# Three unusual doors.



## MikeG. (1 Aug 2018)

I bought some seasoned (French) oak boards, and planed most of it up on a friend's wide planer/ thicknesser:







Some of the boards were too wide even for his monster machine:






This is for three doors: the external front door (porch door), the internal front door, and the downstairs loo door. I started with the outside front door. Before I could start work on the door itself I had to make the 4-centred arch door head, which is done with a pair of spandrels. First, a template:





















That last photo shows the long mortices I left when I made the porch last year. Now, with a wedding coming up in no time at all, I needed to make the spandrels, but I wouldn't have time to carve them, so they'll have to be removable for carving later. I had set aside a large piece of green oak from the porch build, but as it was over a year old it wasn't quite so green any more:





















Big as it was, it wasn't big enough to do the spandrels in one piece a side, so I had to glue on an extra bit:











Marking up the template on the door opening revealed no surprises at aLL..........the timbers weren't straight:











To cut the long shoulder of the top mortice I clamped a guide-piece to the spandrel and just sawed. There are a number of other ways this could be done:






Hogging off the waste:











A bit of wax to help it into place:






And the first trial fit:






It needed a whack or two with a rubber mallet, but went in rather well.

The second one was always going to be more awkward, because the first one is ion the way. I shaped the tenon:





















The butt joint in the middle is obviously never going to be weather-tight:






So my solution was to add a groove to each piece:











And in due course I shall whack in a sliding tenon. Of course, that can't happen until the spandrels have been completely finished and carved, because they won't be removable after the loose tenon is fitted.

And so to the door.........


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## MikeG. (1 Aug 2018)

Not many people make their front door on saw horses outside, but the weather was beautiful.....

The original plan for the front door had been a three-board door, but the extra wide boards I'd found in the woodyard (Thorogoods, Ardleigh, Nr Colchester) might just lend themselves to a 2 board door if I can squeak enough out of each board between the sapwood. These boards had been too wide to put through a planer/ thicknesser, so I cleaned them up "by hand", albeit not with hand-tools. First, the planer:






That's a bit of a mis-laeding photo, as I used it as a scrub-plane to start with, working along the board at 45 degrees, before cleaning up a bit with the planer orientated as shown. Then across the grain with the belt sander (40 grit), then with the grain (same grit), and finally finish off with some 100 grit paper:











Before anyone says that I should have cut the boards to length first, It was necessary first to fully reveal the edge of the sapwood, as I needed every mm of width I could manage to squeeze in. I ripped off the waste with a circular saw against a straight-edge:






After crudely cutting to a coupl;e of inches over-long, I was finally able to put the boards together to see what I was going to get:






You'll notice that one board is wider than the other, and that the junction therefore isn't in the middle. Worry not!! 

I did a half-lap for the junction, using the hand-held circular saw and a router with a winged side cutter. There is no need for this to be furniture grade, as it will be permanently hidden:






I had in stock some 38mm thick off-cuts, albeit with lots of sapwood (that's why they're off-cuts). Perfect for my ledges:






The sapwood ran through the wood at about 30 degrees, so I cut it off at that angle, again using the straight-edge and circular saw:











I propped the boards roughly in place so as to mark the final door width on the boards so that I could make the ledges the necessary length:











Now, it's not as simple as that. The hinge side of the door has the ledges cut off square and close to the edge, but the leading edge of the door doesn't need that. I'll explain later.

Sizing up the aesthetics. Three ledges or 4? With the arched top, three looked right, and 4 looked silly. Oh, and no-one said the boards had to be flat:






Here's a little trick of mine. To prevent any board dropping relative to another in a boarded door, I came up with the idea of a pin in the adjoining edges. Stainless steel obviously, as it is oak:











Time to glue up. Before I fixed the ledges permanently in place, I opened the gap up between the vertical boards. This is seasoned timber, on the hottest day of the year in the middle of a heatwave. They're going to expand rather than contract. Note the lack of glue. Of course, there would have been no glue used at all in old doors. The key thing to note is that the ledges are only fixed to the boards at the outer edges, so all the seasonal movement will be at the middle of the door:






Note also the shaped end of the non-glued ledges, towards the top of the above photo. This is the end at the leading edge of the door. I left the door clamped overnight (not that the glue needed it, but I was running out of light):






The next day:











Cinched-over hand-made nails in pilot holes......and a revelation. I had often wondered why you see hammer-marks on old ledged door. I just thought that the carpenters must have been in a rush, or clumsy, but in doing this myself I found that you have to nail up from the underside of the door. So you're kneeling, and hammering upwards with only half a view of the nail-head, and the occasional accident is hard to avoid.

After the outer nails only in each ledge were nailed and cinched over, I offered the door up to the opening and marked the arch:






Critically, I remembered to off-set this by an inch:











Time to shape up the outer cover-strip. Note the two little rebates (10mmx3mm), again, all done outside on the saw horses:






At the bottom edge of the door is a weather strip, to deflect rain away from the underside of the door. This one has another function too:

There's a reason I keep off-cuts. This is ex-4":































Why the big rebate at the bottom? Well, the threshold seals that are commonly available don't deal with a 22mm thick boarded door. They're designed to 40-odd mm thick doors, so the rebate is to act with the external seal of the 2 in the threshold strip, like this:






Holes from the inside of the door for screwing the weather strip into place, and to take an oak plug:






Now, the magic ingredient. It is a watertight expanding foam seal, which will expand from its original 3mm to up to 13mm thickness, and depending on how tightly it is squeezed will resist in the ingress of a hurricane. I was worried about how quickly it would expand, so didn't take a photo mid-process, but you can see it here at the top of the fixed-in-place weather strip:






Now that the top of the door is cut out, and the bottom is determined by the weather-strip, I could cut the central cover-strip to length and fix that in place. Note the hugely oversized holes in the door boards, and the two lines of my expanding foam tape. Again, this is so that the inner edges of the boards are trapped against the ledge, but not constrained in movement across the grain:





















Note that I left a small gap at the lower end of the cover strip, so that any moisture can dry off rather than be trapped between 2 pieces of timber:






The top end shaped:


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## MikeG. (1 Aug 2018)

Flipping the door over to the inside face, I made a cover strip for the join there too. This is obviously in pieces to allow for the ledges:











Time to prop it in position. The spandrels don't yet have a rebate, so I had to pop them out:






Now, for the ironmongery. 18" tee hinges and some monkey-tail bolts from Suffolk Latch Company:






Photos out of sequence, somewhat:






This is how I rebated the spandrels to suit the door head:































Note the damage where the 45 degree grain tapers to zero. This is obviously a design flaw, and I'll have to do a repair later on. There was something of a cover-up opportunity for me on the leading edge, though:











Again, those photos are slightly out of order as I haven't yet shown the making of the groove for the seal. I have worried about this part of the job for, literally, years. I may even have asked a question about it here some time ago. Anyway, I made a scratch-stock:































It isn't the neatest groove I've ever run, but it will be hidden by the seal itself. It was an awkward and slow job, not helped by the changing grain direction around the curve.

That will do for that door for the time being. I'll come back to it in a few weeks. Now, on to the second......


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## MikeG. (2 Aug 2018)

The next door. This is the downstairs loo door, and is 900mm (C.3 feet) wide. This is where it is going:






Again, I needed to squeeze as much width as I could out of 3 boards. The boards were already planed, and the head isn't arched, so this was a much quicker and easier build:






Again, half-laps at the board edges. This not only allows for expansion & contraction without leaving gaps through the doors (who wants gaps in a loo door!), but it means that the edge of one board acts to trap down the edge of the adjacent board. However, this one wasn't going to be just as simple as half-laps:
















I profiled the middle board, planing and sanding away half the depth tapering down to nothing. This is a traditional mediaeval detail, giving some texture and interest to what would otherwise be just a flat expanse of wood. The slight complication with this one is that it is outward opening, so the hinge is one the board side of the door, not the ledges. I had to offer the hinge up first to make sure that there was a flat bit for the end to rest on. otherwise I would have tapered the board to an apex in the middle.






I did my trick with the pins again, hidden under the ledge positions:






I glued and nailed the ledges as per the last door, fixing the outer edge of the outer boards, and the centre of the middle board:






The inner edge junctions needed to allow for expansion and contraction, so I did the following:































There was a nasty little knot hole on the edge of one of the boards:






I cleaned it up and made a patch:











The Suffolk latch took some working out, particularly as it was on the "wrong" side of the door (it being an outward opening door). I had to make a small packing piece for the handle:






I cut a slot longer than proved necessary, but no matter. Note, too, how far from the edge of the door the ledges finish. Again, this is for the outward opening door, to allow for the stops being on the ledge side, rather than the normal board side.

Ready for hanging:






I can't back far enough away to get a decent photo of the whole door:











Here's the stop, showing the ledges cut short to clear it/ them:






The hinge flying across the tapered board:






I cobbled together a pin and chain to lock the door:
















What's this? Did I mis-measure?






In due course that will have a leaded light for a little "borrowed light" into the room. The loo doesn't have a window. I finished the door with a couple of coats of a satin water-based lacquer. It could probably do with another one, next time I've got some on the go.


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## MikeG. (2 Aug 2018)

Here's a drawing of the next door. It will be far more complicated than these previous two, and will be insulated. This will take the thickness up to 71mm, so it will weigh a ton:






Again, the spandrels will eventually be carved. I'll get to this door in 2 or 3 weeks, I reckon.


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## AndyT (2 Aug 2018)

Wow, wow, and what a beautiful house you are building there Mike!
Threads like this will be so useful for anyone wanting to do anything similar using currently available tools and materials. For the rest of us, it's a fascinating story to follow along and understand the care, effort and skill that goes into it. 
And what fun it must all be!


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## Steliz (2 Aug 2018)

Thanks for posting this, I enjoyed it very much. The doors look superb and I am looking forward to door number 3.


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## MikeG. (2 Aug 2018)

Thanks guys. Yes, more than anything I've done on this house for a year or two now, I'm looking forward to the next door. It should be great fun to build, and look fab. In the meantime, I've got to build a new shed because my workshop is now uninhabitable with building materials and building-type tools. So there will be something of a hiatus.


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## AndyT (2 Aug 2018)

MikeG.":3rf6rac6 said:


> In the meantime, I've got to build a new shed because my workshop is now uninhabitable with building materials and building-type tools. So there will be something of a hiatus.



I'm sure there's a really useful guide on how to build a shed properly somewhere on this site... :wink:


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## DTR (2 Aug 2018)

Beautiful work, MikeG =D>


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## MikeG. (2 Aug 2018)

Thanks Dave.


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## AES (2 Aug 2018)

That really is VERY good looking work, you must be very proud of yourself. FAR far beyond anything I'd ever even contemplate! Well done Sir!

Just as a matter of interest (it's not clear from the posts so far) is this a new build house which you're "just tricking up" to look old, or is it a refurbish of an old building? I see some pictures early on in your post of some horizontal "timber siding" like you see in some old houses in parts of Kent & Sussex.

Anyway, congratulations, if I didn't absolutely HATE the (over-) use of the word, I'd say "I stand in awe"  =D>


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## MikeG. (2 Aug 2018)

Thanks AES, that's very kind (and effusive) of you.

No, it's a 300 year old cottage that I have spent the last 4 years renovating and extending. If you have the appetite for 114 pages and 4500 photos you can see the whole saga here. I doubt it would take less than a week to read the whole thing. A Dutchman, from memory, contacted me a while back to say he had just spent well over a week full time going through every post. The porch to which the first door fits is new, and I posted about it somewhere on here a while back. I struggle to find the thread under the new format.


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## Bm101 (2 Aug 2018)

Been watching and learning with no comments because I have nothing _whatsoever_ plausibly helpful to add. Thanks for taking the time to post in detail Mike it's much appreciated.
Chris


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## MikeG. (3 Aug 2018)

It's a pleasure, Chris.


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## thetyreman (3 Aug 2018)

great thread, look forward to the third door


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## Marineboy (3 Aug 2018)

Thanks for that link to the extended blog on your build. I shall look forward to reading it. Not that I can get near to emulating your skill.


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## custard (3 Aug 2018)

Great work and a really interesting read!

=D>


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## SteveF (3 Aug 2018)

re-read twice as was fascinated
so interesting to see the way you worked around board widths
the rebate that you will wedge in the spandrel looked interesting
will that be a green wedge or dried? 
only out of curiosity if it will dry and fall out

Steve


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## MikeG. (3 Aug 2018)

custard":1zeipael said:


> Great work and a really interesting read!
> 
> =D>



Thanks custard. Come back for the most interesting door of the lot in the next couple of weeks.


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## MikeG. (3 Aug 2018)

SteveF":dffl36kr said:


> re-read twice as was fascinated
> so interesting to see the way you worked around board widths
> the rebate that you will wedge in the spandrel looked interesting
> will that be a green wedge or dried?
> ...



It will be a sliver of seasoned oak. The rebates are getting on for 4 inches long/ deep, so there isn't much danger of it coming loose, but nonetheless I'll probably put a dab of glue on it. I could always pin through from the inside if I felt there was any danger of the tongue coming loose, but as well as shrinking, green oak inevitably twists as it dries, and this will trap that piece as tight as you like. This is a subject in itself, as my theory is that most ancient joints were designed to counteract twisting ahead of any other priority.


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## AJB Temple (4 Aug 2018)

Very good thread. I like the fact that you show it warts and all. Excellent work. Thanks for taking the trouble to do this.


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## pitch pine (4 Aug 2018)

Excellent work Mike. Isn't oak glorious.

Looking forward to number 3.


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## MikeG. (22 Aug 2018)

I'll try and post the construction of the inner front door as I go, rather than after the fact. Just a reminder of what I am trying to achieve:







As with the porch door, I had to start with the spandrels forming the four-centred arch at the door head. I used the other half of this piece of wood, from which the others were cut (it's 250 x 100 in section):






I cut out the rough outer shape, cleaned up the top edges, and glued on another piece to make up the corner:






Then the damn great long tenons to the top and outer edges. This took the best part of a day, because I had overlooked pegging the posts and beam that form the door opening, and the posts had twisted. Not only did I have to peg them (a real struggle because of the mis-aligned holes), but the year-old mortises were no longer parallel and square, so lots of offering up and adjusting ensued:











Note the shaped mortise to the one on the floor, allowing the spandrel to rotate into position with the other spandrel already in place (like this, on the outer door):






Now, this door is going to be 71mm thick, which with an allowance for a draft seal means a curved rebate 75 x 25. That is not easy, however well equipped your workshop. Here is how I started:






After chiseling away as much as I could I then screwed on a template, and with a frightening cutter sticking 3 inches up out of the middle of an unguarded router table, I carefully (and extremely slowly) shaped the rebate. Not carefully enough:






That happened both sides. It is a fundamental design flaw with the piece, as the cross-grain (well, 45 degree grain) tapers to near zero. I had no option but cut it away to something solid, and glue in a long-grain patch:











That's another day ticked off.

Today, I cleaned up and shaped the patches, shaped the outer face of the curve (the downstand against which the door shuts), used the scratchstock to scrape a 2mm curved groove for the seal, and trimmed off the bottom ends. Another 5 hours work. The scratching of the grooves took over an hour each. I'm well into 3 days work with just the door heads.........and who here would allow for that in pricing up a job like this?

I drilled out the peg holes in the tenons, but with only 40mm tenons the pegs can't be draw-bored, particularly into 45 degree grain. Then offered up the spandrels and marked up for a final trim and sand tomorrow:











The corner patches came out really rather well, and I have seen similar repairs to spandrels in ancient buildings:






I then headed off to Thorogood Timber to pick up some more oak for the doors, a dresser in the kitchen, and a couple of other bits around the house. Hopefully I'll be able to get some time on this tomorrow.


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## Steve Maskery (22 Aug 2018)

Fantastic, Mike, just excellent. Thank you.


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## MikeG. (22 Aug 2018)

Thanks Steve. There's some rubbish photos there.........I must do better.


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## custard (22 Aug 2018)

MikeG.":3gjhynux said:


> Now, this door is going to be 71mm thick, which with an allowance for a draft seal means a curved rebate 75 x 25. That is not easy, however well equipped your workshop.



Fascinating stuff!

Instead of forming the curved rebate from the solid, couldn't two pieces have been glued together to deliver the rebate that way?


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## MikeG. (22 Aug 2018)

Possibly, custard, but this is green timber which doesn't glue well (that is, as it shrinks and twists it would have a chance of breaking the glue line apart). I would have had to do it out of seasoned timber, and seasoned 3" oak isn't easy to find, nor is it cheap. More importantly, I get a kick out of making things the way they would have been made 700 years ago, albeit I am quite happy to use electrickery to help me do it. It really gives an insight into those brilliant carpenters who did all this all over the country without the benefit of power tools.


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## MikeG. (24 Aug 2018)

Documenting a day of underachievement. Well, half a day. I do have to earn a living now and then.

This door incorporates a sheet of 6mm oak faced ply, and when I bought it, it came sandwiched between a sheet of cardboard and a sheet of 3mm MDF. That was a bonus, because I wanted the MDF. This door is nearly 3 inches thick, and will weigh an absolute ton. I don't want to be standing it in place, adjusting, trying again, adjusting, and so on. I want it right first time, so, I made a template. Marking it up:











I thought I should start with the centre of the three layers to this door. This needs to be 31mm thick, to accommodate the insulation (25mm) and the ply (6mm). I had an old plank of oak which was 36mm thick.....perfect!

Let me walk you through preparing the stock. Jump ahead if this is old hat. Here is what I started with:






I used the winding sticks to determine that although there was a good couple of metres of the board which was pretty straight, it was twisted, and twisted enough that I wouldn't be able to plane it up as a whole, but I'd have to do it in individual pieces (I wanted bits approx 70mm wide). So, I sliced it up first:






This gave me three pieces about 2200 long, all with a twist. Out with the plane, and the winding sticks:






This is merely to flatten one face enough to pass the board through the thicknesser part of the P/T. Neither face will be seen in the finished door.......this is a very unusual door, I say again...........so it wasn't imperative to get each face perfect. As it turned out, there was just enough thickness to allow the entirety of both faces to be properly planed. The shorter pieces were cut 3 or 4 inches over-length and planed up as per the longer ones, only it is a much simpler process with short bits of wood. The shorter you can cut the wood, the less planing you have to do to get the twist out. Here are all the bits dropped roughly in place over the template:






As I am sure you know by now, I love proper joints. These are a pair of mortise and tenons (with a small haunch) at the bottom corners of the door. This frame is NOT holding the door square, so there is no need for a through tenon, or wedges:






A 12mm mortise, chopped out with a bevel edge bench chisel (because that's all I have, or need):






With a quick haunch, for resistance to twisting):






Tenon marked out:






Shoulders cut with a knife just to provide a guide for the tenon saw (I didn't need to go to this trouble because, as I said, the faces of this frame will never be seen........but I've looked forward to making this door for a long time, and I was rather savouring it):
















You can see I sawed the faces of the tenons, then pared to the line with a 1-1/2" chisel.

It slipped together first time. That's what you get when your stock is properly prepared:






So that's the bottom rail dealt with, dry fitted and offered up to the template to aid marking out the top pieces:






This is the middle joint of the upper two pieces. It will be a long bridle joint, and it needs to be neat because it will be at eye level prominently in the edge of the door. Bridle joints, often taught as one of the first joins you learn, are actually a damned difficult joint to get spot on. Anyway, the shoulders as before, knife then tenon saw:






I roughed off the waste with a handsaw, then cleaned up with the big chisel as always:






Same principle but t'other way around with the female part of the joint. I drilled a hole near the inner shoulder/ face of the joint, sawed down to it, then cleaned up with the chisel (you know how sometimes you get the sharpening absolutely bang-on, and the tool is like a razor......well, that happened, and it makes this job a joy):
















I glued it all up, and that's it for the day. Like I said.......something of an underachiement:


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## MikeG. (26 Aug 2018)

Distractions, distractions. I can't seem get a clear run at this door. Amongst other things, I spent half an hour today trapped on my roof after kicking the ladder away accidentally. Anyway.......

To finish the inner frame I made a couple more bridle joints:






Then whilst the whole thing was together in a dry fit, I ran around the inside of the frame with a bearing guided cutter to create a rebate for some 6mm oak-faced ply, the secret to this door:











I squared up the corners:











The burning is because I was on my knees, and with the polished floor I couldn't get enough of a grip to move fast enough to keep the router moving at sufficient speed.

Having established the thickness, I now wanted to put in a couple of softwood cross members, so I chopped out four mortises (you people with magic joint-making machine just don't know the pleasure and skills you are missing out on):
















Time to glue it all up. The only glue I've got at the moment has a 10 minute open time. Apart from that it's great glue, but 10 minutes, even for only 6 joints (I did the top bridle joints in a second phase), means you have to have absolutely everything ready to go:






I then cut out then glued and pinned in place the veneered ply:






I had planned to do a 3 board door, as per the drawings, but unfortunately, my friend with the large planer thicknesser was away, and with a door width of 835 I needed 3 boards of about 275 wide. My thicknesser maximum is 260. So, I had the choice of waiting for my mate to return, or changing the design. I was eager to get on with things, so I decided to do a 4 boarded door instead. This still worked OK with the boards I'd got, so I spent hours and hours ripping the timber to width, flattening a face, then thicknessing:











Whilst making shavings, I planed up 3 cover strips:






I then marked up the frame using the template:






.......and roughed off the waste with a jigsaw. Useless thing sometimes has a use... 

Here are the boards cut slightly over-size. Note the 5mm gap between each one:






And finally for today, with the cover mouldings sitting roughly in place:






My original intention had been to do a shaped middle board like the loo door:











That idea had been dismissed even before the change to 4 boards, because it wouldn't have been possible to have a properly fitting draft seal with that shape.


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## topchippyles (26 Aug 2018)

Great looking stuff there mike


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## MikeG. (29 Aug 2018)

I forgot to post this photo last time, showing the relief cuts to the back of the boards. These help prevent the board attempting to cup:






I insulated the frame with 25mm Celotex:






Then with the boards screwed in place from the other side of the frame, temporarily, I put the template in place and with a flush trim cutter I trimmed the 2 layers to their final shape:






Time to get on with the other side. This is all going to be half-laps. Once I had set out one of the long pieces and one of the cross pieces, it was just a question of lots of knife cuts, lots of plunge routing, and lots of cleaning up with a chisel:






Here is the more complex top piece (template first):
















The shape is another one of those nasty tapers-to-zero bits, but the difference this time is that it is a glued joint in seasoned timber, so I have every chance of success. I wont trim the last bit until after the joint is made. This the the knife cut establishing the visible line of the joint:






My photos are getting worse. I have no idea why. On the short simple joints I would do the entire cut with a chisel, but for this long diagonal cut I ran the tenon saw along the knife line:






Then plunged the router repeatedly:






Then cleaned up with a chisel:




The piece is oversized, so the fluffy edges are irrelevant.

Finally, it was time to glue up the outer frame:


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## AndyT (29 Aug 2018)

Fascinating blend of old appearance and modern, insulated construction. Your house is going to look fantastic!
How much more work do you have planned, or is it one of those projects that never really ends?


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## MikeG. (29 Aug 2018)

I'm 4 years in already, Andy, and there is at least another year to go, albeit much more part time than it was at first. Then I've a series of other outbuildings to do, and a conservatory. I can't see me running out of work here for the next 5 years or so.


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## MikeG. (29 Aug 2018)

The frame had been glued up overnight. First job today was to clean up , and properly shape the top. Of major concern were the tapering-to-zero corners of the top curve. I cut away at these incredibly carefully, until I was within sanding distance for a small drum sander, and then finally the trimming router following the template:











All the half laps on the frame were already in place:






So now it was a question of filling in the gaps. The horizontals would be in a variety of lengths, using up scraps:






To avoid having too big a gap open up if the timber shrinks, I put a shoulder on each horizontal joint. This made for rather a tiresome chore of endless marking and cutting of tiny bits, but I hope it will be worthwhile:






Eventually it all went together:






My wife came out to check on progress, so I lined both sides up for her to see what we would be getting:






Having glued up the "portcullis", as it was immediately dubbed (I screwed it temporarily too, as I didn't want to wait), I moved on to chamfering. I made up some corner blocks, screwed temporarily in place under the frame, then ran around each frame with the router:











That took a while! I had to flip the door for each frame, unscrew each block, reposition, screw in place, flip back over, rout, then repeat 14 times......

Getting there:


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## custard (29 Aug 2018)

MikeG.":3t5cfzr8 said:


> Getting there



Looking fantastic!


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## MikeG. (29 Aug 2018)

Thanks custard. You are such an encouraging chap!!


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## martin.a.ball (30 Aug 2018)

Really like the chamfered effect and how much it lifts the design. There is quite a contrast between the last photo and the earlier one with the two doors laid on the floor.

Martin.


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## MikeG. (30 Aug 2018)

Yep, quite agree. Chamfers are much misunderstood, and too often ignored, when they can make a huge difference to the look of a piece of furniture (or a door). What looked heavy and plain, even a bit imposing, beforehand, now looks much lighter and more subtle. I'm cleaning them up by hand at the moment.


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## MikeG. (31 Aug 2018)

The first job the following day was to clean up all of the routed chamfers. This was three and a half hours with a 1" chisel......sharpened twice. There is lots of delicate paring, and some scraping, and it changed the chamfers from this:






.......to this:






I put a couple of locating pins into the main frame of the door, sticking up into the "portcullis" frame so as to locate it in exactly the right place:






This was to enable me to apply the first coat of ()water-based) lacquer, and then remove the frame. My thinking here was that the glue-up was going to be very long and complex, and I couldn't afford to under-glue as there is no mechanical fixing at all holding the "portcullis" face onto the door. Therefore there would be squeeze-out, and without pre-finishing like this, cleaning up would be a pig of a job:











Then, a change of venue. I took everything in to the house, and set up in the porch. For those just coming to this for the first time this is because a 3 inch oak door would be a nightmare to try to move from the workshop to the house. I did the boarded side first, because they are fixed with screws through the door from the other side. The outer boards are glued and screwed to their outer edge, so that there is a solid edge to the door. The inner 2 boards are glued and screwed in the middle, and there are movement gaps of 7 to 9mm between each of the boards:
















The last photo shows the cover strip drilled for later plugging, and about to be screwed over the gap between two boards. There is a big hole where the screw passes through the board, again, to allow for movement. This is on the outer (unstable) side of the door, so no chances with movement even though it is inside the enclosed porch.

Then, (following day) deep breath............another curse that I only have a 10 minute glue available.......flip the door over, and begin a glue-up against the clock:






You can imagine why there were no photos during the process. The clean-up of squeeze out took ages, with lots of changes of (warm) water, taking the cauls (is that the right word?) off in sequence to give access all around the panels, and finally a bit of careful scraping as the glue got slightly ahead of me. It's the worst clean up I can remember, with miles of edges to deal with. Worse than a bookcase.

I then toddled off to buy some hinges and handles whilst the glue dried, then spent the afternoon sorting everything out and hanging the door. The shavings on the floor are from angling the leading edge, which the trimming cutter obviously left square. I had to offer it up twice and adjust, but it was so, so close to right first time. The door is so thick that it stood up easily on edge, unsupported:






Finally, in place:





















I can't tell you how pleased I am with this. It's the very best bit of the whole 4 year project in my view. I love it!


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## MikeG. (2 Sep 2018)

I have a collection of handmade nails, and I dug out a bag or 2" ones:







Which I then cut down to 1":






I hammered these into the holes I'd drilled previously in the door:











The missing ones are because I have some bolts to fit, and I wanted to leave myself options. Anyway, you'll have worked out that the nails are decorative only.

I then drew out the template for the carving of the spandrels over the internal door:






before removing everything that wasn't needed. I can't say I am a natural carver, and I've never used carving chisels before (thanks Dave  ), but the result seems OKish to me:






I'll get a better in situ photo tomorrow when the light is OK:


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## MikeG. (3 Sep 2018)

I carved the other spandrel today:
















I then faffed around with the door stops for quite a long time, and finally got them fitted with their seals:











The groove on the back is for that expanding foam seal stuff I used previously, which will draft seal the planted on door stops.

You can see in this next photo (just) that the door stops extend past the face of the spandrels, and with a little cover strip at the top, form a frame around the carving:


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## MikeG. (4 Sep 2018)

I've taken a couple of better photos of the carving in situ:


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## Steliz (4 Sep 2018)

Very impressive Mike and I've really enjoyed this WIP, thanks.


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## MikeG. (4 Sep 2018)

Thanks Steliz.


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## Steve Maskery (4 Sep 2018)

Mike, if you send me your address I'll send send you a packet of Polyfilla for those holes.
Always like to help.


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## thetyreman (4 Sep 2018)

agree, very impressive doors, I can only imagine how heavy they must have been, the carving is very nice as well, that'll still look good in a few hundred years.


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## Setch (4 Sep 2018)

Looks great Mike! Bet you're glad you got the kerning error out of your system before you tackled these!


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## MikeG. (4 Sep 2018)

Steve Maskery":ogeznk10 said:


> Mike, if you send me your address I'll send send you a packet of Polyfilla for those holes.
> Always like to help.



 Thanks Steve. That's thoughtful of you. Oak pegs, though do a better job of holding M&Ts together than Polyfilla does. I imagine.


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## MikeG. (4 Sep 2018)

Setch":zael1ti2 said:


> Looks great Mike! Bet you're glad you got the kerning error out of your system before you tackled these!



Yeah, it's always better to make your mistakes on paper rather than in wood. I'll be re-carving that piece shortly.


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## MikeG. (4 Sep 2018)

thetyreman":t7hrjz7k said:


> agree, very impressive doors, I can only imagine how heavy they must have been, the carving is very nice as well, that'll still look good in a few hundred years.



Thanks Ben. Appreciated.


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## TFrench (5 Sep 2018)

Really impressive work. Thanks for writing it up in such detail, its really appreciated!


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## MikeG. (6 Sep 2018)

Thank you!


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## Nelsun (6 Sep 2018)

Have another thanks Mike. That last door is, and I don't trot out the word unless absolutely necessary, awesome! I'd spend all day long going in and out of that. I bet it feels really good opening and closing it never mind looking at it =D>


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## devonwoody (6 Sep 2018)

Thanks for the time freely given showing this project.


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## AES (6 Sep 2018)

Yup, without being "effusive" (!!) these 3, especially the last, really are a fine example of the chippy's skill. Agree, "awesome" (and like the previous poster, that's NOT a word I use at all lightly.


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## MikeG. (6 Sep 2018)

Thanks guys, much appreciated. And yes, I do look for excuses to go through it. I've just had a visitor, a hobby woodworker (with a serious workshop), who signed up for my proposed woodworking class as soon as he saw the door.

I'm having difficulty organising the locks/ latches, so it won't get used as much as it should for the next few weeks.


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## MikeG. (27 Sep 2018)

I've done the name over the front door. Again, relief carving, but this time with the background painted matt black.


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## Marineboy (27 Sep 2018)

Lovely work. But a question. What’s the significance of the name? The possessive case suggests that the house belongs to Lintel.


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## MikeG. (27 Sep 2018)

Marineboy":7m6h4ihp said:


> Lovely work. But a question. What’s the significance of the name? The possessive case suggests that the house belongs to Lintel.



It did. It was a farm belonging to the Lintel family for 200 years.


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## Marineboy (27 Sep 2018)

Aha! Great to see the historical connection.


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## Bm101 (27 Sep 2018)

Not Linda and Terry then Mike?
:-" 

Looks great btw. 
Chris


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## Marineboy (27 Sep 2018)

I did wonder about that at first. When I retired after my career in children’s social work I toyed with the notion of renaming the house Duncarin. But good taste thankfully prevented me.


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## Benno (11 Oct 2018)

I'm just at the beginning of this woodworking thing, just doing my first projects and learning the ropes - what an inspiration this thread is.


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## rafezetter (11 Oct 2018)

Bm101":8lh1nngp said:


> Not Linda and Terry then Mike?
> :-"
> 
> Looks great btw.
> Chris



Haha - that's exactly what I thought, but with an added "but the posters name is MikeG... I don't get it....?"

Mike - those doors and WIP are just excellent, the front door especially, I think you do yourself a disservice with the comment on your carving ability as well.

Makes me feel very humble at some of the things I've made - I'm not worthy!

I've BM'd your "saga" on the a different place site - if it's as indepth as this WIP it'll keep me busy for some time.


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## MikeG. (11 Oct 2018)

rafezetter":3ur0ed4i said:


> .........I've BM'd your "saga" on the a different place site - if it's as indepth as this WIP it'll keep me busy for some time.



Good luck with that. There are about 120 pages, covering 4 years of work. I reckon you'd do well to read it in under about 50 hours.


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## MikeG. (21 Nov 2018)

Finally, after a 10 week wait, 4 keyed-alike sash locks arrived, and that triggered a bit of activity at the front door. First of all, we don't have a bell or a knocker.

That's a funny shaped piece of wood, Mike:












The bell pull had to be mounted in an unorthodox way because of the arched braces for the porch canopy, with the top element being rotated 90 degrees from the lower piece. Hence the funny shaped piece of oak:











The bell pull itself is a really nice bit of casting, but the screw thread used to join the two halves of the rod was appalling, and failed immediately. I welded it together instead:






Three metres away, inside, is the bell. There are various pulleys in between:






The awful stretchy nylon cord supplied with the bell will be replaced with some twisted wire cable (actually picture hanging wire) when that arrives.

Now, the lock/ latch. Firstly, the door is an inch thick boarded door, so a sash lock won't work in the ordinary way. A rim lock would be the usual answer, but the other three outer doors need a sash lock, and you can't get a sash lock and a rim lock on the same key without paying many hundreds of pounds so......


























I then glued that all up:






Whilst the glue was drying, I decided I needed part of a wheelbarrow for the lock issue:
















The following day I cleaned up the lock box, then did some drilling etc:


























That's the woodwork done for the box. I set to with a file and hacksaw to sort out the metalwork:






I found a collection of gorgeous square headed black screws:






With a little box for the keep, it was time to screw that lot to the door (with the metalwork just resting in place):






After a bit of tiffling to get everything working smoothly, I obtained some old engine oil from my friendly local garage:






It wasn't really possible to take photos whilst using a blow-torch to get the metal glowing dull red, then plunging it repeatedly into the oil, burning off the excess, and repeating, but I did stop half-way through so that the before and after was obvious:






Once cool, I wiped them off, and screwed them in place:






Unfortunately those were all the screws I had, so I had to shorten some hand-made nails and use them at the ends of the straps:
















Ideally, I would have liked a big black doorknob (and separate escutcheon) rather than a monkey-tailed handle, but I couldn't find any big ones with a return spring in them, which was essential for this latch.


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## Marineboy (21 Nov 2018)

That ironwork is absolutely gorgeous, particularly the bell pull. And what an ingenious solution to fit the lock. Hats off to you. 

PS - is tiffling the same as fettling?


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## AndyT (21 Nov 2018)

Brilliant! =D> =D> =D> 

I love the way you mix up the best of the old and new, spending cash where it's necessary and saving it where that's the sensible choice.


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## MikeG. (21 Nov 2018)

Marineboy":1y2mu1lj said:


> That ironwork is absolutely gorgeous, particularly the bell pull. And what an ingenious solution to fit the lock. Hats off to you.
> 
> PS - is tiffling the same as fettling?



I think tiffling involves more time-wasting and bigger hammers than fettling, but requires roughly the same tea consumption.


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## AES (21 Nov 2018)

I really DO like the metal work, it all fits in (in terms of looks) so well with everything else. Heard about the engine oil/blowlamp idea before, but never tried it. If that's the sort of results it brings I'll have a go at that sometime.

I really love the bell arrangement too. If the nylon cord is too springy and you don't want to wait for the picture wire to arrive, how about "Bowden cable" which doesn't normally stretch much at all - e.g. would be push bike brake cable inner, or moped or lawn mower throttle cable inner, etc, etc. Available here in various lengths over the counter in DIY Emporia, amongst others.


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## MikeG. (21 Nov 2018)

That was my first thought for cable, but my sources (I'm into cycling, a lot) all sold it in shorter lengths.........or on 100m drums.

Fleabay tell me my wire should be here tomorrow.


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## pollys13 (21 Nov 2018)

Amazing , knocked out, reminds me of that song line, slinky, cool and nobody's fool.


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## MikeG. (21 Nov 2018)

Thanks, pollys.

Of course, I can't use it yet as we require over-length keys due to the unorthodox arrangements of both front doors. They'll be cut in the next few days.


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## thetyreman (22 Nov 2018)

great to see some progress mike, it's really looking good now, love the bell great detail


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## Sheffield Tony (22 Nov 2018)

I like how the straps have turned out with the heat and oil treatment - I hope you avoided the fumes if you were using old engine oil though.



MikeG.":2hab81jj said:


> Ideally, I would have liked a big black doorknob (and separate escutcheon) rather than a monkey-tailed handle, but I couldn't find any big ones



Careful choice of Google search terms called for there :lol:


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## E-wan (22 Nov 2018)

All looking very impressive

Instead of picture why have you considered using spectra/dynema it's available in a multitude of diameters. Has a very high breaking strain, virtually no stretch, will flow more freely through pulleys and won't corrode like a metal cable.

Ewan

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk


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## Bm101 (22 Nov 2018)

Great read as always. Good to see the new progress
My brother in law has an oak door. And windows. And partition. And chairs, bench and table. All made for the property. You'd like it Mike. 
I _love_ his house. You go there and think why does my house not have leaded oak windows and flagstones on the floor. 
He's an architect too. Specialises in old buildings, you might even know him. 
Only reason I mention it is he has what I know as a zombie bar. Sorry, don't know the real name.
Blacksmith knocked up a couple of brackets and the oak bar sits in it at night. It's *solid*. Better than any lock. Its medieval tech. Designed for proper assaults on your property. By people with swords and spears and stuff. There's modern equivalents but none stand out from my quick google.
Just a thought. :wink: 
Cheers
Chris.


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## MikeG. (22 Nov 2018)

E-wan":1e863i6a said:


> All looking very impressive
> 
> Instead of picture why have you considered using spectra/dynema it's available in a multitude of diameters. Has a very high breaking strain, virtually no stretch, will flow more freely through pulleys and won't corrode like a metal cable............



I had to duckduckgo the stuff because I'd never heard of it. I bought the brass wire because it will be on show, is cheap, and it won't stretch . If it doesn't work as I expect, I'll have a look at your suggestions.


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## AndyT (22 Nov 2018)

MikeG.":2qzdf6xg said:


> I had to duckduckgo the stuff because I'd never heard of it.



So did I, for the same reason. I don't need any at the moment, but the names are now filed away for when I do. Thanks, E-wan.


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## 4ndy (23 Nov 2018)

Stunning work Mike, it's been a great read over my lunch break - and a much better use of my time than another hours free work for the company! 

A good source of dynema, and other very strong low-stretch "string" in every colour you can think of is archery string material. You can buy it by the reel and there's a multitude of options (I used to have a luminous green and black twisted pair setup on my bow). 

Looking forward to the next installment, and have been reading your house thread on the other forum too.


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