Milling machine as a morticer?

[Robin GrahamParticipant @robingraham42208]

This thread is perhaps straying into territory more appropriate for woodworking forum, but thanks for all the further contributions anyway. I have used my little mill for routing wood in the past, I actually haven't found the wood chips much of a problem – a decent extraction hose positioned near the cutter seems to clear most, and anything that escapes can easily be vacuumed up if the machine is dry.

pgk – I take your points entirely – I'm not obsessed with using Georgian techniques, or living a Georgian lifestyle (can' t get decent staff nowadays anyhow) – good Lord, I've even taken out the lead piping for the gas lighting, we use this leckertricity thing. Devil of a job finding authentic Georgian power sockets and light switches though . We are in a sort of ultra-conservation area, you pretty much have to get permission off the council to belch, anything but an C18th style eructation would be frowned upon and severely penalised. We have a set of drawings of acceptable window styles for the period from the council, so I'll work to those. I seem to remember that building regs specify minimum insulation requirements for new window installations, don't know if they take precedence over conservation or not. Doubtless I shall find out.

I think that my original question has been answered – it is entirely feasible to adapt a milling machine to cut mortices using morticing chisels provided I'm willing to put up with the strain on the rack and pinion and the wood chippings.

Jason, I'm interested in your method of making doors by laminating MDF – not appropriate for this project as they will have an oil/wax finish, but maybe for something else I have in mind. Be interested in more detail of how this is done (specifically how the panels are formed) , but maybe more appropriate for UKW than here.

Regards, Robin

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

You will probably find them somewhere on UKW, don't post there much now but used to be as active there as I am here now, only just over 5000posts to look through!!

You can always cut your own veneers from timber reclaimed from your house and stick that to a bit of MDF, these three were done that way with a couple of lengths of cladding off a beam cut very thin

Tried to match this ones with the glass out of the old front door

Or if you want to add insulation the 4 central panels on this one are bandsawn veneers onto marine ply with bandsawn celotex insulation in the middle of the sandwich, moulding applied ontop.

This 2700x 1000 sliding door is a single large press sheet of MDF with assitional strips each side to form teh shaker panels, larger one side to also form the glass rebate. The wardrobe doors you should find my loose tongue method on UKW for how they are made

As does this 7'6" door for the same client reusing glass from a room divider

I usually use Medite Premier as the central panel as its quite light weight and MR MDF for the outer layers as it takes a better finish, structural veneer or bandsawn veneer to the edges and bond in some hardwood blocks below the surface to take the hinges. You can also cut a bit out for the lock before you bond the layers to save having to chop out a mortice.

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