Bending skirting Kitchens, doors, rails, stud, tables, chairs, stair cases, garden furniture etc... Find answers and ask questions here!

[andyj]

Anyone know where I can get 6" oak taurus skirting bent(probably steamed). I have a radiused wall around a spiral stair so I need internal and external bends. I've read about cutting slots in the back etc. I've tried but can't do it and anyway I don't want cuts in the front of the internal bend.

[LEO292]

Tricky one this. To steam bend you have to bend the timber seconds after youve taken out of the kiln and start the process imediatly before the timber goes cold.
The easier way would be to cut saw kerfs in the back of the skirting making it thinner and easier to bend. The kerfs should be about 10mm apart and 100mm before and after the bend. Hope this helps. Leo

[viv]

Just spent three quarters of an hour with a reply to andyj, clicked submit and everything dissappeared and asked to sign in again what went wrong

[andyj]

Thanks for the advice on steaming Leo. I'm going to try and route out a lot of the back - lengthways - and also cut perpendicular kerfs as you suggest. Do you think a bit of local steaming with a wallpaper stripper would help?
Viv, thanks for trying. If you have another suggestion, please try again.
many thanks guys.

[Oddbod]

Hi, Think you might be onto a hiding to nothing here. There is not a great deal of point in routing out the back longitudinally and cutting kerfs as well. That certainly isn’t going to bend smoothly, and will probably break on you.

I don’t think a wallpaper stripper is going to do it either. You need to get the whole thing sitting in a container of nice wet steam for several hours before even trying to bend it. To be honest I don’t think you’ll succeed even then – bending a six inch plank of oak is going to take considerable force and several goes and it’ll almost certainly splinter if the radius is anything other than very gentle.

Leo has the right idea for your external bends, lots and lots of regularly spaced kerfing cuts across the back.

For the internal bends I’d cut the skirting from solid wood, segmented as necessary to get the run and radius - not a DIY job I’m afraid.