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Tag: Screen door build

Throw Back To: Episode of when I took two plus years to build a screen door.

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It all started when I was gifted some Ash boards from the family farm, that were rough sawn, and stored in a shed for twenty plus years. I gladly took them home after sawing the sixteen footers in half by hand, and tossing those heavy suckers in my van.

I planed them for what felt like hours, and then had to man handle them across my jointer. Which took forever to do. This was back when I had my tiny 10″ Ryobi table saw, which kicked on full tilt, and scared me to death. Cutting 2 inch thick ash boards that were 80 plus inches in length took some doing, and set my heart to pounding. I settled on four inch wide boards by roughly eighty inches long, and two inches thick.

I then cut down four cross members, two in Ash, and two in a douglas fir that was pretty heavily knotted. It was at this point that I began to run out of warm season, and all my flat, square milled lumber got shut away in the garage for seven months.

The following spring I dug out my lumber, which was still square and decided to hand cut some mortises for the top and bottom of the door uprights. I first used a circular saw to cut two slices through the end grain about four inches deep. This was super sketchy, and my super old school, under powered Kawasaki circular saw died after a cut & a half – twice. So I finished it off with a Stanley hand saw. You know the old kind that weirdos play with a violin bow to make high pitched whiney muzak. I had to climb up on my work bench in order to get this to work.

I gathered up my chisels and a hammer and got dug in cutting away the channel where the cross members would rest. This would prove a difficult and arduous task. It took several days, and my channel was not straight, nor were they even. I took a file to them, and worked that for a few days too. It was at this point that I started to refinish a rocking chair for my very pregnant sister in law, and that took my whole season.

The following year ( this year 2022) I took some rasps to my channels, and evened them out a fair bit. I then used a brand new Dado blade to cut some even tenons for the cross members. It was an endless cycle of dry fit testing, rasping, filing, and planing until I had a suitable snug fit. Then I measured out my center line, and cut out two mortises for the third, and final center cross member. I hugged it out with a forstner bit, then used a multi tool to cut through the rest, and then hand chiseled it to a clear rectangular hole. It worked quite well. After assembling it all as a dry fit, I noticed my angles were all wonky, and then realized my flat, square lumber, was now bowed, and twisting ever so noticeably. But as I was about to begin sanding I hit the most egregious spots with a hand plane, and sort of made the best of it.

I took the time to glue the frame together. Then in each corner I drilled out a 3/8ths hole and glued some dowels through the joints. Flush cut those, and then did endless rounds up through the grits on every single surface of the door. I stopped to add copious amounts of filler, which meant no more natural wood look, but I was now going to have to paint it all white, to match the house trim.

I used an oil based primer to paint on four coats of pristine paint. Then I cut down some Cedar strips, 16 lengths in all, which would sandwich my screen mesh in place, for the two openings on my screen door. After much cutting and sanding i put the first layer in place. Cutting the mesh material was far simpler than i was imagining it would be. So i put those in place, and pin nailed my last strips on, holding the mesh as tight as i could get it.

It was at this point I placed my hardware on the door. Pilot drilling holes for the handle and a push plate. I also then hand cut in my hinge recesses. Drilled and attached those. Fought with the door for an afternoon to cut in the receiving hinge slots on the house, and hung the door single handedly (do not reccomend). I then added backing trim to stop the door swinging too far inwards and binding. Added a latch, and an extra handle, and Bob’s your uncle. Done like dinner.

I didn’t take any photos while cutting the cross member tenons, but they’re there, and I did them myself.

Back in the shop for a partial build day.

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Yesterday I milled down all of the Cedar trim I would need to fill in the inside portion of my screen door. I cut a 1x6x8ft board down into eight .25 strips, and then trimmed those to be .75 inches wide by 8ft, by .25 inches thick. I pin nailed in the first layer. Now I have to cut up and staple in place the actual mesh material. Another big step forward. Makes me nervous. I have the second layer of trim cut and ready to sandwich in the mesh material. Fingers crossed I don’t screw this up, as I only have so much mesh to work with before I’d have to order & wait for more to arrive.

Once this goes in, I’ll affix the handle, and push plate. Then we are on to hinges, and hanging the heavy thing up in the door frame. Wish me luck! I’m going in.

Waiting on mesh! Almost done the build.

Busy working on the screen door today.

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I have (for me) what I would consider a reasonable dry fit for the outer frame of the screen door. It’ll need a wedge or two to fill gaps, but it holds up, and is somewhat square-ish. So I measured out the tenons and mortise for the center brace, marked them on blue tape, and used a forstner bit to hog out as much of the meat as I could. I used a multitool to cut straight lines through the center so I could hammer out some substantial chunks, and now I’m going at it with a mallet and chisel to clean back to my scores lines. Maybe I’ll try a dry fit of all five pieces today, or maybe not. Once I start to rush, this will collapse in on itself. So slow moving it is.

I have lots of trim I need to mill up to sandwich in the mesh, plus wedges for gaps to make. Then wood filler, sanding, rounding over edges. Glue up and then more sanding, then primer and paint. Plus hinges need to be cut out of one long side, and the door frame where it’ll all hang. Then I have to put the door stop inner frame up so it won’t swing inwards and wedge shut. Hooks, push plate, handles and all sorts of hardware has to be fitted to it too. I can see this going on for another week if I do it correctly. Which would be nice for a change.

Cross pieces with tenons.
Me, this is my proud face.
Measured and cut on blue painter’s tape. A visual guide.
Hog out meat with fat bits and a drill.
Nearly done one full mortise. Needs a touch more clean up.

So in all, a good day today. Sunny and bright weather. I need to eat breakfast soonish though. Then on to illustrations for my book. I have six backgrounds left to go, and then character drawings to populate those backgrounds.

What a busy day it was, yesterday.

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Took the kids for a two hour play at the Tree Top Trekking village, which they loved thoroughly, and I was able to participate and enjoy the obstacle course aswell, even masked up. Then we had a big group lunch where they played for another hour or so, all told it was four hours of fun from start to finish.

After a brief rest at home we finally got to meet our newest nephew outside, while masking up to protect the 7 day old newborn. Can’t be too careful! He’s a sleepy cutie pie, who didn’t make a sound. The kids were enthralled by him, though my youngest got bored of the baby lump action and went for an hour long trampoline jump-a-thon to stay busy in the warm and welcome sunshine.

I need to go do a smaller grocery shop in a few minutes, so I’ll cut this short. Much as I predicted, I have done nothing with my illustrated book this weekend. I did build an armature for my next sculpture. I finished off my other bust a day or two ago. Trying to bring the memory back to my hands. I think I’ll either do a ninja turtle in Super Sculpey or a Killer Croc bust. I have several clay ninja turtles, but nothing in ceramics, or polymer clay which you bake to harden. But I’ve never done a DC’s Killer Croc before. Might be fun to try something outside the usual for me.

I have made headway on my screen door build. I put the dado blades on my table saw for the first time, ever. And made the tenons for my three cross braces of the door. It’s a very tight press fit, so I’m shaving them down a touch so it won’t shatter or explode from the stress. I see a lot of wood filler, sanding, additional planing and painting in my future. I had hoped to stain the door, but my prowess with wood is low, so thick primer to cover my various failings it’ll be! Gotta love it. I’m glad I got over my fear of the dado blade set up. Cut like a hot knife through butter. Better than I’d have done with a hand saw or my tiny Skil bandsaw. Which is a glorified scroll saw at this point. Not good for anything more than .5″ thick hard woods. My doors are 2″ thick, and 4″ wide. So the Skil bandsaw isn’t really an option.

I will most likely need to mill up more thin strips to line the inside panels of the screen doors, so I can sandwich the stapled on mesh material. So I have a fair few steps left to go. Plus I still need to drill and chisel out the mortise for the center cross brace. But the tenons are shorter, so I don’t have as much to dig out, hopefully. I’m definitely going to need to pin the top and bottom braces in place with dowels to not have to rely solely on the press fit and glue holding. I have a handle, push plate, and hook latch to add after it’s all sanded & painted. Plus I’ll be cutting in the hinge plates to the side of the door, and the frame at the back out the house. Maybe a router jig would be better for that? Not too sure. I have weather stripping for the door to butt up against so it won’t swing inwards and get wedged in place. Good lord I hope this all works out. I’ve put a lot of time and effort into this door these last few years! Bah! At least at this point I’m spending time and not money on the project. Happy Lazy Sunday to you all.