Greenleaf Day 24 - interior trims

Today I put some more varnish on the cabinet pieces, then I cut out most of the interior trims.

I planned on cutting only the baseboard trims for the attic, so I reached today's goal. Then I decided to cut out the window trims. Then I thought that I could cut the downstairs window trim and door trim too, to make the best use of my strip wood. I didn't cut the baseboards for the lower floor yet, since I want the door trim to be glued in place first, and the cabinet needs to be installed before I measure for baseboards since the trim not be placed behind the cabinet.

I didn't use moldings for my windows and baseboards because they would not be used in a rustic building. I used 1/16 x 3/8" strip wood for both the baseboards and the window trim. Earlier, I had decided I did not want the window trims to be 1/2 inch wide, so instead of trimming down the die cut plywood pieces in the kit, I chose to dig into my stash of strip wood. 1/16 x 3/8" wood is approximately the size of a "1 x 4" in 12th scale. Not quite, but close. (Real "1 x 4" pieces of wood are not 1 inch by 4 inches! That is the measurement before sanding.)



I have some tips for working with strip wood.

1) Sand the long pieces before you start cutting. It is easier to hold the pieces when they are large than trying to hold onto and sand itty bitty pieces.

2) Cut the long pieces first, then as the piece gets shorter, you can determine how to best cut the pieces to make the best use of the wood. Also, if you cut a piece wrong, you can cut a shorter piece out out it, but you can't make it longer. (Been there, done that, too many times to count.)

3) If you need to make identical pieces, you can cut one and use it as a template to cut the others. Be sure to keep track of which one was cut first and use it as the template for all the others. If your cuts are a bit off, the sizes of the pieces may vary quite a bit by the time you get to the last piece, if you don't use the same template.

4) Another tip for cutting identical pieces is to use a clamp (a spring clothes pin work well) to hold a piece of scrap wood to the miter box to act as a stop. Line up each piece of wood against the stop before you cut it, and each piece should be identical.

4) Save all your scraps, unless it is less than 1/4 inch long or so. I put my longer pieces with my strip wood, and the shorter scraps get put in a small box.

Today's favorite tool: Wide, thick emory boards (for fingernails) for sanding strip wood.