I have an end grain cutting board that the customer has requested I inlay a letter for their last name. I plan to use the inlay app for this. My question is whether I need to make an end grain panel for the Inlay or can I just use a face grain piece? I don’t know if wood movement would be an issue if my inlay is only 1/8” thick material.
Thanks!
My experience with gluing end grain to face grain is that the two woods move in different directions over time and the glue showed stretch marks. In my case I was trying to put solid wood molding of the same species on a panel. I can’t say how a inlay would hold up as I never do wood inlay.
I can not imagine the inlay would have any effect of movement direction. However, with that said, you can always play it safe and do end grai in lay.
Or you can fill it with epoxy
Steve’s idea is best.
End grain to end grain I suspect would be difficult at 1/8 thickness because it would want to chip out really bad on fine details. Different woods will also move at different rates and that could be a problem as well.
End grain to Face grain would likely have issues with wood movement.
Make a thick end grain board and do a trial inlay for your customer and if it fails you can still mill it down.
matching the grain is important. you can cut the inlay letters out of 1/2 inch end grain ( mirror image) and glue them in and then resurface the board to make them level.
