making a traditional front door.

[johnnyb]

quick tot up the rails and stiles came to £26 and £24 for the panels approx.

 

[johnnyb]

my mates dad takes em a farmers auction. £3 everytime for clean white stuff.

 

[A.R]

I dont buy in to the hardwood is the only wood for exterior joinery. redwood is redwood. its the same tree as the old boys used. beautiful to work, smell and finish especially with hand planes. its neither to hard and dry or to soft. and is classed as moderately durable anybody who neglects redwood neglects the last 200 years of historic joinery. that being said a thorough treatment with preserver sprayed all over helps to preserve it for decades and decades.
the door this is replacing is made from quebec yellow pine a thoroughly unsuitable wood and it lasted over a hundred years!
also using sapele from the congo is not at all good. its far to hard to use with hand tools and has a switchback grain.
as well as being unsound in its source.
Russian redwood is better than Swedish if you can get it btw
accoya the wonder wood whilst ticking ethical boxes is very soft and brittle. tricksy to glue and paint.
my next front door and frame will be in sapele. almost the same style but bead and flush. with draughtstrips and multipoint locking!
in summary as a woodworker redwood is my wood of choice for this stuff every time. for anyone wondering my least favourite wood is.....oak!

I always thought the Swedish stuff was better although I haven't used Russian for years. The Russian stuff always seemed softer?

My son, who is a first class welder by trade, has built himself a large house recently and he and his partner wanted a large solid front door.
As he was short on time and a suitable workshop he asked me to make one for him and the door frame to go with it which has 12" wide glass panels down each side of the frame. I made it from accoya wood which is a very heavy wood to handle. The size of the door was 6 feet 8 inches tall and 3 feet 3 inches wide and 2.5 inches thick. Each piece of wood to make the butt joints equal were the same size. As I have said, it was butt jointed and then grooved to take a .25 inch tongue. I glued the joints up so that I was only clamping one joint at a time . I then ended up gluing the last joint with two pieces of jointed wood. I then had to hand plane and machine sand the faces and ends of the door. The door was too heavy for me, or me and my wife to handle to turn it over, so my son and his partner had to travel ten miles over to me just to turn it over to finish off the other side. I then routed a vee groove along all the joints to male it look like a tongue and grooved door. Up to now it hasn't twisted or warped since I made it 18 months ago. Just out of interest, when it was checked out see if it met the specifications as far as being draught proof, he was told by the man who was doing the test that he had to do the test twice as couldn't believe how low the readings he got as they were so good. This was down to my son putting expanded foam in any space that would let cold air into the house.

 

[johnnyb]

the next stage was to undercoat using a splash of gloss to tint it slightly more towards the final pink(lilac).
After a day this was sanded with 320 to remove as many brushstrokes as poss. just an aside about drying times. there are definite benefits to leaving oil paint to dry properly. by properly I mean as long as possible. days in summer maybe a week in winter. its then important(and much easier) to flat it off as its not claggy.
next was the surfacer. or Swedish putty or whatever you call it!
any i take a scoop(after pouring off the oil as that would slow its drying) once again a splash of gloss. mix it up. then smooth it on as thinly and evenly as possible. I use a continental filling blade with a finely papered edge. gradually go over each section then over it a couple more times to remove as many globs as possible. finally mix a spot of white spirit with the remainder and brush on the mouldings this will in effect be thick paint. its important to have previously filled any holes with 2 part or powder filler btw the surfaces is just for brushstrokes. allow to dry referring to previous advice.

 

[johnnyb]

heres the photos

 

[johnnyb]

heres the surface and the finished door

 

[johnnyb]

next is the delicate part... the sanding. the surfacer has put a smooth thin hard shell over the door. Next we need to sand this back to a shiny mirror like surface. this is best done with wet and dry and a Cork block. I initially go over the surface with my orbital but care must be taken not to work one bit to hard or the hard shell is removed and the aluminium primer tears. with wet and dry this doesnt happen.(600 grit)
go over the door with fingers and feel for bits that are not smooth and just go over those. if you see dints or tears then put a smear of surfacer on.
finally the door needs fitting before the gloss goes on. as gloss can be soft for days. (weeks even) .

 

[johnnyb]

just to finish the full circle on this job I eventually managed to fit and paint. it was actually an extremely distinctive colour(dorchester pink) . oil gloss even with extra prep sanding etc. its a pipper to get dust free and without runs. the beads are a particular source of runs. I had to paint it then wipe out the grooves with a cloth on a screwdriver! and keep wiping and brushing the drips.

 

[johnnyb]

heres another

 

[AndyT]

That looks super, a great match for the house.

 

[thetyreman]

very enjoyable thread, thanks for sharing the process.

 

[Jetset]

Excellent work!