Not veneering a chamfer - crazy???

[tuxedocivic]

Hi,

Building a little desktop speaker. I chamfered the edges and thought, man that looks good just like that. So I asked a friend and my wife and they both thought it looked better. But no woodworker would actually do this, so I have to ask, will this look dumb if I don't veneer the chamfer. I'd finish it the same as the rest of the veneer. Not sure what that'll be yet, perhaps some suggestions of finishes for figured eucalyptus would be appreciated

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[tuxedocivic]

I should add, that's it's plywood. The phone camera pictures didn't turn out to good. Hmm, if better pictures are needed to fairly evaluate, let me know.

[Illusus]

I like the look of plywood edges and use it to my advantage in a lot of designs; not just speakers. I'm not the only one. I keep seeing Baltic birch(BB) ply with exposed and finished edges in a lot of installations at boutiques, bars and restaurants. But, most importantly, if it looks good to you then it /is/ good. I will try to dig up a picture of a display cabinet I built from BB, I beveled parts of the vertical edges to add a little drama and finished each bevel in a lamb's tongue. The bevels got a lot of nods.

[Illusus]

... but in your case... a cabinet with plys exposed on every edge looks a bit like a monkey coffin. It confuses me, I don't know if i like it. It looks like there is too much going on and somehow not enough. I'm freaking out man!

[tuxedocivic]

I'm freaking out too. I really can't decide if I like it. I know it's up to me, it's good to know it can finish alright. Ugh, I feel like its going to spoil my veneer work, yet I think it looks really good.

[kevinahcc20]

I think exposed ply edged are fine as long as the ply is the high quality stuff with many thin plies and witout voids or irregularities. One option to consider might be veneering the chamfers (at least the front and top ones) in a contrasting wood like walnut. That would highlight the chamfers without being as visually busy as the exposed edge of the plies. A method that might work (if the width of the chamfer is <3/4") is to use iron-on edge banding typically used to finish the exposed edge of plywood panels. The trick will be block planing & sanding the edges to meet the already veneered surfaces.

[fastbike1]

It's certainly your choice. However, in this case I would recommend veneering the chamfer. I have a couple of related reasons.

A native Baltic Birch edge can look good because it is pretty uniform. However the chamfer on your plywood gives a swirling diagonal pattern. Your veneer is highly figured, which when combined with the markedly different look of the edge, is tiring and confusing to the eye. Primarily it distracts from the beautiful veneer.

As far a finish for the figured eucalyptus, I would highly recommend a dye such as Transtint or similar to bring out the figure. You can have a wide range of color or not as you prefer. I would follow the Transtint with a clear poly.

Alternatively, the color figure is pretty appealing as is. For myself, I would probably just finish with Waterlox. It will be durable and bring out the figure.

[raudio1969]

I think the chamfer should be veneered.

[Cal Weldon]

Painting it a contrasting colour is another option. Depends what you're looking for.

[chrisb]

Originally Posted by raudio1969

I think the chamfer should be veneered.

+1

Originally Posted by Cal Weldon

Painting it a contrasting colour is another option. Depends what you're looking for.

could look interesting indeed, but even the phone camera photos are able to reveal the porosity of exposed ply edge grain (this doesn't look like BB to me)

to do justice to the quality of finish of ecualyptus on the rest of the box with paint would require rather a lot of filling and sanding prep

even with BB, Appleply etc, it takes some filling/ sanding and several layers of clear coat finish to seal the pores on cross band veneer layers

as for color, what drivers - looks like sized for a Mark Audio / 70, Alpair 6 or so? just a natural lacquer or varnish could really pop the figuring on the veneer (and would require no upkeep)