The job in Asheville that made me stop using prefinished plywood for face frames

I was on a custom kitchen install in Asheville last fall and the prefinished plywood face frames started delaminating after three days of humidity. The homeowner was pissed and I had to rip everything out and redo it with solid poplar. Am I the only one who thinks prefinished stuff is a gamble outside of climate controlled shops?

3 comments

3 Comments

cora_west51d ago

Yeah I dunno, three days of humidity sounds like a pretty extreme test for any material. Worked with prefinished ply on a dozen kitchens and only had issues when the homeowner left windows open during a rainstorm. Maybe the batch was bad or you got unlucky. Not saying it's bulletproof but ripping it all out seems like a bit much when you could have just replaced the delaminated panels.

barbaradavis1d ago

Figure out if your plywood supplier stores their sheets flat or on edge. I walked through a warehouse in Charlotte last spring and saw stacks of prefinished plywood stored upright like books on a shelf. The glue had pooled at the bottom of every sheet. By the time it reached the job site, the top half was dry as a bone and the bottom half was delamination city. Next time ask your distributor how they stack their inventory before you blame the material.

rowan_ross1d ago

Three kitchens with prefinished ply and zero issues here. @cora_west5 might have a point, but I still avoid it for face frames in humid spots.