72, Front Door, part 3.

Having some time elapse since my attentions were drawn away from the door frame construction proved to be rather advantageous. The Celery top pine, on the dry fitted assembly, which I had assumed was very stable and had been sufficiently seasoned, shrunk somewhat in the dry summer heat.

The worst affected area was the joints on the large transom rail, where it crosses the mullions. The shrinkage caused the joints to open, creating an unsightly 2mm gap. This seemed quite excessive, but, given the width of this rail, the amount of movement was less than 1%.
Fortunately, with the inside face of the rail needing some form of embellishment, the fix was rather simple.

Firstly, I routed a 100mm wide rebate out along the centre line, 18mm deep, then sawed the piece in half.

When reassembling the frame, the two halves were wedged apart to tighten the joints. Then neatly cut infill blocks were inserted, to line up with the mullions.

Lebanese cedar veneer was then laminated to some 3mm ply, which I placed in the bottom of the rebate before the application of bolection mouldings. It did seem a pity to hack into such a nice section of timber, but as mentioned earlier, it needed some form of decoration.
With the main frame now permanently assembled and prior to inverting the whole unit, the inside face received a light staining and a couple of coats of clear lacquer. This would save any extra flipping of the heavy unit and protect the surface from any moisture damage. My main fear at this stage is from the risk of the resident "leaky" possums, who enjoy scurrying around on the exposed joists overhead. These, I am unable to exclude from the house, until the door and frame are completed and installed.

The joining of the lower rails to the mullions and jambs needed to be very solid. They would need to withstand any movement  generated by the swinging and slamming of the door. To keep it all tight I drilled right through from the outer edges to within about 20mm of the door rebates on the mullions.
Pockets were drilled in from the outside face to intersect with the ends of the holes These allow for the fitting of washers and nuts to10mm threaded rod, which was pushed through the hole from the opposite end and they will later be covered with the frame pedestals.