# Making rustic doors



## Tropic Home (Oct 12, 2007)

I want to make the doors for my Tropic Home. I will be using teak and can get it cut in any dimensioons, but am thinking 1 1/2" x 5" and 3/4" x 4"(or 5"). My tools are limited to a small table saw, circular saw, electric hand planer, router, drill, chop saw, biscut jointer and some clamps. I like a rustic look, but want a good, solid secure door. I am going to have to make 13 of them. I've attached a sketch of a few ideas, but am open to any other ideas. What I am most unsure of is the joints. Will a single biscut in the corner be strong enough? Biscuts to secure the center panel? Also glueing the faces of two 3/4" to make 1 1/2" along the top, is just glue enough? I can get the 3/4" tongue and grooved for the center panel. Also what brand of glue is recommeneded. All ideas and infom is appreciated. I live in Costa Rica, so availability is limited.


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## goingenoan (May 24, 2008)

Tropic Home said:


> I want to make the doors for my Tropic Home. I will be using teak and can get it cut in any dimensioons, but am thinking 1 1/2" x 5" and 3/4" x 4"(or 5"). My tools are limited to a small table saw, circular saw, electric hand planer, router, drill, chop saw, biscut jointer and some clamps. I like a rustic look, but want a good, solid secure door. I am going to have to make 13 of them. I've attached a sketch of a few ideas, but am open to any other ideas. What I am most unsure of is the joints. Will a single biscut in the corner be strong enough? Biscuts to secure the center panel? Also glueing the faces of two 3/4" to make 1 1/2" along the top, is just glue enough? I can get the 3/4" tongue and grooved for the center panel. Also what brand of glue is recommeneded. All ideas and infom is appreciated. I live in Costa Rica, so availability is limited.


Hi Tropic, 
I'm not very good at giving design info so I will leave that to others more qualified on this forum. I can, however, give you some construction advice. First I highly recommend you use a mortise and tenon joint to join the stiles and rails of your doors together. This is a proven joint that will last for decades if properly done. You can cut the tenons on the rail ends on your table saw (a dado blade would speed things up considerably) and you can drill out the mortises in the stiles with your drill and a jig (could be something as simple as a 90* pilot hole drill in a block of wood) and finished up with a sharp chisel. There are several options available through mail order catalogs; all depends on how much money you have to spend. One of the simplest jigs is the "Beadloc" which you can find at www.rockler.com as well as other internet woodworking stores. It uses your electric drill and some floating tenon stock to make a very strong and twist resistent joint fairly quickly. I have used this jig with great results and now it is offered in a larger format to handle up to 3 1/2" thick wood! Another jig out there that works with a router is the mortisepal (www.mortisepal.com) but I think it requires a plunge router. Your biscuit joiner will work fine to join the panel stock together. Titebond glue has been my choice of wood glues for a long time and I really like the newer Titebond III which is water-proof and has a slightly longer working time. I am not sure how teak responds to glues. Some oily hardwoods arre tuff to glue together because of their natural oils. Some say you can wipe the joint prior to glueing with acetone or alcohol to clean off the oils and give the glue a chance to do its thing. Again, I will defer to those with more experience with this. I suppose you can get away with glueing 2 3/4" boards together as long as the glue works with teak but you stated you have access to 6/4 or 1 1/2" teak so why not use that? Hope I have helped a little. You have a great project ahead of you and I wish you all the best. I'm guessing teak is pretty available in your world.:yes: I'm jealous! I once came across a website that would grow teak and other exotic trees on their tree farm in Costa Rica for you if you sent them some money. I was intrigued but decided I was too far away to check on my investment so I chickened out! Time for some sleep so I can dream about my next project!nline2long:

_____________________________
Work to live, not live to work!


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## GeorgeC (Jul 30, 2008)

From a looks viewpoint I definitely prefer the back with the diagonal brace.

You certainly want to use the rail and stile method for framing the door. Mortising would be the preferred joining method as described above.

Using 1 1/2" material would be preferable to gluing two 2/4 boards together. Teak must be ok to glue as it is done all of the time in the marine industry where teak is widely used.

Teak must be relatively cheap is Costa Rica. I cannot imagine the expense it would be here to build 13 doors as teak can run as high as $24 per board foot. I have seen it as cheap as $14 per board foot locally.

George


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## Tropic Home (Oct 12, 2007)

*rail and stile?*

Thanks for the info. I was a framer by trade so some of the cartentry terminoligy is unknow. What is "rail and stile", Removing wood from the 1 1/2" stock so the 3/4' fits in? Is glueing this joint sufficiant? Would drilling holes and adding wood pins work over screws or bolt? 

Teak here is 2-3$ per inch (1"x1"x11') it differs a bit from the Polinesian teak)


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## goingenoan (May 24, 2008)

Hiya Tropic,
lets see if I can explain styles and rails a little better for you. :blink: The styles are the vertical pieces on either side of the door while the rails are the horizontal pieces at the top and bottom of the door. (there can also be more rails dividing the door horizontaly in the field). Anyway, to create a mortise and tenon joint, you would first cut a slot as wide as 1/3 of the thickness of the board into the style. It can either be a through mortise (cut all the way through the style) or a blind mortise generally cut 1/2 to 2/3 of the way through. Then you make the tenon on the end of the rail to fit just snuggly into the mortise. This tenon has shoulders all around to hide the joint line. You want to make the tenon about 1/16" shorter than the depth of the mortise to give the glue a little room. The tenon has to be cut just right so that it fits snuggly into the mortise without any slop. But, you don't want it so tight that you have to pound it into place. (When you glue the joint it should almost slip together and then you use the clamp to draw the joint up tight. Itys kind of a fine line between too loose and too tight! I am including an attackment with a simple drawing to show the components. I hope this works?!
Well, I guess not.:furious: Maybe you can google "mortise" or "styles and rails" to find an example.


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## goingenoan (May 24, 2008)

I decided to Google it myself and here are a couple of good links;

Mortise and tenon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Here's some better instruction:

Making a Mortise and Tenon Joint

Hope these sites will help make everything clear for ya. :yes:
Have fun!

P.S. You can definitely pin the joint with wood dowels or pegs especially if you want to make it part of the design. I recommend using a hardwood peg for the extra strength. You can also choose a lighter or darker colored peg for contrast against the teak. I have noticed that some people will even use a square peg and then taper the ends that protrude into a little pyramid! Lots of ideas out there!


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