I am making a 7″ x 7″ x 4′ tall candle stand out of 4/4 mahogany (actually Sapele). I plan on making an internal box out MDF and then applying (gluing and maybe mechanically attach) the Sapele sides to the MDF core. Each side will have a full chamfer on the edges and will have a tall (3′) ornamental arch carved deep into it…thus reducing the thickness under the arch. My concern is wood movement over time. I plan to initially rip the 8″ wide Sapele boards and re-glue the boards for the side panels. My hope is that this will stabilize the panel and prevent warping. It is also my hope is that this will help prevent the panels from moving laterally over time thus opening up a space at the corners?
Does this sound like a good solution? The Sapele seems to move (bend) a lot when I rip the boards? This may be the characteristics of Sapele wood? I have not used Sapele before. I was unable to get Mahogany and my supplier said this is what people are using to replace Mahogany now that it so hard to get?
Thanks for your help,
Thom
Replies
Hi Thom,
This solution you suggest isn’t your best choice. Build the candle stand out of sapele with no mdf core. You won’t need the mdf support even for your heavier candles. The sapele just needs joining at the corners like the mdf.
Wood is wood, no matter how you slice it. It’s still hygroscopic, i.e. acts like a sponge, so no matter how much you hope for no movement, you cannot prevent it. Slicing and regluing it may relieve some drying tension, that it sounds like you have, but it won’t prevent movement over time. Just build a box out of the sapele with the grain direction running around the outside of the box. Cut a groove for a top to float in and set your candle on that. I’m sure it will be a beautiful
solution.
Thanks, Gary for the advise and help. I have one question...when you say, "build the box with the grain direction running around the outside of the box", are you suggesting the grain should run horizontally rather than vertically? This would mean gluing up several short boards to get to each side to be 4' tall?
I have one other question...is Sapele equivalent to Mahogany?
Thom
Thom,
Yes, that’s what I did mean. Then I read the fine print. My eyes went right by the 4' note assuming it was 4". Yikes! New set of problems. Let’s see what we can do. First of all, a candle in the wind will have a better chance of staying upright than this stand. It has too small a footprint to stand on its own unless it’s attached to a wall. So that’s one design issue.
I had figured this to be 7" wide and not 4' feet wide, so we go to Plan B.Plan B necessarily involves veneer. A 4' wide x 7" long piece, as I originally suggested, would be very tough to work with. But sapele plywood, which is available, is not hard to work. You now can sheath your mdf with this plywood, cutting miters at the corners to hide the veneers. Or you can build the stand straight from thicker sapele plywood. I would run the grain vertically for its visual impact, but
definitely use veneer. My apologies for taking you down the wrong path.
Sincerely,
Gary
Thom,
A final note. Sadly, no wood is equivalent to mahogany. Gary
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