4 ms·

What's interesting is that if your trying to build your own stuff is that the veneers and things are expensive, but actual wood is cheap. Ikea, or someone else

What's interesting is that if your trying to build your own stuff is that the veneers and things are expensive, but actual wood is cheap. Ikea, or someone else could probably make huge profits and great quality furniture where you buy the flatpack with hardware and veneers from them but it's design to add your own wood for massively improved stability. You could even have a few guys with miter and table saws chopping locally sourced 2x4s and plywood that fits the kit.

JAlexoid 4y ago
Cabinetry grade wood is actually expensive.
- dublin 4y ago
  Pro-grade stuff, yes, but you can build decently nice cabinetry out of the affordable Alder or other whitewood boards at Lowes or Home Depot, especially if you're going for paint, not stain. Also, nice birch plywood has come back down to reasonable prices per sheet. (Use edge banding on plywood to give a pro look - it's easy to iron on and trim with a razor knife.) Part of the trick to doing this on the cheap and easy is recognizing that many times (e.g., bookcases, or cases for cabinets (order doors from an Internet shop) the precise dimensions matter less than consistency between the pieces. I did a bunch of built-in bookcases a few years ago after my table saw died, and had Lowes cut all the 3/4 Birch ply down to about 9 inches. They won't do or guarantee precision cuts, but I just had them set up the saw once and rip out all the strips from several sheets of plywood at once, so all were identical width, which I could then easily cut to length with a power miter saw. I saved thousands of dollars over the quotes I got from local carpenters and cabinetmakers, and the result is very close to what I would have gotten from them. (BTW, another pro tip is General Finishes "Milk Paint", which is expensive, but worth every penny - put it on with a good brush and the stuff self-levels so well it looks very close to a pro sprayed finish, and comes in a wide range of colors.)
  - JAlexoid 4y ago
    Whitewood boards are great and very cheap, but I would still opt for MDF. Kiln dried whitewood still produces sap and dents easier than any MDF I have worked with. By whitewood I presume you mean that mysterious asian species of wood, that dominates the market. Byt here's my tip - for amateur woodworking, go to a speciality lumber yard that sells S4S. They have discounted and returned items at fairly low prices. I made two bedside tables out of warped, cracked oak shelving S4S boards at about 30% of the cost of materials. But... that was still a hobby project that I had spare time for. If I accounted for the average cost of a carpenter's hourly wages - those items would cost easily $2000 each in labor.
kube-system 4y ago
Ikea has a decent amount of cheap furniture that is already solid pine.
- Kretinsky 4y ago
  Unfortunately, the range of Ikea products made from wood is getting smaller and smaller each year.
  - dirtyid 4y ago
    The range from fairly durable/solid sheet metal getting larger and larger each year. But aesthetics not to everyones taste.
    - Kretinsky 4y ago
      I don't know where you live (Ikea has local lineups), but for instance, where I am (Baltics), I couldn't find a wooden dressing cabinet last week.
      - kube-system 4y ago
        Interesting. I am always surprised that here in the US most (maybe all) of my pine Ikea furniture was made in Poland, considering how cheap pine is here in North America. Strange that you wouldn't have the same stuff considering how much closer it is to you. We have a lot of solid wood dressers here, this is just a few: https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/hemnes-8-drawer-dresser-white-stain-00318598/ https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/hemnes-8-drawer-dresser-white-s... https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/rast-3-drawer-chest-pine-10484790/ https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/rast-3-drawer-chest-pine-104847... https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/bjoerksnaes-5-drawer-chest-birch-70407303/ https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/bjoerksnaes-5-drawer-chest-birc... https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/tarva-5-drawer-chest-pine-10360704/ https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/tarva-5-drawer-chest-pine-10360...
        Kretinsky 4y ago
majormajor 4y ago
Cutting your own pine boards to replace the particleboard shelves and side panels in your Billy bookcase is likely to give you ok-but-also-not-exactly-straight-and-parallel results without a lot of specialized tools and techniques.
- teg4n_ 4y ago
  that is replacing essentially the whole piece of furniture beside the cardboard backing
- yetanotherloser 4y ago
  Not really. Youtubers with sponsors sell this daft idea that you "need" a lot of power tools to do woodwork, but you can do most of it quite precisely with a couple of hand saws, a good chisel and a block plane. Though by the time you've replaced all the particleboard in a Billy you may as well just make a new bookcase from scratch and give it proper joints.
  - JAlexoid 4y ago
    And loosing 5-12 hours of your life. Is the price difference worth that?
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - tap-snap-or-nap 4y ago
      Being on phone, ipads and computer almost all the rest of my waking hours makes doing single tasks towards a larger project slowly quite meditative.
    - orthoxerox 4y ago
      What else should I spend my hobby hours on? Woodworking is better than DotA2 or whatever kids play these days.
    - yetanotherloser 4y ago

JAlexoid 4y ago

Cabinetry grade wood is actually expensive.

dublin 4y ago
Pro-grade stuff, yes, but you can build decently nice cabinetry out of the affordable Alder or other whitewood boards at Lowes or Home Depot, especially if you're going for paint, not stain. Also, nice birch plywood has come back down to reasonable prices per sheet. (Use edge banding on plywood to give a pro look - it's easy to iron on and trim with a razor knife.) Part of the trick to doing this on the cheap and easy is recognizing that many times (e.g., bookcases, or cases for cabinets (order doors from an Internet shop) the precise dimensions matter less than consistency between the pieces. I did a bunch of built-in bookcases a few years ago after my table saw died, and had Lowes cut all the 3/4 Birch ply down to about 9 inches. They won't do or guarantee precision cuts, but I just had them set up the saw once and rip out all the strips from several sheets of plywood at once, so all were identical width, which I could then easily cut to length with a power miter saw. I saved thousands of dollars over the quotes I got from local carpenters and cabinetmakers, and the result is very close to what I would have gotten from them. (BTW, another pro tip is General Finishes "Milk Paint", which is expensive, but worth every penny - put it on with a good brush and the stuff self-levels so well it looks very close to a pro sprayed finish, and comes in a wide range of colors.)
- JAlexoid 4y ago
  Whitewood boards are great and very cheap, but I would still opt for MDF. Kiln dried whitewood still produces sap and dents easier than any MDF I have worked with. By whitewood I presume you mean that mysterious asian species of wood, that dominates the market. Byt here's my tip - for amateur woodworking, go to a speciality lumber yard that sells S4S. They have discounted and returned items at fairly low prices. I made two bedside tables out of warped, cracked oak shelving S4S boards at about 30% of the cost of materials. But... that was still a hobby project that I had spare time for. If I accounted for the average cost of a carpenter's hourly wages - those items would cost easily $2000 each in labor.

kube-system 4y ago

Ikea has a decent amount of cheap furniture that is already solid pine.

Kretinsky 4y ago
Unfortunately, the range of Ikea products made from wood is getting smaller and smaller each year.
- dirtyid 4y ago
  The range from fairly durable/solid sheet metal getting larger and larger each year. But aesthetics not to everyones taste.
  - Kretinsky 4y ago
    I don't know where you live (Ikea has local lineups), but for instance, where I am (Baltics), I couldn't find a wooden dressing cabinet last week.
    - kube-system 4y ago
      Interesting. I am always surprised that here in the US most (maybe all) of my pine Ikea furniture was made in Poland, considering how cheap pine is here in North America. Strange that you wouldn't have the same stuff considering how much closer it is to you. We have a lot of solid wood dressers here, this is just a few: https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/hemnes-8-drawer-dresser-white-stain-00318598/ https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/hemnes-8-drawer-dresser-white-s... https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/rast-3-drawer-chest-pine-10484790/ https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/rast-3-drawer-chest-pine-104847... https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/bjoerksnaes-5-drawer-chest-birch-70407303/ https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/bjoerksnaes-5-drawer-chest-birc... https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/tarva-5-drawer-chest-pine-10360704/ https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/tarva-5-drawer-chest-pine-10360...
      - Kretinsky 4y ago

majormajor 4y ago

Cutting your own pine boards to replace the particleboard shelves and side panels in your Billy bookcase is likely to give you ok-but-also-not-exactly-straight-and-parallel results without a lot of specialized tools and techniques.

teg4n_ 4y ago
that is replacing essentially the whole piece of furniture beside the cardboard backing
yetanotherloser 4y ago
Not really. Youtubers with sponsors sell this daft idea that you "need" a lot of power tools to do woodwork, but you can do most of it quite precisely with a couple of hand saws, a good chisel and a block plane. Though by the time you've replaced all the particleboard in a Billy you may as well just make a new bookcase from scratch and give it proper joints.
- JAlexoid 4y ago
  And loosing 5-12 hours of your life. Is the price difference worth that?
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - tap-snap-or-nap 4y ago
    Being on phone, ipads and computer almost all the rest of my waking hours makes doing single tasks towards a larger project slowly quite meditative.
  - orthoxerox 4y ago
    What else should I spend my hobby hours on? Woodworking is better than DotA2 or whatever kids play these days.
  - yetanotherloser 4y ago