I'm gonna be a Star!! #2: Mucho progress!!

I wasn’t supposed to work on this today because I’m supposed to work on a fence for the property I’m renting. I have a huge pile of fence material that the landlord and I just picked up yesterday. But I started this project this morning, blogged it around lunch time thinking I was done for the day, and then ended up back out there. This project has actually been kinda fun. It’s been fast, but fun. Total to this point is around 5 hours. The only thing left is the panels. I’m in the stained glass, leather, wood, WHAT TO USE? phase of the project.
Someone asked what the diminsion of this door was. It’s around 24.5 high x 25 5/8 wide. It’s wider then I like to have a door, but like I stated in the previous blog, there really isn’t a design. It started as a star and I’m going crazy with it. It pops in my head as I go. The bad thing is that I don’t have any material for the cabinet, so I believe it was mentioned that this will be wall mounted until the material is purchased.

Anyhow, to continue the process we left off with the pieces cut and had the raised panel detail. The next step was to rabbit the back and buiscuit them. Here are the motions.
Set the router table up with a rabbiting bit or slot cutter and set it to a height that will leave 1/4” tongue on your panel.



Once your panel has the rabbit on the back you can lay them out, mark them, and biscuit them.

mark a line from one piece to the next without stopping. This will be where you biscuit. Leave enough room so that you don’t blow out one side or the other. Mark the pieces with letters or numbers so you know where they go.

To buiscuit them, put the center line on the joiner on your mark. I set the jointer to “0” size biscuit. That way I don’t have to much to worry about. The jointer has 3 marking, 0, 10, and 20. 20 is the largest. My space is small, so I want a small biscuit.




Now that all my pieces are biscuited and ready to assemble I go ahead and do that. It’s a pain to try to clamp this, so I came up with a little trick. Some of you may not agree with it, but it works. I put yellow glue (titebond ll) in the buscuit slot, on the buscuit and around it and leave the ends unglued. I then use CA glue on the to points. This holds the piece together while the yellow glue dries. It’s flush, and pushed tight.

So I have this star panel. Obviously it needs a frame. So lets do it. First you need to know your frame size. I always make my rails and styles to doors 2 1/2”. It’s pretty standard. I cut my stock and then set up the router table. In this situation I am going to use a cope and stick bit. This bit is a stacked bit, so I do not need to make any adjustments once it’s set up.

I also have a sled. The sled is used for the ends of the rails. Or the coping. The coping is the “tenon” that goes into the sticking or “mortice”. This is essentially a mortice and tenon door but with a decorative detail, and the slot for the panel continues. The detailing makes it called a Cope and Stick door.

You set the bit up using samples. They do make templates out of the plastic so that you can set the bit up quickly, but I find that the material varies in thickness, so setting it up with some scrap from the same job is the way I do it. I simply route a cope in one piece, and the sticking in another, and test the fit. I do this until the fit is flush. Once the fit is flush I run the coping on all of my rails.

You use the sled to do this. The sled lifts the piece up the required 1/2” and also has a fence to hold the piece square to the fence. On a good sled there will be a hold down. The piece should hit the bearing as it passes through. This will ensure that the tounge and the groove are the same.

When running your coping the Face of the door (good side) should be up.
Now it is time to run the sticking. You run the coping first because if you don’t you will end up with tear out on the sticking. There will be an exception, as I will show shortly.
Running the sticking is simple. Put the face of the door (good side) down in this case. You may want to “climb cut” the stock to avoid tear out. Run the stock along the fence, ensuring that it rides along the bearing of the bit to ensure depth of cut.



And that’s it for the frame.

Next it’s time for the Muntins. Muntins are strips of wood in a door or window that seperates the glass into smaller panels or “lights”. In this case they are seperating who knows what from the star. I haven’t gotten that far. They aren’t to be confused with Mullions. You do the same procedures on the muntins as you do the stiles and rails. However, in this situation I run all the muntins sticking first. I do this in this situation because of the way I cut my pieces. To cut them I mark my 3/8” line along my star panel. Then I place the muntin on the line and mark where it will need to be cut.


I cut the pieces on the miter saw and then run the coping. Because the pieces are mitered I need to have backer blocks to help hold the pieces, as well as to have the proper angle along the fence.


Once your piece is coped it is ready for placement. With any luck it is a good fit.


I continue the process until all my pieces are cut.


The door is now ready for panels, stained glass, leather, whatever.

I’m not quite sure I am doing a good tutorial. It’s difficult for me because I am going so fast through the process that I’m forgetting to take pictures and such. If you have any questions please ask. If you feel as though I’m wrong do tell. I’m not sure I can be to wrong since the piece is ready for panels in record time and everything lines up nice. But you can’t really see my process either. I’m not the guy that sits there trying to do math or draw pictures. I’m a do’er. Moulding work is simple to some, but difficult to others. My only suggestion is to stop over thinking your processes. It can be simple, only if you let it be so.

I hope to get to the panels soon. If I can’t I am for sure going to jump on the carvings. So stay tuned to the next part of this series. As always I welcome constructive criticism, positive or negative. Thanks for reading, and have fun on your next project.

-- ~ Inspiring those who inspire me ~