French doors question

UKworkshop.co.uk

Help Support UKworkshop.co.uk:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Manny

Established Member
Joined
31 Mar 2004
Messages
152
Reaction score
0
Location
London
I'm making a pair of external single panel french doors which will have 16mm double glazed units fitted.
To save the hassle of planing 2m lenghts of sappele I bought the timber planed from the merchants, the outcome is that I have two stiles that are perfect and two that have a 4mm bow in them.
The question is:-

1. Do I use the two straight stiles for one door and the two bowed stiles for the other ending up with one straight and one bowed door, hoping that the bow might be lessened by the d/glazing unit.

Or

2. Mix bowed stile with straight stile in the same door and hang the doors on the bowed stile. As I'm using three hinges on each door the middle hinge may help straighten the bowed stiles, I will then have two straight meeting stiles.

I can't decide which is the best option - what do you think

John
 
John how good a customer are you? Because if you buy regualy from this merchant then i would take the bad lengths back and ask them to exchanged them. If they value your custom then they will. If not then shop someone else in the future.


Did you pick the wood up or have it delivered? Either way didn't you check it?

Regards

Woody
 
Woody

I ordered it and picked it up, the timber was shrink wrapped and was sitting around for a week in their shed and then for a few days with me, I only noticed it this morning. They would probably say it's down to the time it's been sitting around, anyway I've put the moulding on now, so it's a bit late to return it, but I'll let them know.

John
 
I would strongly advise avoiding making a door from a bowed stile! (DAMHIKT - It's probably got a bit of wind too. :roll: ) The double glazing will not sufficiently correct the bow, and with one straight and one bowed stile, the door will not be a good fit on all sides.
Also, it would be unusual for a timber merchant to be making any guarantees as to their wood being straight. Usually its bought PAR, PSE etc which has nothing to do with straightness.
In other words, a good timber yard may well exchange it, but only for more of the same. It was a fluke that you got two straight pieces!
IMO, long door stiles like this must be worked flat, straight and without wind in the workshop, after sufficient acclimatising, to stand a chance of having a nice flat, straight door.
:(
 
Thanks guys

Having thought about it today I've decided to get some sawn sappele for replacement stiles and plane them myself, which is what I should have done in the first place.
 
Aragorn, the way i read it was that the timber merchant planed manny's wood to size to fill an order. Hence the reason he could not plane out the bow himself. If as it now appears that he picked the lengths himself from the rack then that is a different story, but even then a good merchant would exchange them.

It just shows that if you are going to buy PAR near the final size you are going to use then make sure it is straight. If not then get sawn and plane and thickness it yourself.

Regards

Woody
 
I ordered the PAR sappele from W.L. West in Sussex, the cost for planing wasn't a lot and it would save me the hassle of handling 2m lenghts on my small planer. As it was coming from a quality merchant I assumed there wouldn't be a problem but I've learnt my lesson now and in future will be buying sawn timber only.

Thanks for the advice

John
 
Manny
I've ordered quite a lot of planed timber form British Hardwoods.
A great many of their lengths are straight, flat and without wind.
I think it is possible to get PAR usable off the lorry, but some just seem to do it better than others!
 
Manny

if you think that there is a risk that the timber will continue to twist or wind then my recommendation would be to mount the glazing units in oversize holes with special glazing 'gunge' (can't think what else to call it).

I mounted some (admittedly very large) panes of Pilkington K series glass panes (2m x 1m)in an oak frame and as the frame has twisted, one of the panes has multiple cracks in it.

Just a thought.

Roger
 
I mounted some (admittedly very large) panes of Pilkington K series glass panes (2m x 1m)in an oak frame and as the frame has twisted, one of the panes has multiple cracks in it.

Roger that's a bit frightening - I bed the DGU on silicon and and then fix with beading pinned in, the d/glazing will be toughened. I would hope that any movement would force the beading out rather than crack the DGU (fingers crossed)
 
As I named the merchants (W.L. West) who supplied the bowed sappele this is just to say that they were very helpful and replaced the timber.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top