Century Design Workshop

A little planning in advance. Knowing that these panels would be finished before assembly, I needed to know that I can plane and sand the frame without damaging the panel finish. I set them below the surface by about 1/32” so that I can plane the joints flush. Planing them flush in this case is safer than sanding because sandpaper has some give as opposed to a hard flat surface of a plane. However, planing can lead to tear out. As you could see on the second photo of the edge, the grain sometimes isn’t perfectly parallel to the surface, if you plane “downhill” it will tear. Since the edges aren’t visible on the rails in the middle of the door, I need to determine which direction to plane by looking at the surface. In the third photo I highlighted one of the pores, shaped sort of like a teardrop. If you plane towards the teardrop’s tail it probably won’t tear.

Here are a couple panels of quarter sawn white oak being glued together for a pair of closet doors I’m making. The stiles and rails are “dry fitted” so that I can test the fit the mortise and tenons and so that I can measure the openings for the panels. I’m using story sticks to take my measurements of the height and width because it reduces the chance of error that occurs when using a tape measures and rulers.