Kitchen cabinet, prefinished maple plywood

[rlpeterson]

Hello,

 

My sister has done some much for me in my life that I am going to make her some Kitchen Cabinets for her ski condo in Colorado. I am going to make them out of prefinished maple plywood with a rustic hickory face frame and doors. This will be the biggest project that I have ever done. For the sides of the cabinets that will be exposed, I am going to cover them with a 1/4" one sided rustic hickory on MDF. I have worked with MDF before but not the prefinished Maple plywood. I would want to glue the MDF to the sides of the prefinished maple plywood (I could only get the maple plywood 2 sided) and want to know if anyone else has faced this issue? Would I have to scuff the finish up with a low grit sandpaper, or can I use tightbond III glue straight?

 

Best regards, 

 

Ron

[Danl]

A few times I have had this dilemma.  I sanded the finish off with 100-150 grit, applied 100% glue coverage, and adequate weight for clamping.  Danl

[DAB]

a few years ago i made our kitchen out of the same pre-finished maple plywood, frameless cabinets, with wormy maple doors and drawer fronts. I just left the exposed plywood as is.  looks fine.  got lucky with the end of the pantry, found a sheet with some nice coloration.

 

 

[Fred W. Hargis Jr]

I've painted over the pre finished stuff, but never tried to glue to it. I'm suspicious that any PVA would stick to it very well. I certainly would scuff it up....hats off to Danl for complete removal. That UV cured finish is tough, had to be some work to get it all off. But unless you remove it all, I think I'd be more inclined to use a different adhesive, maybe even a construction adhesive. It might be worth a test or 2 to see how glues would hold. Also consider contact cement, especially if the construction adhesive sounds, well, not cabinet-like. Contact cement will bond to fairly slick surfaces and should do well on the UV cured finish (still scuff it up).

Edited September 8, 2018 by Fred W. Hargis Jr

[rlpeterson]

Dab, kudo's on those cabinets, they look good. But I am making the cabinets out of hickory. I haven't seen the prefinished maple plywood, it is getting delivered to my shop next Wednesday but I have bought rustic hickory 1/4 veneer plywood to cover the exposed areas. But I like Fred's suggestion. I have used rubber cement to cover some table tops in my shop with laminate. So thanks Fred for pointing that out. 

 

I will certainly come back and let you all know what I ended up doing. 

 

Best to all, 

 

Ron

[Roly]

Suggest the solvent type contact cement, not the water based type.  Roly

[Warped & Twisted]

Deleted

 

I've done quite a few end panels. Both prefinished plywood and melamine. I use either PSA venner or 1/4" plywood of the same species.  Scuff sand, apply contact cement, stick and trim. For the PSA veneer just follow the direction. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 12, 2018 by Warped & Twisted

[Dadio]

Tite Bond II has a Panel Adhesive that I have used for bonding wood veneer to unfinished birch plywood and it give you a longer open time to work with. It is a brown color. I have had good success with that.

Herb

[Dadio]

This is what I used: will work on MDF to Wood.

 

https://www.rockler.com/titebond-cold-press-for-veneer

 

https://titebond.com.au/products/titebond-veneer/

 

Herb

 

 

Edited September 13, 2018 by Dadio

[rlpeterson]

I'm finally done with making all the boxes for the kitchen cabinets. Thank you for all the suggestions to my question. Here is an update. 

 

I need to glue a 1/4" rough hickory veneered mdf on some end cabinets or other cabinets that their sides are exposed. I cut one of the sheets of the mdf cored plywood and used a scrap piece of the prefinished maple and a scrap piece of the mdf cored plywood and used DAP original contact cement to join them. I did not scuff up the prefinished maple plywood, just put contact cement on each and let it dry. It WORKED! Below are some photos of my test piece. 

 

So if you need to add something to prefinished maple plywood, DAP original contact cement will adhere it without any prep to the finished side

[Grandpadave52]

Thanks for the "test tip" Ron. In your spare time, PIP's of the cabinets are always appreciated and enjoyed.

[Gene Howe]

4 hours ago, Grandpadave52 said:

Thanks for the "test tip" Ron. In your spare time, PIP's of the cabinets are always appreciated and enjoyed.

Ditto.