First Baseboard

Unless your glue application was meticulous in both amount and preparation, not long I suspect ! IMO anyone who relies solely on glue is asking for early trouble, just as those who solely use screws.....

preparation,

Had thought about that, but as the ply is relatively thin, I'm not keen on trying to get any screws into it for fear of splitting the layers.

I did put a fair amount of glue on, but possibly not enough. For the second board I'm going to be a bit more meticulous (to the point of anality) in making sure every joined surface is glued properly.

Ian J.

The problem is not screws or glue.

For glue, the strength is a combination of the surface area of the joint - a

6mm ply butt-join is not strong - and whether the structure is adequately braced against failure from the timber.

For glue, I would be putting internal corner blocks which will increase the surface area of the glue. If the board is under sufficient compression whilst the glue sets, it will outlast the life of the owner.

Its possible to build baseboard structures which self-lock without glue or screws.

Good idea about the corner blocks. Will definitely consider something along those lines for future boards, and also perhaps as a strengthening job on the existing one.

Thx.

Ian J.

Ian,

Have a look here.

I use bandage and PVA on one board, and a generous fillet of No More Nails on the other board, and they still seem to be OK after two or three years. The plywood is 3mm or 4mm, and the idea is developed from Dick Ganderton's method of using glass fibre tape and resin.

Here are the boards in actual use with a small Scale7 industrial layout.

The boards have been humped about quite a lot at home and are set up and stripped down quite regularly. The layout has also made a recent visit to an exhibition. The boards have survived very well and show no signs of deterioration over the past two or three years.

Jim.

"Ian J." wrote

Drill and countersink before screwing will virtually elminate any risk of the plywood splitting, but make sure your drill bit is sharp.

John.

As Jim Guthrie has said, my system works very well and is simple. My original baseboards are now approaching 20 years old and haven't yet warped or fallen apart. They are made from 3mm marine ply for the tops and 6mm "rubbish" ply for the framework. Each joint is hot glued and then re-inforced with glass tape and resin.

I will send you a description separately.

Ian J. wrote:

snip

I appreciate the offer, Dick, do try, but it may be any email to the hotmail address I use for newsgroups gets deleted as spam. I can't give out an email in this message in case it gets caught for spam.

I was quite intrigued by Jim Guthrie's idea of bandage and pva. I'm going to experiment with that as glass tape and resin is not something I've ever dealt with before.

Ian J.

Ian,

You might find it difficult finding sufficient standard bandage. I virtually cleared out the chemist shops in our local shopping centre and only got about a dozen. The bandages are also a bit expensive. Hence the reason I experimented with using the No More Nails glue and forming it into a broad fillet in the joints since, At the time, I could get plenty of it at a good price in a special offer in the local B&Q.

However, next time I build a baseboard frame, I'll look at using the fabric tape used to cover plasterboard joins, or maybe look for hellion strip. Apparently, the fabric and glue method is used for jointing in the construction of scenery in the theatre, so there might be supplies of fabric strip from theatrical suppliers, but I haven't found any yet.

Jim.

Sorry, before folks go searching for what 'hellion' is, that should be 'hessian'. I think my spell checker got me :-)

Jim.

Just found this online supplier of gauze bandage strip.

Not sure if I understand their pricing policy, when 1 metre costs 17p and a half metre costs 29p :-)

This gauze strip is 90mm wide, so could be cut in half to give 45mm strips - just under 2" wide - which should be adequate.

Jim.

Never mind, it added to BT's profit! :o))

So, you obviously have never had an old banger - the glass tape and res>

snip

Ah...I see. No, my current car has a hole (I know cause it let's in water which causes bad condensation on the windows), however it isn't in the body work, so would not have research how to do body work repairs (I think it on rear quarterlight window seal, but can't be sure).

Ian J.