With cabinet door making, it is crucial to carefully select the appropriate design and materials for a project. Regardless of the type of joinery or tools involved, having a solid understanding of different styles, assembly techniques, hardware, and finishing methods is essential.
This knowledge ensures a high-quality finish that not only enhances the appearance of a cabinet door but also contributes to the durability and longevity of the final product.
This article looks at different types of cabinet doors, different finishes, and common issues when manufacturing and installing cabinet doors.
Types of cabinet doors
There are many different types of cabinet doors, each with different construction techniques and benefits depending on the intended use.
Raised panel doors
Raised panel doors add a classic style to joinery projects. These doors offer a level of sophistication with their raised central panel in a timber frame which supports their popular choice for custom built, high-end designs. They come in a variety of styles and commonly use solid timber for their construction, allowing for a sturdy and long lasting door.
Raised panel doors consistently cost more to build than other simpler, flat panel doors. For raised panel doors to be effectively manufactured, they require skilled craftsmanship, adding additional time and cost to their creation. These doors require regular maintenance as grooves can accumulate dust and grime more easily.
Laminated doors
Laminated doors offer a cost effective alternative to solid timber doors and come in a variety of colours and textures. Laminated doors are made from manufactured boards and coated in a thin layer of laminate, which can be made from recycled materials. This laminate can come in a range of colours, textures and sheet sizes, and is known for longevity and adaptability.
Their style is limited to a flat faced application. They cannot be used with panels that have inner tooling manufacturing, and have limited resistance to high moisture conditions. Laminated doors are relatively lighter when compared with most solid timbers.
Thermo-laminated doors
Thermo-laminating doors involve the process of heat-sealing vinyl onto manufactured boards. This process is able to be completed on more complex shapes and curves that are not achievable with laminated doors.
Using thermo-laminated doors creates a cost effective option that is semi-durable and more water resistant than other types of manufactured doors, and come in a wide range of colours and textures.
However, these doors do have limited repair options, are susceptible to heat damage, peel over time, and are not as environmentally friendly as other products.
Glass doors
Glass doors are often used in kitchen wall cabinets or display cabinets. Glass doors can be made of clear, frosted, or textured glass. Glass doors can be produced without a frame, or framed with timber or various metallic materials.
Blum provides an option for hinging glass to cabinets, the Cristallo Hinge. The Cristallo hinge adheres to glass, eliminating the need for glass drilling. See below:
Additionally, glass can be recessed into timber frames, or fitted to metallic frames and hinged as a standard timber cabinet door.
Outdoor cabinet doors
Standard cabinet doors cannot be used in exterior conditions due to weather exposure. Therefore, the correct material needs to be used to withstand sun exposure and higher moisture conditions. One example of this is a compact laminate material.
Compact laminate is commonly made from recycled materials using layers of paper that have been soaked in resin, dried, compressed, and heated into a solid material.
It is waterproof, durable, and non-porous, making it easy to clean. It can be ordered in large sheets with a vast range of colours and textures.
On the other hand, compact laminate can be more wearing on tools when machining and is usually heavier than most other manufactured materials.
More cabinet door finishes
When making a cabinet door, understanding the correct type of finish is important for longevity of the door, and varies depending on the material being used.
Edge tape
Edge tape can be used to cover exposed edges of manufactured boards. Edge tape comes in a range of colours and textures and can be manually applied with heat and pressed onto an unfinished edge, or applied with machinery such as an edge bander. It helps to seal edges from moisture and improve the overall aesthetic of cabinet doors.
Polyurethane
Polyurethane is a common finish for building cabinet doors that can utilise various types of manufactured boards. The benefits of using polyurethane are its durability, moisture resistance, heat resistance, aesthetic appeal, and ease of maintenance.
The finish is often outsourced, as the proper setup for finishing panels in polyurethane is expensive and time consuming. Additionally, polyurethane finishes are commonly more costly than other types of finishes.
Polyurethane comes in water-based and oil-based applications.
Varnish
Wood varnish is a transparent finish used to protect and seal natural timber. It is made from a combination of resins, oils and solvents that create a hard and durable finish to enhance the appearance of timber.
Wood varnish is used for timber durability, water protection and UV protection. Furthermore, varnish comes in a variety of sheen levels depending on the desired outcome.
The application of varnish is more complex than other finishes, difficult to perfect, toxic during application, expensive, and time consuming to apply.
Grain matching
Grain matching is an important factor that needs to be considered before the ordering and manufacturing stages of a project. Grain matching occurs when cabinet doors are machined from one length of board and the grain is aligned across the length or width of the installation.
Whilst grain matching enhances a project’s aesthetic, it adds complexity, and is more costly and time consuming to manufacture. Additionally, damaging a single panel can compromise the success of a project.
Common issues
There are a number of issues that occur when manufacturing cabinet doors that can either present symptoms during manufacture, or post construction. Some of these problems are discussed below.
Bowing, warping and cupping
If cabinet doors are seeing movement, such as bowing, warping or cupping, there are a number of primary causes. These could include a moisture imbalance in the timber, fluctuations in temperature conditions or direct heat exposure.
Additionally, these could be symptoms of inadequate or failed sealing of the timber, defects in manufactured boards, internal stresses such as tension or compression, poor storage pre-installation, or low quality material selection.
Timber movement is commonly the result of environmental factors, although manufacturing inconsistencies and poor handling can also contribute. To prevent these defects, professional planning, manufacturing, storage, and handling are required.
Misalignment in cabinet doors
A misalignment in cabinet doors can be the result of easy to fix simple issues, or can be a sign of greater significant underlying problems.
A simple problem could be un-adjusted cabinet hinges. Cabinet hinges usually have a number of adjustable screws that allow a hinge to be adjusted vertically, horizontally, or toward the depth of a cabinet. Well adjusted hinges see cabinet doors align and operate smoothly.
A greater problem could be poorly leveled cabinets. Cabinets that are not level commonly display symptoms in the misalignment of the doors. To address this problem, the solution is to re-align cabinets for proper functionality and alignment.
Furthermore, cheaper cabinet hinges can often sag or fail much faster than more reputable brands. Typically, to ensure cabinet doors stay in alignment over long periods of time, best practice is to invest in quality cabinet hinges.
Building cabinet doors
When building cabinet doors, construction methods will vary depending on the style and material being used. Once these have each been selected, construction techniques can be planned and utilised accordingly.
Below are steps to manufacturing various types of cabinet doors.
Raised panel doors
See below a cutting list for a raised panel door.
Additionally, a manufacturing workflow follows:
- Cut door components
- Machine mortise and tenon joints into components
- Machine any moldings being used on the door
- Assemble, glue, and clamp the components together (commonly clamped with sash clamps)
- Sand the cabinet door and drill hinge holes in appropriate locations
- Finish the door in an appropriate finish eg. a clear varnish or stain
Laminated/melamine doors
Laminated/melamine doors are very common in the joinery industry.
See below the workflow for manufacturing a laminated or melamine door:
- Cut the panel from a sheet of laminated board (commonly completed with a CNC router or panel saw)
- Edge the door on all sides with the corresponding coloured edge tape
- Drill hinge holes on the back face of the door
Sliding cabinet doors
Below is the workflow for manufacturing sliding doors used for wardrobes or storage rooms. Sliding doors commonly consist of a track, a timber or glass panel, and an aluminum frame.
The manufacture for this type of sliding door is explained below:
- Cut the panels and aluminum to size
- Line the panel with rubber edging
- Assemble the aluminum over the rubber edging
- Screw the frame together and attach wheels and guides
- Install the top and bottom track
- Lift the doors into place, installing into the top track first
- Adjust the wheels for aligned and leveled doors
How PolyBoard and Opticut can help
PolyBoard is a modeling software that is used for cabinet design and manufacturing, incorporating various designs of cabinet doors. PolyBoard can utilise different materials and manufacturing processes to customise and personalise cabinet door making.
Once the design is complete, you have instant access to the cut list, plans of all parts and CNC files for your machine if required.
When integrated with OptiCut, PolyBoard will output manufacturing files with perfect grain management, and OptiCut will generate a cutting map whilst minimising material waste, ready for your panel or beam saw. OptiCut will also manage material stocks and off-cuts, and allow for the clear labeling of cut components.
These tools together offer an efficient manufacturing process for varying types of cabinet door components, and indeed all cabinet parts.
Please get in touch if you would like to use PolyBoard and OptiCut in your workshop.
