Hi, I feel massively inferior writing here as a woodworker I am not (You should see the mitre joints on my most recent home made fame - its more woodfiller than it is wood! lol!) however...
I'm a single mum with a passion for solid wood, and I'm in the middle of trying to banish flatpacked rubbish from my house. Obviously budget is an issue, so I've been buying pine furniture second hand and refinishing / sprucing it up myself.
Problem is, living in a small house I can only work on one project at a time, so if I find a glut of bargains, they tend to sit in the very cold and slightly damp garage until it's their time to be worked on. Recently I've noticed that a pine welsh dresser and pine TV stand have both developed separating issues on the doors - the joints seem to be of the tongue and groove variety (??) and they literally... pull apart on their own meaning the doors no longer shut.
Other than finding somewhere else to store my bargains or working quicker, does anyone have any advice for me on how to fix this problem? I've taken the door off and given it a good whack with a soft mallet, but it hasn't done much to push everything back in place. In the summer I managed to fill the gap and plane off the edge so the doors shut properly again (I like the 'country' look where the bottom is painted and the top is waxed so this wasn't an issue) but I wasn't able to finish the project so it's since been in the garage all winter it now no longer closes again. I'm loathe to plane more of the wood off... and I'm worried it's ruined.
Is there a trick I'm missing here? Any idea why this is happening? Is it just the cold, or more a case of the damp causing the problem? If so, would a dehumidifier / heater work? Any advice from more experienced people would be very very appreciated!
I'm a single mum with a passion for solid wood, and I'm in the middle of trying to banish flatpacked rubbish from my house. Obviously budget is an issue, so I've been buying pine furniture second hand and refinishing / sprucing it up myself.
Problem is, living in a small house I can only work on one project at a time, so if I find a glut of bargains, they tend to sit in the very cold and slightly damp garage until it's their time to be worked on. Recently I've noticed that a pine welsh dresser and pine TV stand have both developed separating issues on the doors - the joints seem to be of the tongue and groove variety (??) and they literally... pull apart on their own meaning the doors no longer shut.
Other than finding somewhere else to store my bargains or working quicker, does anyone have any advice for me on how to fix this problem? I've taken the door off and given it a good whack with a soft mallet, but it hasn't done much to push everything back in place. In the summer I managed to fill the gap and plane off the edge so the doors shut properly again (I like the 'country' look where the bottom is painted and the top is waxed so this wasn't an issue) but I wasn't able to finish the project so it's since been in the garage all winter it now no longer closes again. I'm loathe to plane more of the wood off... and I'm worried it's ruined.
Is there a trick I'm missing here? Any idea why this is happening? Is it just the cold, or more a case of the damp causing the problem? If so, would a dehumidifier / heater work? Any advice from more experienced people would be very very appreciated!
