cutting into engineered wood

[thetyreman]

I will be planning on cutting into hardboard and also MDF for a build coming up,

it's acoustic treatment and it definitely can't be made from real wood in this case.

is it a crazy idea to use handtools for this? could always hire some power tools for the day and do it outside on sawhorses, I've not done anything like this before or worked with MDF it's only been handtools and real wood, cheers.

 

[profchris]

I find both cut easily with handsaws.

 

[Rorschach]

A sharp fine tooth handsaw will work lovely on MDF, japanese style blade will go through fast and leave a lovely finish.

 

[custard]

I guess different people have different experiences. I agree you can work MDF and ply with handtools, but personally I hate it. Ply splinters out at the edges with a handsaw, MDF crumbles. Sheet goods aren't as rigid as solid timber, so they flex and trap your hand saw. The edges need finishing with a hand plane, which isn't very clean, it dulls the blades, and without dust extraction at source you're covered in clouds of MDF dust.

When it comes to sheet materials, a track saw is good, a proper dimension saw with a sliding table and a scoring blade is even better.

At a pinch could you set up a router with dust extraction to run along a straight edge and clean up that raggedy one or two mill at the edges? That or buy your sheet goods ready dimensioned?

 

[sunnybob]

Be very careful of MDF dust. Its so fine that it can get past most face masks, and it will ruin your lungs.

 

[skipdiver]

You could easily do it with handsaws but as custard says, you are then left with poor edges to finish. Track saws are ideal for this. Maybe getting a cheap one from Aldi or Titan from screwfix is an option?

 

[ED65]

Because hardboard is made just from compressed wood fibres (bonded together by the lignin, not an added resin) it's no more wearing than some hardwoods so no real worries there.

With MDF the resin adhesive used as a binder does make it a known blunter of edges but in MDF it's not too bad really because it's not in big chunks like in chipboard! All my saws until recently were hardpoint saws so I never noticed any effect on those when sawing MDF, but you do notice it a bit when you plane edges.

If you needed to plane it much you can counteract the effect to some degree by adding a small back bevel to your iron to increase the edge thickness. This back bevel can be very tiny, truly a microbevel, and still provide the effect and being that small you can hone it away subsequently fairly quickly to return the iron to its original state.