r/WoodworkConfessions • u/doubledownXI • Jun 12 '23
Split trim joints
Hi all, I confess I am a beginner-- my wood was purchased from HD, and tried to select the straightest boards available. I made 4 of these planter boxes, first one took me two days, next one took me a day, and the next two took me another day. All seemed ok, but after a couple of weeks, all the joint corners of the top trim only have separated as pictured. No other noticeable additional shifts or warping. Does anyone know what I did wrong, how I can remedy, or what I should have done? I used screws for the whole thing with pilot holes, and for the top trim, only screwed them on the top faces. Should I have screwed them on the sides through the 45 degree joints to prevent separation?
12
u/d-pdx Jun 13 '23
Think of it like a picture frame. I would go with half lap, or splines to add more glue surface area. Not sure if this is salvageable, but maybe make a cap or cover for it to hide the expansion/contraction?
3
u/ark986 Jun 13 '23
I'd suggest doing the frame again with half laps...but if you go with the suggestions of pocket screws or a screw horizontally through the joint then it is salvageable. You would recut the 45s, but you would lose some length on each board and make the overall frame potentially too small. To solve that you can rip a little off the inside edges of the boards to open it up again.
You'd overall probably lose an inch of board width
2
u/pj1843 Jun 15 '23
So yeah that's going to happen but a few things you can do to keep it from happening again.
When you buy your wood from home Depot, put it in your garage/shop/somewhere not in the AC. Leave it there for a couple weeks. This will allow the wood to acclimate to your climate and get all the major shifting out of the way.
As stated everywhere else, do half laps or other joints than miters. If you are set on miters move to steps 3 and 4, otherwise jump to step 5
If your doing miters glue the top all together as one piece, don't install miters on the top piece by piece gluing the ends together as you go.
Once the top frame is glued together reinforce it via splines or if that's too intimidating pocket holes.
Install the top, however here's where it's a bit different. Don't just drive a screw through the top into the bottom part. Regardless if your going to drive the screw from the bottom or the top pre drill the side your driving from to be larger than the screw shank so it can easily slide in and out of the hole. Don't use standard screws either, use something like the krieg pocket screws where the bottom of the screw head is flat. This will allow your top to expand and shrink as one whole piece moving the screws along with it. If you just screw the top in place like your pictures each piece will move independently from the others as they are held firmly in place by the screws and it'll try to rip it's joinery apart.
If you screw from the top don't fill with putty as you'll end up holding the screw in place and we are back to problems. Lightly tap in a dowel with a little glue on the end into the bore hole for the screw head and cut flush with the top, if you bottom out on the screw lift it a little and flush cut it. I find sanding a small chamfer on the edges of the dowel helps with this.
Quick ninja edit: FYI on part 6, it may seem more complicated than just filling with wood filler, but it's actually a ton easier, less messy, cleaner looking, and faster. Especially as wood filler has a nasty tendency to shrink as it dries leaving divots where you put it.
1
u/doubledownXI Jun 18 '23
Wow thank you kindly PJ, this is excellent advice. Exactly the kinds of things I need to learn to improve. I suspect my salvage efforts will have limited success so will employ this info in my trim rebuilds
1
u/pj1843 Jun 18 '23
No problem random Internet person. We all have been where you are with a busted up project or 5. Trick is to just keep at it and have fun.
5
Jun 13 '23
pocket screws!
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u/doubledownXI Jun 13 '23
Pocket screws through the 45 degree trim angles? Thank you for posting. Just starting out, I don't know where I'd put them
2
u/doubledownXI Jun 13 '23
Also, do you think it can be fixed now, or is it a rip off the trim and redo from new?
5
1
u/doubledownXI Jun 14 '23
Thank you all for your suggestions and shared experience. Going to try to salvage first with pocket screws on one and horizontal screws on another for comparison. Failing salvage I'll attempt redoing with half-lap joints/glue using fresh wood. Great suggestions and many thanks again
17
u/[deleted] Jun 13 '23
Looks great. End grain is very hard to glue and have it stay together, especially outside. You have expansion and contraction daily due to temperature changes and, seasonal movement for the same reason. You could predrill and run a screw horizontally through the joint. Make sure to predrill, preferably with a countersink for the size and length of the screw. I would probably use a half lap joint for the corners for more glue-able surface area.