Face Frame Finishing Tips
George VondriskaWhen a face frame cabinet has been built from melamine or a similar material, you need to make sure that you don’t get stain and sealer on the melamine while you’re applying finish to the face frame. The solution is very easy. It’s all about prefinishing, but you have to take care with the finish to make sure you have a glue bond between the face frame and the front of the case. Check out the solution to this problem.
I really like making kitchen or bathroom cabinets outta melamine. It's got that great bright interior. I don't have to go back and do any finishing on the inside of the cabinet after the cabinet is constructed. But what ya run into is that, if it's a face frame style cabinet, when I go to finish the face frame, am I gonna get finish all over the melamine that I'm gonna have to clean up? There's a really, really simple solution for this.
And here it is. This is the face frame for this cabinet. This is just simple stuff. It's pre-finished before it goes onto the case. So the dealio is that, I assembled the face frame so that it's the right size for my cabinet.
Then I stained it and sealed it, so it's all ready to go. Now, a really good question would be, well, George, glue doesn't stick to finish, so how do ya handle that? And the answer is also real easy, which is just that, the back of the face frame is left unfinished. So, what we get outta this is, once the face frame goes on, and be sure you use clamp pads out here to make sure you don't mar your finish. We'll glue that on, let the glue dry.
If we get any glue drips on that melamine, it's not a big deal. Let the glue dry, glue doesn't stick to melamine, so it's very easy to flake the glue off after the fact. That's gonna take care of having a beautifully finished face frame, pre-finished and applied to the front of your melamine cabinet with no worries at all about getting finish on the melamine.
I never glue my Face Frames, I use pocket holes to secure it. That way there is no worry about whether the glue sticks or not. It's all a preference I suppose, I just find it easier and there is no waiting for the glue to dry, more so, of what type of wood you are using. Thanks for the video George all good information!
So how am I supposed to watch the video if all I see is a stupid ad?!? Every time I try to hit play it just takes me to a Vicks web page. This is a dumb page.
I work in a cabinet shop for several years and we always dadoed the face frame . I don't like the idea of just gluing your wood to particleboard . I think if I wasn't going to use a dado I might put a pocket hole or so on the inside .
Melamine edges are usually made of a very poor particle board material so do you actually only use yellow glue? Is it a special glue? Since the particle board material is usually kind of crumbly it is surprising that no finishing nails up front, or pocket screws or biscuits from behind are used. Also since you have never had a joint fail or face frame warp because of only applying finish to one side you have caused so many of us to feel like we have been wasting our time doing it the other way. Thanks for preventing us from losing more time. :o)
Why not use a biscuit jointer .
You don't nail it as well?
But George, what happened to what you do on one side of a project, you should do on the other side, to prevent warping. e.g., 3 coats of poly on one side needs 3 coat of poly on the other side. I think the reasoning was uneven escape of moisture in the wood causes warpage. Are you thinking that because the faceface is secured to the carcass, that my point is moot?
You said no problem with glue on the melamine because glue doesn't stick to melamine. Does that mean that gluding the face frame to the melamine will not be a strong joint?
George, You said that glue doesn't stick to melamine well, how did you secure the face frame onto the melamine? Did you have to scuff the melamine first?