Comments on: When Special Orders Go Bad

By: Mike Hawkins

Mike Hawkins — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 20:19:21 +0000

Sean,
Good article. I like the fact that you just didn’t tell the gc to go pound salt and made the best of a poorly planned situation. I like the setup on the table saw. I was wondering how you were going to cut the small molding safely. I make up jigs similar to what you did on the miter box for repetitive cuts. The little bit of time is well worth the ease of cutting and the accuracy it affords. Keep up the good work.
Mike Hawkins

By: Eric Tavitian

Eric Tavitian — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 19:16:51 +0000

For me this an all too common occurrence. I’m a GC these days but I most definitely came up through the ranks. I think given the situation as it occurred he made the best of it. I have lots and lots of tools but when this happens it seems as though they’re never exactly the right ones. At least the ones that are on the job at the time. In this situation I would have Okee-Doked the GC and found some scrap clear wood and began setting up a router with a better profile and then begin cutting my own moulding. (I always try to keep a good selection of bits with me. I can’t tell you how many times they have saved my but). Then strip cut each on the table saw. After this I would repeat the his miter saw work. His technique is sound & works well. It would have taken about the same amount of time and come out maybe a little closer to what the rest of the doors in the house looked like than the beading that he was given to re-work. I have to say that he did a great job with it and unless the customer is really picky & spends way too much time focusing on details it would be just fine. I’d keep him hired.

By: john

john — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 17:53:51 +0000

Yes, good execution of making do with what you’re given, but doesn’t make for a good article considering the professionalism I thought this website intends to portray. At the least, would have expected that someone would go out, get some flat stock and a bead & cove bit and get the profile right for the sake of the customer and an article on this site.

By: Dion Richins

Dion Richins — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 16:12:17 +0000

While I agree that it would have been better for the correct doors to have been ordered. HE wasn’t in the position to make that decision. The GC made the decision to jerry rig these doors and I believe the author did an outstanding job. Basic carpentry skills or not, I know way to many carpenters who would have looked at the flat stock and said there wasn’t any way. Nice fix to the problem.

By: Joe Stoddard

Joe Stoddard — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 05:11:08 +0000

Creative solution and good article, so don’t take this as any kind of criticism of your work – but three beads of screen door molding doesn’t look anything like the bed molding on the original doors. I guess if it’s not a critical restoration it might be ‘good enough’ – but if they really needed to match… If I were the owner I would have been happy to wait two weeks for the right units. As long as the frames were installed there really wouldn’t have been any critical path delay. The units could have been shop-painted and hung in installed frames when they did come in.