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Beauty is in the details when it comes to trim. Prominent nail holes, clunky cuts, poorly matched joints and gaps at floors all look bad and distract from an otherwise finely crafted and finished project. Here’s where fussing over details pays off.
Hide those nail heads
If you want your trim work to have a rustic, distressed look, go ahead and make the nail holes stand out. But if you’re seeking a smooth, furniture-like finish, you have to make those nail holes disappear. Hiding nail holes takes a little more time and patience, but you’ll get the fine, flawless appearance you want.
Begin by staining and sealing the trim before you put it up. Then buy colored putties to closely match the stain colors on the wood (Photo 3). (The other option, filling the holes with stainable filler before staining, is tricky unless you have a lot of experience. (See “Coat Rack & Storage Bench,”) Prestaining also makes the darker grain lines of the wood stand out. Position your nails there for the least visibility.
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Buy several putty colors and mix them to match the wood color. Wood tone is rarely uniform, even when the wood is stained, so you can’t rely on only one color to fill every hole (Photo 3). Fine-tune your blends, and set your test piece alongside the trim to check the visibility of the nail holes under real light conditions. Lighting can significantly affect whether the filler blends or stands out.
Keep in mind that you can correct past mistakes or fix a situation where the wood has darkened after a year or two (with cherry, for example). Simply buy woodtone felt-tip pens and touch up the filler. (Photo 2). Or lightly drill out the most unsightly old filler holes with a small drill bit and refill them. Minwax is one common brand of colored putties and touchup pens (800-523-9299) available at most hardware stores and home centers.
1. Predrill and drive nails in the darker grain lines when possible. Holes are much easier to hide.
2. Touch up bad matches with a colored felt-tip pen. Or drill out the old putty and refill.
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3. Blend putty colors to more closely match the finished wood colors. One color won’t do all.
End your trim with returns
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Click Image to enlarge. |
The tough part about making the return is cutting and fastening such a small, fragile piece. It usually flies off the power miter saw and breaks. One good solution is to cut it against a temporary sacrificial fence, which gives the trim piece full support (Photo 1).Use the tallest fence your miter saw blade guard allows for maximum support. Even so, some profiles are simply too fine to cut cleanly. In that case, cut off the return, leaving a little extra length. Then belt-sand off the excess on the backside after you glue the return to the main piece (Photo 2).
Returns usually split if you try to fasten them with nails, even if you use an air nailer. Gluing works better. Wrap them with tape from the backside to clamp the mitered corner just right. Or if you’re in a hurry, use fast-setting epoxy (five minutes or less) and simply hold the return in place until the epoxy sets.
For a really sharp look, cut the return off the end of the same trim piece so it looks as though the grain turns the corner.
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1. Cut the return at a 45-degree angle, using a 1x3 “sacrificial fence” for a backer. Make the cut as fine as possible.
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2. Spread glue on the mitered edges and tape the return tightly to the trim.
Match wood grain at joints
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Contrasting grain patterns at corners, although less prominent, can look bad too (Photos 1 and 2).
TIP
Trim is expensive, but it’s often worth buying 10 to 20 percent extra just to have more placement options. And although it’s fussy, cutting a single piece of trim to flow around prominent outside corners lends a subtle touch of class to your trim. Others may not notice the matching grain pattern, but you will.
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| 1. Differences in lighting at corners often help hide poor grain matches. Still, try to match grain at corners as closely as possible. | |
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| 2. Either a wide grain pattern or a narrow one can look fine as long as each is consistent at joints. | |
Scribe the base to the floor (and skip the shoe)
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1. Set the baseboard in place and run a thick pencil along the floor, marking the floor dips and humps.
2. Sand to the line with a belt sander until the profile matches the floor. Angle the sander toward the back and finetune the outer edge for a closer fit.
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