Share your craft projects
Make new craft buddies
Ask craft questions
Blog your craft journey
re: Kitchen Cart
Nice job on the cart! It looks really good.
I'll take a shot at a wood movement explanation:
Any time edge grain is joined to end grain there will be stress with moisture changes. If the piece is in an environment where moisture is fairly consistent the wood will remain stable. When moisture varies, the end grain piece will expand/contract many times (up to 10x?) more than the edge grain piece. The wood can handle stresses up to a point. At some point the stress exceeds the strength of the wood. Below that stress level every thing will be fine.
When the stress exceeds the strength of the wood a couple things can happen. If the end grain tries to expand too much the wood fibers will crush. If the end grain is trying to shrink too much the wood will crack. Quite often both will happen. During an expansion phase the wood fibers get crushed, making them smaller. Then during a drying (shrinking) phase the wood contracts and cracks. The cracks may take several wet/dry cycles before they show up.
Finally this is all proportional to the size of the joint. A small joint will handle moisture changes with no risk while a large joint will definitely crack.
In this case, the combination of the wood strength, moisture range, and panel size all seem to add up to a situation where the panels remain in good shape.
I'll take a shot at a wood movement explanation:
Any time edge grain is joined to end grain there will be stress with moisture changes. If the piece is in an environment where moisture is fairly consistent the wood will remain stable. When moisture varies, the end grain piece will expand/contract many times (up to 10x?) more than the edge grain piece. The wood can handle stresses up to a point. At some point the stress exceeds the strength of the wood. Below that stress level every thing will be fine.
When the stress exceeds the strength of the wood a couple things can happen. If the end grain tries to expand too much the wood fibers will crush. If the end grain is trying to shrink too much the wood will crack. Quite often both will happen. During an expansion phase the wood fibers get crushed, making them smaller. Then during a drying (shrinking) phase the wood contracts and cracks. The cracks may take several wet/dry cycles before they show up.
Finally this is all proportional to the size of the joint. A small joint will handle moisture changes with no risk while a large joint will definitely crack.
In this case, the combination of the wood strength, moisture range, and panel size all seem to add up to a situation where the panels remain in good shape.
