hands made for wood

My Dad and I are building cabinets for the kitchen and we have been discussing whether it is worth the money to use baltic birch instead of about 6-ply maple plywood. Windsor plywood has a 5x5 ft. 3/4 in. baltic birch plywood for about $70 where as at home depot you can get a 8x4 ft. maple plywood for close to half the price... what would your advice be? is it worth the money?

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I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.

God bless!
Levi

cabinetman

I would go to the store and select some good 4'x8' 3/4" maple ply and save the money. I would use 1/2" BB for the drawers.

Just Bill

What he said. If this will be finished naturally, baltic birch is not the better choice.

TexasTimbers

Dayyyyum. I didn't know BB had gotten that high.

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Rob

Just my 2 cents...you get what you pay for. Does this Windsor plywood carry any good 3/4" maple/birch? What you are going to get at the big box stores is absolutely junk and is getting worse every month.

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nicole

Levi , what part of the country are you in? There are more resonable suppliers than Windsor Glen.

hands made for wood

hey Bill, we had decided to go with white painted cupboards. Thanks for all the advice everyone! I appreciate it!

__________________
I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.

God bless!
Levi

cabinetdesigner

I recently bought some baltic birch from a saw mill. Excellent material . however i did not buy enough and could not make it back to the saw mill. so I went to home depot and bought a sheet of 1/2" 4x8 birch . I figured it would not mater all I had left to cut was the drawer bottoms. When I cut into this plywood it was seperating like crazy. I loaded the wood back up and took it back and got another sheet. Cut into that sheet it was the same way finnally I just cut around the waste and got the job done with a lot of waste. Next time I will wait and get the baltic birch.

Dave (PacNW)

The last "Baltic Birch" (1/2") I bought was so bad that you could not cut it with a new 80 tooth Melamine Blade with out it splintering all to hell. The outer layer would just fall off and was so soft that A stick of chalk would dent it. We don't even talk about the Borg stuff. I now bite the bullet an use only American made ApplePly for drawers at $130 a sheet it is a bite, but the sheets are 4X8 not 5X5 (32 sq/ft not 25 sq/ft) the lack of aggravation is worth the difference in price

Dave (PacNW)

Leo G

I use 5/8" Euro Maple plywood for my drawers. About $100/sht. 9 plys, I make dovetail drawers

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scribbles

Those drawers are beautiful. I have been using birch, but the non import stuff is geting so expensive that maple is about the same cost. The birtch seems to be getting worse and worse.

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scribbles

Are you using undermount slides?

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Leo G

Thanks about the drawers. Yes, Blum Tandems.

__________________
Measure Twice Cut Once -- It's a lot easier to cut more off then it is to cut MORON.
TGIF just means two more working days until Monday http://lrgwood.com

BigRob

Hi, I'm new to the forum, but wanted to put my two cents in on this.
Generally speaking, the only time I think it would be worth the money to go with an Apple or Euro Ply is if you are joining the ends or your fiinished product will have exposed edges like in the drawer pictures above, which are beautiful by the way. I will say that I am biased against Chinese plywood of any type,( I have worked in west coast plywood manufacturing for 20 years) and have heard too many horror stories to count, but if you are getting true Baltic Birch from Russia or Poland, the quality should be good. The Chinese are masters of misrepresenting product, i.e. marketing a product as Baltic Birch when it really isnt, and the big box stores buy a lot of low qualty Chinese product to keep their price points low. If you want to make sure to get true Baltic Birch core plywood, or any other plywood for that matter, that won't delam when you cut it, I would take Dave's advice above and find product that is produced in either the U.S. or Canada. The price will be higher but you should have much better luck as to the quality of the panel, and a lot less waste.

TexasTimbers

Welcome BigRob. I agree with you the BB I used to buy at my local FoxGal was from Russia and I loved it. Took some getting used to the 5' x 5' size but it was worth getting used to for the great quality.

It's not mandatory but hows about intro-ing yourself in the Intro section. You seem like you'll be right handy to have around.

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Anything Ben Franklin said. Just pick one.
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hands made for wood

thanks so much for the advice I will definitely look out for the Chinese made BB and see if we would be able to get some Russian or as you said North America BB... thanks again. :)

__________________
I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.

God bless!
Levi

mtgrizzly52

Hi All,

A newby here to the forum, but just had to weigh in on this. First of all, Maple plywood *drool* Not going to find that in Montana anywhere, and for $35 a sheet. I would die and go to heaven on that one!!!!.

Second of all, I've been birch plywood at Lowes (3/4") for some workshop cabinets. It costs $40.00 a sheet here. The other day I ran into Home Depot, and they also had some 3/4" birch plywood for the same price. (in the past, it's always been $50.00 a sheet) Because it had dropped in price and I was there, I picked up the HD plywood. The next day, a friend of mine who is a furniture and cabinet maker (nothing but top end stuff) and we got into a discussion about the Lowes vs HD plywood. He convinced me in a heart beat that the quality of birch plywood that HD is junk compared with Lowes and it is quite obvious. Take a look at the number of layers how they are constructed from a piece of Lowes and HD, and it will be very obvious to you as well that the HD plywood is JUNK! Greg will not buy any wood at HD as a matter of fact.

As much as I hate the box stores, that is the only reasonable choice out here in the wilds of Montana, and this amateur will be sticking with only Lowes lumber in the future.

Rick (mtgrizzly52)

WarnerConstInc.

I get the russian BB at my lumber yard for 45 bucks a sheet, 4x8, 1/2" thick.

hands made for wood

Hey Rick sorry I have to apologize I have no idea where I got the $35 from I don't think I was thinking of the right plywood.... we ended up getting some birch plywood form Rona which I have been very impressed with, though, not baltic birch but it does have about 11 plys :D

__________________
I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.

God bless!
Levi

skymaster

Try searching all the suppliers in your area and if you can, go with Norbord ply, canadian made and really really good and reasonable.
Havent bought in a while but I was getting shop birch 3/4 for 45 and prefinished 3/4 Maple 2 sides for 75.
Norbord is a brand