brummer, etc.). Particle boards and hardboards should have the glazed skin broken through with light sanding to enable the glue to take. Cheap foreign plywoods, machine-sanded with flint-papers, should be very carefully examined, sanded afresh and thoroughly dusted, for there have been several cases of embedded flint-dust setting up a chemical reaction with synthetic finishes. Cutting of some plywoods presents difficulties, and certain varieties, notably birch, tend to splinter under the saw. The remedy is either to use finer teeth to the saw, clamp a waste piece firmly under the ply to contain the splintering, or score the cutting-line deeply with a knife in advance of the cut—a preliminary trial will always show what propensity there is to splinter out. In machine-sawing, if the surface breaks out on top. increase the projection of the saw, or. if underneath, then decrease the projection, and if possible keep the board tight to the saw-table with spring arms, etc. Some panel saws now have a built-in scoring blade which finely cuts the undersurface.