Face Frame Woods

[Ted Lexier]

I've done a bit of reading lately about making Face Frames for cabinets and
was wondering why hardwoods are the preferred material? Is there a
particular reason softwoods are not used?

[Leon]

Simply, hardwoods hold up better. Screws for hinges stay tight compared to
those in soft woods.

[Earl Creel]

The hardwoods such as oak, maple, cherry etc. are stronger but I
suspect there is a tendency to use these woods simply because they
cost more and therefore in the mind of most consumers they must be
better. I like the looks of red oak and that is what I use when
building for myself. When a youngster many years ago working in a
cabinet shop most of the cabinets had pine face frames and fir plywood
for doors. Back then cost was a big issue with most customers and
pine/fir plywood cabinets were much cheaper to build. Many a time I
was sent to lumber yard to pick up a pine board for cabinet making.
If I dug through the pile of #2 boards could usually find one almost
free of knots. Pine and other soft woods can be used in cabinet
making but hardwoods are used mostly because of personal preference.
Earl Creel

"Ted Lexier" <tle...@cableregina.com> wrote in message
news:3d0749a9$1...@news3.accesscomm.ca...

[Fly-by-Night CC]

In article <3d0749a9$1...@news3.accesscomm.ca>,
"Ted Lexier" <tle...@cableregina.com> wrote:

I have another take on it from the previous responses...

Perhaps it's due to primarily to the heavy harvesting of the US's
softwood forests of the last 150 years. The quality of today's softwood
stock is generally terrible with many knots and wide (unstable) growth
rings resulting from fast growth. Costs for a furniture quality stick of
clear, vertical grain Douglas Fir ($8-ish/bf in NW Oregon) usually
exceeds that of most domestic hardwoods - mainly because of the
exceedingly short supply of trees possessing this level of quality (only
through slow growth and the way that thinning through natural forces
shaped forests - [humans could duplicate these conditions, but it is
counterintuitive to commercial utilization of this resource and takes
over 100 years to yeild the crop]).

I live in a c.1920 home constructed of practically 100% old growth fir -
the framing, doors, builtin cabinets, subflooring and flooring. I built
a small stepstool for my at-the-time 2 year old from some scrap subfloor
after an insulation project. The beautiful, clear, quarter-sawn 4" wide
steps have over 200 rings - let me restate that - in 200 years this tree
grew ONLY 4" in radius. 200 years before this tree was cut (1920 - 200 =
1720) Lewis and Clark hadn't even been born yet to make their way to the
Pacific through the "wilderness". The USA didn't exist yet and this tree
was already sizeable given the radius of the rings. It must have been a
monster - and it was used for a subfloor in a common house in a small
town.

--
Owen Lowe and his Fly-by-Night Copper Company
Offering a shim for the Porter-Cable 557 type 2 fence design.
<http://www.flybynightcoppercompany.com>
<http://www.easystreet.com/~onlnlowe/index.html>

[Lee Michaels]

"Fly-by-Night CC" <onln...@easystreet.com> wrote in message
news:onlnlowe-7AE4F5...@corp.supernews.com...

I remember about 25 years ago when quality softwood was more reasonable. I
built a bunch of samples of craft items out of clear fir. Everyone loved
them and the price was right. I went to the lumberyard to build my first
batch, and the price had tripled!! That was the end of that project.

[elmwood]

Well sorry to disappoint everyone but if someone wants a knotty pine set
of cabinets guess what the face frames are made from. Cabinet face
frames can be made from any wood. The type of pine that is used for
knotty pine cabinets is not your, run down to Lowes and get a 2x4 and
rip it down to size but is from cabinet grade pine. One type is sugar
pine. It will run you more for that than for oak in most cases. The last
bunch of pine I purchased was around $3.50 bd. ft. if I remember.
If you want to paint then good paint grade woods are poplar and soft
maple (hardwoods) and if you want a face grade wood then the skies the
limit, oak, cherry, maple and so forth. Oak and other hardwoods are just
the more popular woods to use.

Eric Morehouse
ELM Woodworks

--
reply to: elmwood at wavecomputers dot net

[mjag]

Howdy Ted

All the insightful answers aside the reason hard wood are used is quite
simple. It is what customers want and are willing to pay for..

A bit more then just a few years ago honey finished pine and knotty pine was
the rage and you saw quite a few kitchens with soft wood cabinets.

While there may be the odd den or family room still being done in pine it is
not "the thing" to have in your kitchen any longer and hasn't been for a
long time.

There are no practical reasons for not using a soft wood. Soft woods in it's
true meaning, woods from conifers, not the strength of the wood.

Hope it helps

--
Mike Glennon
Heirloom Woods
www.heirloom-woods.net
mi...@heirloom-woods.net

"Ted Lexier" <tle...@cableregina.com> wrote in message
news:3d0749a9$1...@news3.accesscomm.ca...

[Leon]

Personally I steer my customers away from soft woods for face frames. I
have seen a lot of old kitchen cabinets that were banged up and most were
pine and or fir. A heavy pot banging into the frame always left a dent or
chipped place in the wood. I will say that SYP being a soft wood is much
harder than most soft woods. My now 13 year old remodeled kitchen all done
in oak still looks like it did when new. No dents and no loose screws.

As for soft woods coming from conifers, that is a true statement, I would
venture to say that 90% of those woods are soft and that 10% of hard woods
are soft also.