How to bend
Veneer
Pre Bending Parts for Easy Laminating
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in a previous video I had shown you how
to laminate parts from thin strips of
wood using a two-part form but these
very thin strips are subject to cracking
especially in tight radius bends but
during a recent project I came across an
easy tip to solve this problem I
discovered that I could pre bend the
parts before gluing making the entire
process much easier it turns out that
soaking the parts is the key the strips
to be laminated are cut and prepped in
the same manner as before but then
immersed in water for a half an hour to
an hour allowing them to become pliable
nothing complicated about this I simply
used water from the tap at room
temperature the thin strips soaked
through quickly and become very pliable
the trick is to have them dry out while
bent without any glue and while they are
still wet the stack of laminations is
clamped into the same form that they'll
get glued up in there's no glue drying
so there's no rush the time can be taken
now to make sure the stack is in the
proper order that all the parts are
lined up all of those things that are
usually difficult to do because you're
racing against the clock once the parts
are clamped tight in your fixture you
can set it aside and allow it to dry
it's best to let it sit at least
overnight you want it to dry out pretty
thoroughly
once the parts are dry and removed from
the clamps
they will largely retain their shape
greatly reducing the stress they'll be
under during the final clamping if
you're not going to glue them up right
away put some tape around the ends to
hold them in position until you're ready
gluing up is no different than before
you're simply applying glue to the
curved pieces rather than straight ones
but the actual clamping will be much
easier with the parts pre bent you're
not forcing them from straight all the
way through to bent all you need to do
is finish closing the clamps around the
form to see more great content like this
visit my website at wwlp.com
