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…Build Your Own Dolls House - Cutting Out The Pieces
This article continues on from …Building Your Own Dolls House Getting Started. It assumes that you have decided on the kind of dolls house that you would like to build and that you have drawn you designs out on graph paper and copied them onto brown paper to make templates to transfer to wood.
Lay the templates onto your chosen wood. If you are using plywood and not MDF, the patterns should be laid out so that the grain runs vertically wherever possible. This helps to reduce warping.
- Draw each section onto the wood carefully and accurately. Use a steel rule to make sure that lines are completely straight and use set squares and measures to make sure that angles are true.
- Label each section before you cut it out and mark the locations of windows, floors and doors. Indicate whether each piece is left or right and top or bottom (or which side of the wood is for the interior or exterior)
- Cut out each piece. Try not to be disheartened if your sawing does not appear to be very straight, many people struggle to saw in straight lines without a lot of experience and there will be some scope for correcting mistakes by sanding and screwing later in the process
- Sand each piece thoroughly
- Door and window openings now need to be cut, If they are in the middle of the sheet of wood and a fretsaw will not reach them, a jigsaw will do this job.
- Windows can be any size you wish, however, if you wish to put commercially available frames inside the window holes it might be helpful to have bought these in advance so you know what size holes they will need
- Doorways need to be 15cm high (5 ½ inches) Do not locate in the immediate corner of rooms, remember you will need a margin of space for the architrave
- To cut internal holes, drill a hold in the area to be removed to create a space for the fretsaw blade. Cut away the waste roughly and then go back and cut more accurately, following your pencil lines. Do not cut too far into the corners, these can be tidied up afterwards with a file or sandpaper.
- Assemble the dolls house shell in a “dry run” Tapping in panel pins or screws is fine but do not glue anything at this stage.
- Be prepared for endless tweaking, adjusting, fiddling and co-ercing of the sections to get them in place. The main priority is to make sure that the back wall fits neatly inside the two outside edges. Small holes and gaps can be plugged with sawdust, wood glue and polyfilla. Cracks between floor and interior walls can be hidden with skirting boards and coving later on.
- Examine the dolls house exterior thoroughly at this stage because it will be your last chance to adapt it. Do you have enough windows? Is it worth adding another while you can. Do those two walls join really neatly or is it worth planning off another bit whilst you still have the chance to do so?
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