Est. 1998 — 27 years of woodworking knowledge
Saw cut veneer?
John in West TN
>I've noticed that many late 18th century boxes have what is referred to as "saw cut veneer" What is that?
Veneer in this context is sometimes refered to as "facings" about 1/16" or better thick. How can one make this?
Relatedly, how do you plane (smooth/flatten) very thin pieces of wood (1/8" 3/16")?
Again, thank you for your help.
John
Re: Saw cut veneer?
Ed Mulligan, Cape Cod
>John -
In pre-industrial times veneer was cut from a log with a hand saw, hence the name.
The veneer saw blade was mounted in a wood frame. According to Salaman the blade was 4 to 5 feet long, 4 to 5 inches wide and had 2 to 4 tpi. Two men operated the saw
Some veneer sellers carry 1/16" thicknesses for restoration work.
Nowadays we use the bandsaw to make veneer.
For smoothing thin stock (too thin to plane against a bench stop)I've had good results clamping one end to the bench, planing away from the clamp, then moving the clamp to the other end to expose the area not yet worked.
Ed
Modern Veneer question
Adam Cherubini, NJ
>Never worked veneer, so forgive my ignorance. Aren't modern veneers peeled off the log like plywood in one big sheet? I guess I'm thinking saw cut veneers were cross sectional cuts by a saw (band saw, veneer saw or other). Not the big apple peeler thingy.
Please help!
Adam
P.S. if you read my glue thing earlier, I think that points to some of the old secrets of veneer work and may help answer the original question. The roughened sawn surface was desirable to maintain the glue line thickness. Smoothing could be done after gluing. Otherwise, this is all theory for me though. Never done it.
Re: Modern Veneer question
Scott Post
>Modern veneer is cut by knife. The stuff cut like an apple peeler is called rotary cut. It's what (in my view) particularly ugly plywood is made from. I've also read that some woods such as birdseye maple benefit from being rotary cut for best figure. Most of the veneers we work with are cut from the log the same way they would have been sawn although much, much thinner.
Reference
Ed Mulligan, Cape Cod
>The Complete Manual of Wood Veneering by W. Lincoln has a good description of the various veneer peeling and slicing processes.
Re: Modern Veneer question
Ed Snow
>There is one other type of veneer that I have recently run into. Pizza wheel cut veneer, it sucks. It gets the little back tracks on the back of the blade simular to those of the poorly tuned table saw, so you do get 1/40" veneer but ater facing off the back tracks you are left with a sheet of paper.
Re: Saw cut veneer?
John in West TN
>Ed, thank you, this is useful information. I found a place (www.certainlywood) that carries 1/16 and 1/8 mahogany veneer. The tip on planing thin stock will certainly come in handy for the interior dividers.
Again, thank you.
Cheers,
John