A Diamond in the Rough: Using Salvaged wood for Custom Cabinets

Chris Mire

Member
Messages
945
Location
Southern Louisiana
Ok guys and gals, I am gearing up for a little project I thought might interest at least a few of you. So i figured I would accompany it with somewhat of a journal. Hopefully I will be able to update this thing through the process of this project. There may be days when I don't get to post anything since I am very busy working full time, working part time on this project, building a temp shop and keeping LOML happy at the same time.

Project Overview....

Some friends of mine who live out in a very rural area nearby inherited a house that was built circa 1890. They decided to remodel this house adding certain modern conveniences while attempting to keep the character of the house intact. In order to do this they also purchased another similiar house in the area which was in disrepair. This house will become the provider of much of the wood and material needed to remodel their house. In the process of tearing this house down they found a later behind a baseboard dated 1891. Construction methods used on the house date it somewhere around 1870's.
The house, like many built back then, is contructed almost completely with old growth cypress and pine. i have attached a pic of the house with all the cypress siding and flooring removed. Notice the (true) 4x4 studs spaced about 30" apart. not a single 2x4 in this house.

The project will include building a small u-shaped kitchen, a bathroom vanity, and a linen cab. The kitchen will be built with the Antique cypress that was taken off the old house. Doors and drawers will be inset, with applied beading on frames. Drawers in kitchen will receive Blum Tandem guides with softclose feature. There will be a decorative range hood, a wine rack and a set of pot drawers. The range and sink areas will be flanked with decorative half columns made with 4x4's from the house. The bath vanity and linen will be painted due to the majority of the walls and tub surround being cypress.

I am really excited about this job. This has the potential to be the nicest Kitchen I have done to date. I am anxious to get started. I am sure there are many more details I could add but this is getting long winded.

Today I will start by stacking the wood to allow it to dry after some rain we received yesterday wet it pretty good.

Then the long and time consuming task of planing all of this wood will begin.

Sorry this was so long. Thanks for reading.

More pics to come
Chris
 

Attachments

  • PI5Send2.Jpg
    PI5Send2.Jpg
    56.7 KB · Views: 145
  • PI5Send12.Jpg
    PI5Send12.Jpg
    63.5 KB · Views: 135
  • PI5Send17.Jpg
    PI5Send17.Jpg
    44.6 KB · Views: 118
  • PI5Send1.Jpg
    PI5Send1.Jpg
    47.3 KB · Views: 104
Ok i know some of you are thinking....what wood?

Well here is what I brought home last night. I haven't a clue on the board footage. Almost all of it is over 1" thick. some 1-1/2", plus a couple of the 4x4 studs.

As you can imagine, seeing as this wood is over 100 years old. and was cut using slightly more primitive means, almost all of it has deep saw marks and resembles the look of a rough cut cedar. It also has formed a layer of aged wood, mildew, dirt and who knows what else. So at first glance it may not look like much. But send it though the planer and WOW. You just can't buy cypress that looks like this anymore. Some of these boards measure 16 and even 17" in width. I know for sure of 2 boards that are 16" wide and 10' long. I am attempting to leave these boards intact if possible. I would rather not use them since they are so rare.

Well, here it is, my measely little 5x8 trailer loaded down.

I couldn't resist planing down a couple of boards to show you what is hidden under that dark exterior.

I know the pics aren't great, but it was dark and I was in a hurry. I'll try to get better pics today.

until then thanks for looking
take care
chris
 

Attachments

  • PI5Send5.Jpg
    PI5Send5.Jpg
    58.8 KB · Views: 75
  • PI5Send6.Jpg
    PI5Send6.Jpg
    71.3 KB · Views: 109
  • PI5Send8.Jpg
    PI5Send8.Jpg
    55.2 KB · Views: 53
  • PI5Send10.Jpg
    PI5Send10.Jpg
    56.1 KB · Views: 64
  • PI5Send11.Jpg
    PI5Send11.Jpg
    63.3 KB · Views: 121
  • PI5Send14.Jpg
    PI5Send14.Jpg
    41.7 KB · Views: 114
Nice project, and beautiful wood. Look forward to following this.

Stu... The "style" of the house looks vaguely familiar....no? :D

Greg
 
Last edited:
chris, this thread has the potential to be a really cool thread! please keep us posted......thanks! tod
 
thanks for the interest everyone. hopefully i can keep you pleased with updates and photos. sorry, no photos today, yesterday was quite uneventful as far as this project. I did go to a friends house were i'm storing the wood and laid it all out on the floor of his shop. kinda looks like he has a wooden floor in there now. hopefully the wood will be dry by today or tomorrow. it was mostly just surface moisture. i did take some pics of the wood all laid out to try and give a better idea of how much there was. and i planed down a couple of the 4x4's. man do they look good. i took pics of those too, but for some reason last night i could not get on the site from home. i'll see if i can get the little lady to send them to me here at work.

i have a plan drawing and elevation shots i drew up in autocad. i'm trying to figure out the best way to post those on here. i have the ability to pdf the files, so i may just do that. anyone got any other ideas? i wasn't sure how well pdf's did when posted.

hopefully another update later today, with pics and plans.

thanks checkin in
chris
 
Looking interesting. Must be lots of Katrina "victims" around down there to be salvaged.
Hope you've got a great metal detector.. cut nails and planers don't mix well.. I've had better success driving them thru than trying to pull them out unless they were really loose.
Makings for a great thread.
 
Chris,

Speaking of planing, what kind of planer are you using? Any "action" pics you could share?

Thanks,

Greg

at the moment i am stuck with my little delta 12" shopmaster. it has been my little workhorse for about 3 years now and it's still kickin. i am looking to upgrade soon just not sure to what yet. it may be another benchtop until i can get my business going good and be able to afford a really nice planer. for now this lil puppy does the job and to be honest with you, i'd rather use this planer for this kind of work anyway. if it gets damaged i'm only out 200 bucks.

action pics?? hmmm, never really thought about that. might have to see if i can satisfy that request this weekend.

stay tuned
chris
 
Rick

i am sure there are tons of katrina "victims". but the sad part is, i'd be willing to bet alot of great wood that could have been salvaged was thrown to the dump in the mass clean up after the storm. i don't get down that way much. still tons and tons of work and construction and remodeling going on down there though.

thanks for your interest
chris
 
more pics

ok the LOML came through for me and emailed me the pics here at work. so here are some shots of all the wood laid out in my friends unused shop. sorry for the bad lighting, he doesn't have electrical in there yet. I didn't feel like taking the time to sticker the wood since it won't be there that long. so i just took advantage of his 25x30 storage shed, that has hardly nuthin in it.

I got some more before and after shots as well, planed a couple of the 4x4 posts down...man do they look good. totally out of square though...gonna have to fix that.

that is a 24" level sitting on that one board that i think is around 15-16" wide

this may be the last post for a few days. wife has a garage sale so i'll be haulin stuff for that. and then this weekend if my dad gets his permits will be working on his shop...which will soon be my temp shop. 30x54....can't wait!!
more on that in another thread soon.

as always thanks for looking.
chris
 

Attachments

  • PI5Send1.Jpg
    PI5Send1.Jpg
    71.8 KB · Views: 62
  • PI5Send2.Jpg
    PI5Send2.Jpg
    69.8 KB · Views: 33
  • PI5Send3.Jpg
    PI5Send3.Jpg
    65.1 KB · Views: 29
  • PI5Send4.Jpg
    PI5Send4.Jpg
    43.3 KB · Views: 37
  • PI5Send5.Jpg
    PI5Send5.Jpg
    60.6 KB · Views: 35
  • PI5Send6.Jpg
    PI5Send6.Jpg
    45.3 KB · Views: 28
  • PI5Send10.Jpg
    PI5Send10.Jpg
    56.2 KB · Views: 35
  • PI5Send12.Jpg
    PI5Send12.Jpg
    47.8 KB · Views: 37
Boy Chris, are you right, there are some really nice looking boards in there!!

Cheers!

PS watch you tools at that garage sale, stuff goes missing....... DAMHIK..... :mad:

Looks forward to your next posts! :D
 
stu,

my wife knows better than that. especially now that my tools will be earning our living for us. but she has always been fine with me having my tools, as long as i was building her something occasionally or handing her the check when a job was done....;)

besides, all my tools are safely locked away in my dad's shop. and she doesn't have a key!!!:D
 
okay here is a little basic 2-D drawing of the kitchen and bathroom plan. It just shows the layout and the design of the cabinets. no doors are shown. This is what I brought to show the customer to make sure they were getting what they wanted before I started cutting wood.

if you have any questions about my really basic drawing i'd be happy to answer.


hoping to get some planing done this weekend.

thanks fer lookin
chris

ps. all i have is a pdf of these drawings. if someone can tell me a better way to post these from an autocad drawing please do. thanks
 

Attachments

  • kitchen.pdf
    7.3 KB · Views: 45
  • bathroom.pdf
    4.9 KB · Views: 13
stu,

my wife knows better than that. especially now that my tools will be earning our living for us. but she has always been fine with me having my tools, as long as i was building her something occasionally or handing her the check when a job was done....;)

besides, all my tools are safely locked away in my dad's shop. and she doesn't have a key!!!:D

Not your wife I was worried about, it is all the people wandering around the place crowd control can be hard to do some times.

Just a warning, I lost a tool wrap of Snap On wrenches that were at my Dad's house, they had a garage sale, and when it was all said and done, my wrap of combo wrenches was gone. The wrap was in a drawer in the workshop, but the workshop was open, they had a ton of people there, and my Mom and Dad are good, trusting people, and someone egaged my parents in conversation, while someone else went into the shop and ripped them off.

Happens, just a warning....
 
okay here is a little basic 2-D drawing of the kitchen and bathroom plan. It just shows the layout and the design of the cabinets. no doors are shown. This is what I brought to show the customer to make sure they were getting what they wanted before I started cutting wood.

if you have any questions about my really basic drawing i'd be happy to answer.


hoping to get some planing done this weekend.

thanks fer lookin
chris

ps. all i have is a pdf of these drawings. if someone can tell me a better way to post these from an autocad drawing please do. thanks

Chris,

First off, congrats on the kewl project. I can't wait to see some of that lumber once you have it cleaned up.

Second, on your drawings, if you don't want to 'pdf' them, you can just take screen shots and save them into Word or some graphics program so you can post them here as images.

Oh, and by the way, have you considered using Sketchup instead of Autocad? Let's you play in 3-d and the clients would like that way better.

Just a thought...
- Marty -
 
Top