Inspired by JR's chair thread, I figured I'd post some pics and description of my veneering process for the cabinet doors I'm making. Besides, the kid does most of the hard work....
I started by finding that I don't have a burl veneer large enough for the panels, so I decided to quarter match them. This works well anyway as it'll match the other cabinet in the room, which is also quarter matched walnut burl. Commercial veneer is super thin, 1/42" or so, and burls just don't stay flat. For the past week I've been flattening them. I'm using glycerin that I bought from Rockler mixed with water, paint the veneers with that solution, both sides, and clamp flat with newsprint between each veneer sheet. I've changed that print every day for the past week.
It's just clamped between some flooring and 8/4 poplar (well almost 8/4, I did resaw some veneer from the board for marquetry...)
The next step is to cut the edges straight so that I can piece the 4 together. As my sheets together are a bit oversize, I don't really worry about cutting a square corner, just a straight edge on 2, tape them up, then the other 2, then finally cut straight edges on each of those pairs to get the 4 together nice and tight...I used a veneer saw on my last project, but figured I'd try just a razor knife on this one, and I think it's the way to go, just change the blade often and you get great cuts. I just hold the edge down with a jointed board and cut. Note the sacrificial ply so that I don't muck up the assembly table.
The offcuts you see here are form the walnut underbelly counterbalance veneer.
I started by finding that I don't have a burl veneer large enough for the panels, so I decided to quarter match them. This works well anyway as it'll match the other cabinet in the room, which is also quarter matched walnut burl. Commercial veneer is super thin, 1/42" or so, and burls just don't stay flat. For the past week I've been flattening them. I'm using glycerin that I bought from Rockler mixed with water, paint the veneers with that solution, both sides, and clamp flat with newsprint between each veneer sheet. I've changed that print every day for the past week.
It's just clamped between some flooring and 8/4 poplar (well almost 8/4, I did resaw some veneer from the board for marquetry...)
The next step is to cut the edges straight so that I can piece the 4 together. As my sheets together are a bit oversize, I don't really worry about cutting a square corner, just a straight edge on 2, tape them up, then the other 2, then finally cut straight edges on each of those pairs to get the 4 together nice and tight...I used a veneer saw on my last project, but figured I'd try just a razor knife on this one, and I think it's the way to go, just change the blade often and you get great cuts. I just hold the edge down with a jointed board and cut. Note the sacrificial ply so that I don't muck up the assembly table.
The offcuts you see here are form the walnut underbelly counterbalance veneer.
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