Priming a Custom Exterior Door

What’s the Purpose of Primer?

Many viewers may wonder what the purpose is in priming wood. Why bother priming when you can simply paint a couple of coats and be done with it?

Primer helps with several possible painting problems at once.

Primer has plenty of solids in it which block the underlying color, figure, and grain of the wood. If you hate painted wood then this seems like a bad thing. But if your goal in painting is to hide the wood look and gain an even color surface, then primer is your friend. In this case we used white primer but your paint supplier often can tint the primer toward the final paint color thus adding to the primer’s ability to hide the underlying surface (substrate in painter’s professional lingo).

Primer is designed to bond to that substrate better than paint: and excellent bonding is highly important in most paint projects. Who, after all, wants their new paint to be peeling and flaking? Additionally, paint will bond to primer better than to bare wood. The primer provides the bonding both to the underlying surface and it provides a good surface for paint to stick to.

Plus — Primer dries hard enough that it can be sanded to a silky smooth surface prior to painting. This gives the painter a superior clean, smooth surface to apply paint. If you want a professional paint project then take the time to prime the wood, sand the surface, and then apply a couple coats of the best quality paint.

Free advice from Suspender Man™

Custom Mahogany Door Assembly

Custom Doors Built Strong

This big mahogany door is a great example of what can be done in a custom wood shop. We can create truly superior products in our own one-at-a-time way.

Better Wood, Better Construction

For one thing the frames of our doors are doweled together at every joint. This is, we believe, the strongest way to build a door.

Plus, if you are building your own door you can construct it out of better wood species and cuts of wood. We often use quarter sawn African mahogany. Quarter sawn wood is far more dimensionally stable than the plain sawn wood in most factory built doors. Mahogany in itself, is also more likely to lay flat and be stable than other woods.

We also laminate our door rails and panels with two layers of wood to, once again, make sure that the doors never warp or twist. It is kind of a big deal if your new custom door, for which you have paid substantial money, warps after you get it. It’s our job to make sure that doesn’t happen.

Door Thickness and Strength are Important

Other things to keep in mind when ordering a custom door are the thickness and strength of the door and frame.

Thick Doors Make Strong Doors

Once we decided to laminate two layers of wood on every door rail we found we could also build the doors thicker (meaning stronger) than typical factory doors. We suggest building doors to full 2” or 2-1/4” thick. This makes a much heavier, stronger door. It also makes a more beautiful one. All of the details are heavier, thicker, and show the door to have real substance.

Strong Construction is Our Jamb 🙂

The jambs as well should be considered for their safe, strong performance. A typical factory door jamb will be only pine and around ¾” thick plus the stop. I like to build door jambs at least 1-1/2” thick or more plus the stop.

This strength of frame is useful for resisting break-ins. It also assists in keeping a heavy door hanging straight for the long haul. When we see people on TV smashing in a door with a single kick or shoulder block – those are the cheap pine jambs from the big manufacturers splintering open. If the door and jamb are made from solid hardwoods in thicker dimensions, then that break in guy just bounces off. OK, even a great custom door and frame will, likely, not keep out the US Marshals. But any local thieves have at it cause you aint gettin in.

Those Lovely Ball Bearing Hinges

One last thing; heavy doors swing like a dream on ball bearing hinges. For heavy doors we typically use four, 5”, ball bearing hinges. You do not want to cheap out on the hinges. If the hinges are under sized you will have many difficulties keeping that door hanging straight and swinging properly.

Custom Door System for a Greek Revival House Restoration

Restoration Greek Revival Project—Custom Doors

One of the worrisome issues about contracting restoration work is that we may lack the tools or skills to reproduce the details needed. Architectural trims and designs can be complex and often were made with equipment we simply do not have today.

Energy Efficiency

The entry ways for this house are additionally complicated by the need to make them energy efficient with good door thresholds and weather stripping. Those needs forced us to do significant adaptation, melding the new with the old designs.

Restoring and Rebuilding Historic Details

When it comes to matching the historic details we find there is a little room for changes. It is not, however, acceptable to build what we would like to see instead of what the architect and owner have ordered. With restoration projects we are more copy cats then designers. We work with the architect and owner to produce a style-consistent project. We sort of re-invent the project with as many authentic architectural moldings and details as we possibly can, on the equipment we own (which is substantial).

We also invent or substitute style consistent details as needed. For instance, on this entry way the original glass was held in with glazing putty. Glazing putty can do a great job but the look tends to be undesirable on many projects. Hence we created a stop for the glass that is so consistent with the original details that even the best trained architectural moldings expert would never detect that a change has been made. The project is more beautiful while retaining design integrity. If you want to tackle custom moldings there is plenty to learn, but these little paragraphs are all I can write today.

Mission Accomplished—THE BIG Custom Doors!

Working Double-Time on Double Doors

We spent two weeks working nearly all waking hours to complete the big doors. These massive custom doors were a huge project for such a tiny shop. The size of the pieces was certainly huge, though there were only three (two huge doors and one double-huge door frame), but it was the intensity of labor and endless fine details that made this a big project. Each of these heavy, double doors measure 8’ high by 40” wide each by 2-1/4” thick solid African mahogany. They have curved, raised panels, curved glass panels and curved frame and trims, curves everywhere.

Apprentice Tim cutting curves with our custom curve cutting contraption.

Always Ready for a Challenge

But the most difficult part for us was the wonderful Endura Trilennium^® locking system hardware chosen by the customer. The active panel of the double door system has a five point locking mechanism that operates three bolts into the inactive panel along with head and foot bolts as well. Kachunk—multiple CLICK, when that door closes. This is the best locking system I have ever seen. It took quite a bit of our time to figure out everything about the installation.

We, with our customer’s strong help, purchased the routing guide package to router out the edges of the door for this hardware brand. It was kind of a big deal around here. Tim spent a lot of time figuring it all out. He routered a practice piece first and then went to it on the doors. I told him I was responsible if anything went wrong. Nothing went wrong. Everything fit. Tim is great with these kinds of projects and he excelled on this.

Suspender Man™ showing off the door project progress.

Am I a Craftsman or a Preacher?

It was a really busy couple of weeks. All through it, however, I was thinking about how to actively disciple my apprentice. Just how does a craftsman communicate his best ethics and his best thoughts about being a Christian businessman to his apprentice? If I preach big gobs of unsolicited advice I am going to be ignored or worse, hated, and despised as a crack pot or someone detestable I am certain.

Talking is plenty useful but it has to be practiced within the proper framework. I am starting to think that I ought to tell (warn?) my apprentice that I will be sharing any spiritual insights I have, with him, just as a general heads up. If I had, from the beginning, let him know that I was going to do this it would have been better all around. It is not to late to tell him now though. For the sake of honesty I think I will tell him that I am going to share spiritual insights as a normal part of his training. That way he will understand more clearly the direction I am taking this relationship. For, I am remembering that, “When a student is fully taught he will be just like his teacher.”

Completed custom exterior doors (African mahogany, rain finish glass, Endura Trilennium® locking system).

Installing Endura Door Hardware Upped Our Skills & Our Tool Collection!

Double doors can be double trouble. That old (really old) gum commercial keeps coming to mind “two, two, two mints in one.” With my apprentice at my side (OK— maybe Batman and Robin is a better image) we dived into the double-doors hardware dilemma with uneasy confidence. Oh sure we can build complicated contraptions but can we do so without making a major mistake? These could have been your doors we honed our skills on but it was some other guy’s—so there’s that. Figuring out a one-off project can be disconcerting sometimes. You keep worrying—what if I botch this?

BIG Doors Need Better Hardware

Our recent big custom doors project involved a lot more than typical woodworking. The hardware package was a project in itself. It was a learning curve for Tim and I as we worked through the preparation and installation of a new (new to us) line of products.

My original contract to build these doors included all of the woodworking plus there was an allowance of man hours to install customer supplied hardware. That included hinges, threshold, weather stripping, lock sets, and any head or foot bolts.

When building double doors the hardware and installation of it can be pretty demanding. With two doors that open and close independently there is the strong likelihood of air and light leaks showing up in the completed project. I knew that from having installed a good many double door units back in my construction days. Now Tim, he was entirely unaware but that is OK—and I am unsure why I brought this fact up except it just popped into my enigmatic mind. So, there we were, two guys trying to build the big doors and not get into trouble along the way.

Lock Those Custom Doors Up Tight with Endura Trilennium ^®

My customer had been to Europe and seen the great locking systems used there. He searched on-line and discovered the Endura Trilennium^® Multi-Point locking systems which exhibited the best features available. These high quality locksets were offered in three-point and five-point systems. My customer was concerned about security so he bought the five-point locking system. That meant that the active panel of the two door entry latched at five points every time the door closed—head bolt, foot bolt, and three side bolts into the inactive panel. Man, what a system!

The Endura locking system was great but Tim and I were the poor slobs who had to figure out how to finish this complex hardware installation to look clean and operate professionally. I don’t know about you but I am not a magician and neither is Tim. We are just two guys with tools (OK lots of tools) who try to produce great work. So here we were with two huge custom mahogany art doors we had built and a stack of hardware parts we barely understood.

Planning a Smooth Installation

One thing I was glad for is that we were able to purchase all of the hardware pieces from the same company. That was important to me because I wanted to make sure that every part interacted with every other part correctly. I did not want any ugly surprises when we got to the end of the project. If there are any ugly surprises I always blame them on Tim no matter what. There is nothing he can do about it because there are only two of us here so, well—just, so, I guess.

NEW TOOLS—YIPPEE!

One of the complications with this type of high quality hardware is that the doors have to be custom routered along the entire front edge to receive the hardware. You can’t just do this work with your handy Black and Yellow router that you have dragged from job to job for the past twenty years. You have to have a custom router jig and a high-test plunge router to do the work. The whole router jig set-up cost north of $2,500 which the customer agreed to partially supply and I paid the rest. It is an impressive system with its red, yellow, and green stops and guides that are designed to help you avoid those ugly surprises mentioned previously.

Apprentice & Friends On the Job

As for me, I slowly backed out of hands on work with this part of the door project. I remained only a few feet away but let Tim (made Tim?) take over. He did a great job figuring out how the system worked. I should mention here that Tim was assisted by our friend Sam and his son Jonathan for over two days. The extra sets of hands proved valuable (‘invaluable’ would have sounded more sophisticated but what does invaluable really mean?). A few years ago Sam told me that if I ever tried to give him anything that even looked like money he would never help me again. We did sneak him a box of treats at Christmas one year yet he still comes out when I need extra help. But I have drifted from our story about the big doors hardware.

I try to give Tim important roles in our shop work whenever I can. Having him figure out the routering work was good for him because it taught him he really can figure out this stuff and he can produce exceptional work. I want him to have confidence and skills so that he can work without me around. It is good for both of us. Today while I am typing this Tim is down in the shop repairing veneer work on a walnut desk and getting it ready to re-stain. Someday he will not need me at all and will fly away but in the mean time I am blessed with a good helper and he is learning a worthwhile trade. So I guess this is my unashamed recommendation to try a trade apprenticeship relationship if you can. Everybody gains by it.

Hanging our custom doors and getting ready to test our installation of the Endura Trilennium® five-point locking system.

The Sweet Sound of Success!

Once the routering for the hardware was completed we installed the Endura Trilennium^® hardware and hung the doors. The big ta-da moment came when we (Tim) got the knobs and levers attached and we tested the system. Click-chunk it worked smooth as a, I don’t know what, just smooth as.

I still needed to mortise in the strike plate at the head jamb. I had to do it standing on a step ladder looking upside down with glasses on, then off, then on a hundred times due to my eye correction difficulties. In a shadowed location, no way to accurately mark the dark wood, and nerve damaged hands it was one of the most difficult mortise jobs I have ever completed. I thought my arms were going to fall off. Fortunately they did not as demonstrated by the fact that I can type this monograph.

Completed set of custom doors with installation of Endura Trilennium locking system hardware.

Onward! To Even Bigger Doors.

Now we own the (rather expensive) routering guide and we have that valuable experience. Plus we have another set of complicated doors built and working. We are trained and ready for bigger fancier doors yet to come. We conquered the eight foot tall doors challenge. Ten foot tall doors next time?

See another one of our custom door projects from start to finish >>> HERE.

Cutting Curves (and Dodging Curve Balls)

I rarely write Shop Notes on Sundays. Sundays are reserved for rest (“Six days you shall do all your labor”). But a couple weeks ago every aspect of life got turned on its head when we were thrown a curve ball in the form of eight (or was it nine?) power outages. Granted a few were only 30-90 minutes in length but others lasted several hours. Everything felt upside down.

Custom Mahogany Curves

I spent our working hours teaching Tim how to build the 56” diameter curved pieces needed to build this set of custom exterior doors. The doors, when installed, will create a big circle in the center with half of the circle in each door. The inside of the circle is made up of odd shaped glass panels.

Mahogany curve layout for custom exterior doors

Laying out the glued up mahogany blocks to build our curves.

Gluing/clamping our mahogany curves for a set of custom doors.

Suspender Man™ working some clamping magic to get a sturdy, tight set of curves before cutting them to their final shape.

Projects & Problem-Solving

This project is complicated to build and I am guessing and by-goshing my way through it as I go. I have allowed Tim to see that is what I am doing. He might as well understand that I sometimes must figure processes out as I go. Every business owner faces this same reality. Nobody knows how to do everything they contract to do.

My apprentice may as well see this side of reality. He ought to understand that owning a small business involves taking risks (measured risks but risks just the same). He needs to see the agonies as well as the easier aspects of owning a business. He will, after all, have to learn how to navigate similar waters when he is the master craftsman.

Glued up mahogany curves ready to cut to shape with our custom template.

Curves ready for cutting to fit our custom exterior doors.

Apprentice Tim using the bandsaw to cut the mahogany curves to fit our custom doors.

Apprentice Tim using the bandsaw to shape the mahogany curves.

Growing Our Knowledge & Building the Future

This reminds me of a thought: I want my apprentice to catch the vision for training another person to do his work and take his place in God’s economy. We are not put on earth to simply provide for ourselves. We also need to help other people learn to be masters in God’s kingdom. We must pull other people along teaching them skills and a biblical philosophy needed to take dominion (Genesis 2) and push forward God’s kingdom in every field. This is a distinctively Christian enterprise and practice.

The humanists of our age (or any age) have nothing to match the biblical apprenticeship model. Their idea for teaching is to impart endless gobs of book knowledge, or of personal philosophy disguised as book knowledge, and to take captive the upcoming generation through their “philosophy and vain deceit” (Colossians 2:8). Ours is to disciple people in the means and methods required to take dominion of the earth and to push forward the crown rights of King Jesus. We live for different purposes and achieve those purposes through differing means. Christian discipleship and apprenticeship do not look like the humanist alternative which most of our students labor under. So, I guess, this is where this week’s curves and curve balls conversation has taken us. I do not always know where I am going to land when I launch these conversations.

Once the curves are cut, the assembly of these custom doors begins!

Custom Doors Should Be Straight…Like Our Morals

With every big project, like these custom designed mahogany doors, the pressure builds to keep the project on schedule.

Gluing up the outer frame for a set of custom exterior doors

Suspender Man™ gluing and doweling the outer frame for a mahogany set of custom designed exterior doors.

With every type of work there are schedule demands that must be met. Nobody contracts work in a vacuum, separated from the demands and pressures of the market place. Well, maybe in a socialist or communist system they might but not when operating under the constraints of biblical morality and a consumer-driven economy. I understand that these two might be at odds and often are, but that is about the best we will have for the immediate future.

Laboring to Keep Our Word

We try to focus on the biblical morality part of the equation as much as possible. Hence we are trying to treat our customers as better than ourselves, and are committed to laboring as for the Lord, and doing our best to not only keep our word but to exceed it if possible. We want our customers to say “well done” but we also want the God of heaven to say the same.

Making Things Straight

Our morals must be built on God’s Word to be strong and upright. Similarly, custom woodworking projects share the need for level surfaces on which to build. There are a number of new skills for my apprentice to learn while building these custom doors. One is learning how to build a flat door—and I mean, dead flat, no warps or twists of any kind. I taught him to level one of our big workbenches using a 10’ long straightedge and a couple of long levels. If we assemble the doors on a flat workbench, we by necessity, ought to create flat doors.

Custom door frame on the (flat) workbench, glued and clamped, with curve patterns laid out.

Custom door frame on our (flat) workbench, glued and clamped, with curve patterns laid out.

This is just one of the many ways I work to teach Tim the larger principles of the trade not just have him do needed tasks. Learning the principles for creating a flat surface will be useful for him and in his service for me.

Let’s Build Some BIG DOORS!

A few weeks ago a man contacted me and asked to have a large set of custom exterior doors made for the front of his house. These doors are 8’ high by 7’ wide x 2-1/4” thick mahogany. Once the contract was signed we obtained the wood and work began. This was a perfect project for my aspiring apprentice to learn some new skills. And it helped me out to have him here shoving what is a good sized stack of heavy lumber through the machines.

Pile of raw mahogany ready to be planed for custom exterior doors

Bringing the raw mahogany back to the shop to be planed for these custom exterior doors

No Need to Hover

This project is by no means easy. The work is complicated. Tim is clearly excited to be taking on fresh challenges. I have been putting him to the work full time but have only remained in the shop part time. This is good for him I believe. I give him careful instructions and then let him go do his best.

There is a balance between hovering and being unwisely detached on my part. I want my apprentice to know he is trusted but not abandoned. I cannot let him make any serious errors but I know he learns a lot faster if he cannot come to me every minute for endless help. I want him to learn to do this work without me—that is the goal after all.

Pile of mahogany after we planed it. Ready to start the custom doors project.

Importance of Learning Why Not Just How

I have found there is high value in teaching him the principles of the trade. If I merely tell my apprentice what to do, a list of commands to obey, he will never learn the principles he needs to understand and plan future work. I do not merely tell him how to use the tools a certain way I tell him why he should do so. I spend a lot of time explaining why we do what we do as well as how to do the work.

Sometimes the talk about why we do the work a certain way revolves around moral principles not just physical reasons for building a product. Without moral reasoning, work is just work. But if we can teach moral principles and a vision for the building of God’s kingdom through our work, we have done double duty. In the case of these custom exterior doors what could be more desired?