The Mirror

My wife likes mirrors. She really likes mirrors. We have 4 mirrors on our ground floor, and that doesn't include the one in the bathroom. When our local Buy-Nothing Facebook group had a large (24x30") mirror available for free, she decided she had to have it - and I may have offered to build a frame for it. (Btw, if you are interested in getting things to upcycle, join your local Buy-Nothing group. You can get things for free that need some TLC. This post is an example of doing just that).

We had purchased a large mirror with a box frame at HomeSense last year. Most things at that store aren't too expensive, but I think we paid almost $100 for the 28x38" mirror. It was a simple design, so I figured I would be able to replicate it.

I still had lots of 1x3 pine (back in the summer of 2020, I had planned on making another Harmony Bench, so I bought more wood for it. I am never making another one of them, so the wood is available for other things, like the shelves and this mirror frame!). I didn't follow any particular set of plans, but I did review a few designs for box frames from various sites for some tips. I was excited to be able to use my table saw to make dado cuts for the first time. Dado cuts are channels cut into wood for something else to sit in, such as a shelf in a cabinet, or a in this case, a mirror. I had planned on using a mitered corner (45° cuts) with some reinforcements on the corners to help support the weight of the glass. 

The first thing I did was sketch out the design, bearing in mind the fact that the dado cuts would reduce the length of of wood I would need. Think about it - if the wood on top of the mirror has a 1/4" channel for the mirror to sit in, which is replicated on the bottom board, then the side boards would be 1/2" shorter than if there were no dado slots. Anyways, the design was done on paper, and I cut my boards to length.

Dado slots with mitered corners cut at 45°

The next thing was to cut dados, but I wasn't comfortable holding the boards with my hands on the table saw while cutting the dados. My table saw came with a push stick but that wouldn't provide enough pressure and control over the boards. I needed a push block. I didn't want to buy one, so I decided to build one (in the middle of my project)

The design would be simple enough - a flat sticky block with a handle that would keep my hand away from the wood being cut by the scary table saw. I drew a rectangle on some scrap plywood, and drew a handle piece.

I cut the rectangle with the table saw, and used my jigsaw to cut the handle. Yes, that's a mouse pad in the photo. I decided to use a mouse pad as the sticky grip bottom that would be pressed against my work pieces. 

Once that was cut, I used my router to cut a channel into the plywood where the handle would sit. That channel was a dado. It would allow me to glue the handle to the board with glue on the bottom, but also on the sides - giving better adhesion to the board. I didn't want to use any screws because if I ended up touching the push block with my saw, I could damage the blade by hitting a screw.

Before gluing the handle on, I decided to put the mouse pad on. Trimmed it to fit and glued it well. Then put the handle in and glued it down also. The pressure from my clamps would help both the mouse pad and handle adhere well.

Testing the fit of the handle after sanding it smooth

With the Push block finally done, I tested the cut on the table saw for a dado slot for the mirror frame. Crap. The teeth weren't flat. I hadn't realized that the blade that came with my Ridgid table saw was an Alternate-Top-Bevel design, meaning the channel it cut wasn't flat - it had a ridge. It's a general purpose blade but that type of cut wouldn't suit my requirements. I would need a Flat-top Grind blade, but didn't want to buy a new blade. Just as I had cut a dado in my push block with my router, I would need to do that for the long boards of the frame also. I set the height of the router and used my router fence to set the position of the dado to about 1/3 inch. This would leave a bit of space behind the mirror glass, so it wouldn't be resting directly against the wall, and would leave enough wood to hold the glass stable.

All four sides cut with mitred corners and dado slots

I also wanted to add some corner supports. These would help keep the frame square and provide more glued edges to hold the boards together supporting the weight of the glass. I cut some thin boards into right-angles. They would be added after the frame boards were glued.

Next, I wanted to add another feature that would help support the corner glued joints. Splines. Splines were thin pieces of wood that would be inserted into channels in the wood that would not only look nice, but also add additional glued edges. All of this would help keep the corners secure. I assembled a jig on my table saw sled that included a couple sloped pieces of 2x4" that were tightly held against the sled. I held my frame boards against the jig and cut 1/2" slots into the corners of the frame boards. I had some Brazilian walnut that I had bought at The WoodSource, which would look nice was dark splines. I cut some thin pieces of it and chipped it into the shapes I needed to fit nicely into the splines.

Testing the fit of the boards before gluing. I bought four of those corner clamps right before this project.

 

Walnut strips cut from the board.....

...chipped into the right shape with a chisel

At this point. I glued 3 of the boards together. I left one end open which I would use to slide in the mirror when the other parts were dry.

Gluing two splines. Brazilian walnut in pine.

Once the glue on the two corners was dry, I asked my wife for assistance and we slide the mirror into the frame. I glued the corners with the corner clamps, then inserted the splines. When the glue dried on the spines, I needed the trim the wood close to the frame so that I could smooth it with a sander. Unfortunately, I didn't have a flush-cut saw, so I used tin-snips to cut the wood down. I then smoothed it with the sander and it came out pretty nice.

Assembled, and ready for finishing.

The next thing I wanted was to glue the corner pieces on the back side, to help support the strain on the corners. I flipped the mirror onto its face, and glued the corner pieces to the frame, making sure not to get the glue on the mirror. I was worried what the glue might do to the grey coating on the back of the mirror that actually makes the mirror reflect. When the glue dried, I used the branding iron that my wife got me for Christmas. It was the first time I got to use it. I think it looks great.

First project with my new branding iron

I chose the stain I wanted to use at my local Home Depot. I remembered the frustration from the previous project, so I made sure I had water-based stain and conditioner, and that I was ready to wipe it off right after application. 

I don't think I am ever going to learn my lessons with glue stains though. I should have sanded more before staining. I wasn't frustrated though, as I half-expected this to happen. I simply examined the rest of the project thoroughly, found the light spots and sanded them down. Stain was re-applied and wiped. The result was seamless with the first coat.

The last step was to apply keyhole hangers. I couldn't create a keyhole slot into this frame, because it was simply too thin. Keyhole brackets were bought. A small recess in the wood was chipped out with a chisel, which would allow the screw head to sit behind the bracket.

The mirror was installed in our bedroom the same day. I'm very happy with how it turned out. I bought the stain and the keyhole brackets. The mirror was free, and the wood was already in my lumber cart from some other purchase. This used very little stain so I say this was a pretty good deal. I learned a lot about what I could do with my table saw, and how to use a spline on a joint. I also had the opportunity to make a dado with my router and made a table saw push block with a mouse pad. It was a good, productive project.