Home Door Help!

[Vinson]

I know there are a lot of ppl on here who do/have done this and/or posted about it but I can't seem to find what im looking for..We are wanting to make interior home doors for our house, but we are unsure of the type of door to use. We don't want to use an expensive door. We are wanting both V carved and 3D..Can you use just any solid core door? We are kinda clueless. any help would be great thank

[bleeth]

A typical solid core flat door has a thin layer of plywood veneer with partical board underneath. Not exactly good looking when you carve into it.
Best would be a solid wood stile and rail door with raised panels in it. The least expensive would be Pine doors, usually made in Brazil. The issue there is they are a pretty soft wood and can be heavy on the fuzzies when carved.
All Mahogany doors are available as a special order item from most yards but they are not inexpensive.
The best way to do it, unfortunately, is build your own from scratch. Best is a good quality Hardwood like Mahogany, although Lyptus, which is less expensive may work very well. You don't want wide planks as it will likely warp so if you start with wide pieces you should rip them to 4" maximum and then edge glue with the grain reversed in each piece.

Carving into pre-made doors is more challenging than it seems at first thought. You may want to order a door made for a window but without the glass and then make your own panel from scratch and put it in. Don't overcarve as one-sided carving can result in a warped panel and you need to watch your depth on 2 sided very carefully.

Most of the carved doors on the site over the last years have been done by Gene Crane down in Mexico and he starts with thick blanks that he makes himself from lumber. There is someone else in the Northwest that does them and he uses Hardwoods. If you have to ask how much he charges for one you can't afford it!!!

[gc3]

Kyle,

shoot me a email, we have 11 doors from sapele we are doing right now and I can fab one up for you $1950 no hardware, no installation...:eek:

[myxpykalix]

here is a door i did pretty simply. I wanted the design and the door to look like something you might have seen back in the 20's. It is simply carved out of mdf and applied to the hollow core door.
It does make the door heavier and i did add a 3rd hinge and longer screws but in the 6 years it's been hanging i've not had any tennant complain about it causing any problems.
I need a new front door and i've thought about how i could make some cool carving and how i would do this even for an interior door is to find a suitable material for carving your design (like a lightweight mdf) and carve the face of the mdf to whatever you want then take the door and pocket out a cavity in which to insert your carving. You would have to use a solid core door because a hollow core is just a wafer like construction with no way to hold your carving.

[genek]

Jack nice door. Jack you could glue up 2x4 or even 2x2 to make a door. You could pocket out a section for a window say 1.25 inches deep then cut your pattern out in the material that remains. This way you could put a 2 or 3 pane sealed glass in the pocket then trim out to hold the glass in place.


Did you do the wayne's coat also

[steve fedor]

If you have a place like this near you. They sell solid door slab closeouts.

http://www.building9.biz/doors

[myxpykalix]

yes eugene i designed and cut the wainscoting at the same time. I had a outlet on that wall that was controlled by a lightswitch and didn't want to cut a hole for it so i ran the line over and made the column on the corner with a light in it.
That "shade" is actually a plastic decorative plant basket that i cut to fit on the corner.