Best glue/method for installing a cabinet skin?

Super99 from 3M

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I've heard spray contact cement, rolled-on wood glue, and a hot glue gun (no thanks). It's just an end piece for an upper cabinet. TIA.

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what's the materials?

If it's wood veneer, I'd use wood glue.

I use roll-on contact cement. Must better coverage than spraying.

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I do quite a bit of veneering

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Gonna hijack this thread for a second since you obviously have a lot of experience. Made a few humidors in the past and just lined them with Spanish cedar. Plan to build a few larger ones soon and thinking of building from spanish cedar and veneering with more "exotic" woods. Simpler design overall, cheaper, etc..

Problem is I don't have a vacuum bag system. But these are relatively small panels, so can find ways to clamp even pressure. So not a huge concern, but a concern. Also this is a device that will hopefully see stable humidity on the inside, but may have considerable difference in humidity inside to out. Not sure how that affects the veneer to cedar interface. What type of glue would be suggested there? And where do you buy your veneers, local or online?

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Problem is I don't have a vacuum bag system.

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If you are going to do much veneering building a vacuum press system is the way to go, but I do understand budgets. Some people will say they are only needed for curved work but I use them for flat panels too and they just work.

Parts for DIY vac press

If you don't use a press what you need is some sort of clamping caul. Bowclamp made slightly radiased maple cauls but I actually think they are out of business. Woodpecker made a "One Time Tool" phenolic radiused cauls back a couple of years ago which oddly enough they just brought back and orders are open for a couple more weeks. They are excellent and better than the Bowclamps in every way. But they aren't a cheap solution.



When clamping veneer you need to understand the clamping force from a clamp or caul radiates downward at a 45 degree angle and you need to ensure all the areas of the veneer get enough clamping force.



The thicker the platen the wider the force is spread out.

You can make your own cauls several ways.

May years ago I used some scrap angle iron. You can also make them from clear hard maple (or similar) and to get a bit of a radius on them you can use a hand plane.

Get your flat caul and set your hand plane up to take a fairly thin shaving 2-3 thousandth. Marke the center of the caul then start about an inch away from the center and take a single shaving all the way to the end. Then move out another inch and take another shaving all the way to the end. Repeat that all the way to the end of the caul in both directions from center. This puts enough of a rough radius to help even out the clamping pressure. This is called a crowned caul. If you have access to a CNC machine you can just make a caul where the end is 1/16" more narrow than the center per foot. So a 24" caul would be say 3" in the center and taper to 2 15/16" at each end. You could also do it on a table saw etc.

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What type of glue would be suggested there?

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The best answer for this and almost every veneering project that you can clamp is pre-cat dry urea resin adhesive. The big advantages are long open times, very little bleed through and it dries rock hard so you don't get creep like you do with PVA adhesives because they dry "soft" which also means it sands well so you don't get gunny edges. My preferences are Pro-Glue Veneer Bond or Better Bond Ultra Cat. The other nice thing is it comes dry so you just mix what you need. All of this doesn't mean you can't use PVA and a lot of people do but if you are going to spend the time and effort to build a nice veneered humidor the extra expense is worth it to me.

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And where do you buy your veneers, local or online?

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I cut a lot of my own veneer but what I buy I buy online. My main source is Veneer Supplies: LINK

The quality, variety, price, and pictures of the actual flitch make this my go to. There are a ton of other great suppliers (don't sleep on eBay either) all over the web.