An amateur builds a kitchen...

JimD

Jim
Senior User
I agree with both of Bas's comments. Track saw is safer and would be pretty easy to use for this but you may want to make what I call a track setting jig. Something to position the track 1.5 inches plus the saw kerf from the good edge of the stock. You will also want to put other wood of the same thickness under the track when the workpiece is narrower than the track.

On the table saw, a feather board would help you consistently keep the workpiece tight to the fence but it would pretty much require you to get the boards to the same width before you start cutting. A ripping blade would be a good idea too but just to reduce saw effort.

I also congratulate you for doing this the way you are - making all the parts as you go. That should be less total effort. The one time I made a whole kitchen I did it a cabinet at a time. I was using the front of the car garage so I did not have much space without backing the cars out. But an equally important reason was my strong tendency to get bored with too much effort before the payoff of a completed project. I made a cabinet at a time where I could. I had a run of base that supported the sink and housed the dishwasher that I saved until last. I think that also helped my wife's confidence. She had a bunch of completed cabinets installed at the time I took her sink out of service.
 

LB75

Moderator
George
George as Rob mentioned, a powerfeed wont help throughput, it would only help with quality and safety though. I realize its too late now but alot of lumber suppliers will supply pre ripped material , for a premium of course but it would remove the tedium of doing it yourself. What sort of doors are you making?. I see youre in concord and Ive since relocated to High rock lake. If I can be of any help, let me know. I have tons of shaper cutters and a powerfeed on the shaper for doing doors. You come and run it and empty the DC, and its all yours!. A tip for you as well.... are these painted cabinets? if they are, prepaint the face frames and doors of course, before attaching to the boxes.

Thank you very much for the offer Chris! I'm planning on simple shaker style doors and just received the rail and style bit set from Infinity. I'll see how that goes on my router table but I might just take you up on your offer!

The power feeder idea was definitely thinking more about safety and quality. I'm not too worried about speed, I've been planning this project for a couple years and am about 2 months into the build process.
 

LB75

Moderator
George
Those cabinets are coming along great!

I don't know if you have one, but this could actually be a really good job for a track saw. Set up the track on top of a piece of stock, overhanging by 1 1/2", and clamp it down. Slide another piece of stock underneath the track, cut it, rinse, repeat. Still tedious, but you're moving the blade through the wood, not the wood through the blade. You're also more likely to have better dust collection and less hand fatigue.

If you don't have a track saw, I just gave you an excellent reason to buy one :)

If you are going to use the table saw, you may want to buy a thin kerf rip blade to make the ripping a little easier. With 3/4" stock you're unlikely to have blade deflection issues. But it's still tedious work. Featherboards will help too.

That's a heck of an idea Bas, I do have a track saw and setting up a cutting station like you describe really does seem like it would be safer. Thanks!
 

Bas

Recovering tool addict
Bas
Corporate Member
That's a heck of an idea Bas, I do have a track saw and setting up a cutting station like you describe really does seem like it would be safer. Thanks!
Sorry I discouraged you from getting a power feeder. You may want to get one after all, try both methods, and see which one you prefer :cool:
 

LB75

Moderator
George
Sorry I discouraged you from getting a power feeder. You may want to get one after all, try both methods, and see which one you prefer :cool:

I like where your head is at. The wife though, she's not really a fan at the moment :p :p :p
 

LB75

Moderator
George
Well, it's looking like a power feeder may be in the cards after all. This batch of maple is being particularly unruly and releasing some tension during ripping making it almost impossible to get nice parallel cuts with the track saw. Racking my brain here and I just can't come up with any other option to get this done. I really should have just paid the premium to have this stuff milled to final size....
 

LB75

Moderator
George
Okay, thanks to the magical thinking power of a Killian's Irish Red, I have a new plan to tackle this. I realized I have a 1" Woodslicer blade in my Hammer bandsaw. Going to rough cut to width all of this maple to release any tension before running them through the table saw to get to final width. I'll feel a lot safer during the process if I'm only taking off an 1/8" on each pass on the table saw instead of trying to rip 1 1/2" strips off of 8" wide boards. Wish me luck...
 

Bas

Recovering tool addict
Bas
Corporate Member
Okay, thanks to the magical thinking power of a Killian's Irish Red, I have a new plan to tackle this. I realized I have a 1" Woodslicer blade in my Hammer bandsaw. Going to rough cut to width all of this maple to release any tension before running them through the table saw to get to final width. I'll feel a lot safer during the process if I'm only taking off an 1/8" on each pass on the table saw instead of trying to rip 1 1/2" strips off of 8" wide boards. Wish me luck...
That makes a lot of sense. If there's tension you're going to have problems no matter what method you use, at least with the bandsaw you have ample control, and more effective power than a track saw.

Good luck! Take lots of breaks, repetition is always the biggest danger.
 

Rwe2156

DrBob
Senior User
Anyone have any tips on ripping a large quantity of face frame material on a table saw?
A power feeder, while nice entails mounting on a table saw, so I would go with your built in power feeder:
biceps and triceps!!

Seriously its not that difficult. I stack the material to the left, all the jointed edges toward fence, when ripped stack to right.

I would mention the really big issue here is safety because lengthy repetitive tasks like this, while not in themselves dangerous, can become dangerous if we don't stay focused. My point is a power feeder also functions as a safety device.

Tip: Wait to rip the rails/stiles to final size after the profiles are routed. I keep mine 1/4 -1/2" oversized. This way when you're routing if there is any tearout or an oops you can rip just a bit of the profile off and re-route

Now the router table is where a power feeder really pays off. One of the cheaper "mini" models will work fine. I have one of the ShopFox mini feeders and it works well, not sure if its powerful enough for a table saw though.
 

LB75

Moderator
George
Im surprised youre seeing that much instability, but I never make faceframes less than 2"

Yeah, I am too. As I got deeper into the stack last night it's looking like I'm going to be okay. It may only be a couple boards acting unruly.
 

chris_goris

Chris
Senior User
Thank you very much for the offer Chris! I'm planning on simple shaker style doors and just received the rail and style bit set from Infinity. I'll see how that goes on my router table but I might just take you up on your offer!

The power feeder idea was definitely thinking more about safety and quality. I'm not too worried about speed, I've been planning this project for a couple years and am about 2 months into the build process.
George, how deep is the cope on the cope and stick door set?. If its only 1/4-3/8 deep, you may want to improve that joint. In my opinion, thats not enough for a cabinet door joint. Especially if you have some larger width doors. Those joints get stressed heavily and a simple shaker style joint that shallow can fail over time. When I make these I put a 8mm Domino in each corner. Do you have a domino?.
 

LB75

Moderator
George
George, how deep is the cope on the cope and stick door set?. If its only 1/4-3/8 deep, you may want to improve that joint. In my opinion, thats not enough for a cabinet door joint. Especially if you have some larger width doors. Those joints get stressed heavily and a simple shaker style joint that shallow can fail over time. When I make these I put a 8mm Domino in each corner. Do you have a domino?.

The set I bought from Infinity cuts 1/2" deep so I think I'll be good to go. The widest width door in the plan is 18".

I do have a domino and popping one in each corner might not be a bad idea, I've already gone through this much effort, why not make the doors are as strong as possible? Would help the alignment during glue up too. When you do your doors, are you cutting your mortises before or after routing the cope and stick profile?
 

McRabbet

Rob
Corporate Member
You need to cut the mortises with your Domino before you rout the cope and stick joints. That way you are able to get correct registration of the Domino against the end of the rails and the sides of the stiles. I did this same thing on some glass doors I made for a dining room cabinet several years ago and the joints were rock solid.
 

LB75

Moderator
George
George as Rob mentioned, a powerfeed wont help throughput, it would only help with quality and safety though. I realize its too late now but alot of lumber suppliers will supply pre ripped material , for a premium of course but it would remove the tedium of doing it yourself. What sort of doors are you making?. I see youre in concord and Ive since relocated to High rock lake. If I can be of any help, let me know. I have tons of shaper cutters and a powerfeed on the shaper for doing doors. You come and run it and empty the DC, and its all yours!. A tip for you as well.... are these painted cabinets? if they are, prepaint the face frames and doors of course, before attaching to the boxes.

Hey Chris, I would like to take you up your offer to spend some time using your shaper and sent you a PM. Thanks again for your help on this!!!
 

chris_goris

Chris
Senior User
The set I bought from Infinity cuts 1/2" deep so I think I'll be good to go. The widest width door in the plan is 18".

I do have a domino and popping one in each corner might not be a bad idea, I've already gone through this much effort, why not make the doors are as strong as possible? Would help the alignment during glue up too. When you do your doors, are you cutting your mortises before or after routing the cope and stick profile?
Like Rob has already said here... before the mortise.
 

vinson

Doug
Corporate Member
Not exactly related but helps to know that I am not the only one. I recently bought some nice 6 inch hard maple to use in a segmented bowl and when I ripped some 1.5 inch strips they turned into pretzels.
 

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