"C & M" wrote in message
...
I'm thinking that even though the material cost per door seems small they
have to multiply that by hundreds if not thousands and the savings add
up,
in their eyes.


"George E. Cawthon" wrote in message
...
Battleax wrote:
"World Traveler" wrote in message
k.net...

wrote in message
groups.com...

I'm finishing a ton of the doors in my home but this is my first time.
Can anyone out there give me some tips? I've finished wood before;
it's just that I'm not quite sure what position the doors should be
in.
Should the doors be left hanging? Should they be finished
horizontally/vertically? Should all of the hardware preps, tops,
sides, and bottoms be finished with as many coats as the front and
back? I only have one sawhorse, so maybe I need to get another. Any
help you might have would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.


Some recommend leaving the bottom unfinished to allow the door to
better
accomodate seasonal changes in temperature and humidity. Regards --




Seasonal changes are the reason you MUST paint the bottom, as well as
everything else.


Not a must, maybe not even common. Many interior
door tops and/or bottom are raw wood. Most of
the bottoms of old time solid doors that I have
seen do not have paint on them. There is stain
but no finish on the top or bottom of the hollow
core doors in my 1970's built house. The tops of
many hollow core doors bought at HF or Lowes are
not primed although the other surfaces are.

Sure it is smart to finish all surfaces. But
furniture manufactures commonly do not finish any
surface that doesn't show, even though applying a
finish would add little to the cost of the item.


Well, I've learned something here. As I recall, the recommendation to leave
the bottom of an interior door unfinished came from a High School wood shop
class, to keep moisture from being trapped inside the door. After the
comments in this thread, I went to a couple of door suppliers web sites
(e.g., http://www.architecturaltraditions.com/warranty.shtml,
http://www.the-wood.com/maintenance.htm) and they require that all six sides
be finished to maintain the warranty. So either my memory is at fault, or
my old shop teacher was giving out bad information,

-- or things changed in the [## exact number garbled - and it's going to
stay that way] decades since I was in school.

Regards