Fitting a Panel into a Frame
This weekend was one of those weekends when my lovely wife made it very clear that she had some things she wanted me to get done around the house. One of those tasks I had managed to put off for over a year.
She wanted a white board put up in the kitchen so she’d have a place to write her grocery list, notes, and whatever else came to mind. Our 1960’s-vintage kitchen still has the original cabinets with the rabbeted plywood doors. But the way the cabinets were built, there’s a bumpout in one corner that is essentially the back side of a closet. Strange floor plan, I know, but this whole house is strange. Anyway, where the wall cabinets meet this bumpout, there’s an adjacent empty space on the wall that had been framed in 1×2’s. The area is about 28″ high by 14″ wide. A perfect size and location for a whiteboard, my wife so strongly hints.
So here’s the challenge: Can I get a ¼” whiteboard panel to fit inside this framed area without having to add trim to hide any gaps? I brought in my framing square and was pleasantly surprised to find out that one corner was only out of square by about 1/8″ over the 28″ length. “Hmmm. Not bad,” I thought. “This will be easier than I thought.” (Usually, this thought gets me into serious trouble…but not this time.)
I cut the panel just about 1/16″ oversized on my table saw and kept trimming a little off until the panel just started to slide into the “narrow” end of the frame. Knowing that I had to take about another 1/16″ off the other end of the panel, I went back to my table saw, folded up an old business card to four thickness, and put it between my panel and the rip fence at one end. That effectively “tapered” the cut. I checked the fit of the panel and it was real close to fitting. So I brought my small block plane into the kitchen and kept shaving the edges here and there until the panel could be held in place with friction only. Of course, my ten-year old walks in while I was planing and says, “Dad, why are you doing that in the kitchen?”
After a few rounds of planing and test-fitting, I ended up not needing any glue or screws to hold the panel in place. And there was barely any noticable gap around the panel. Nothing beats a block plane for final trimming and fitting.
I was happy to get another project checked off my list and my lovely bride was happy to have a place to make a list.
Marty said,
Doesn’t it worry you just a little bit that you just made a very convenient way for your lovely bride to add to the “honey do” list?
(posted on November 6th, 2007 at 10:54 am)