Making Custom Inlay Banding For Clocks & Furniture

If you studied the original image of the clock I'll be reproducing, you will notice that it has a few strips of inlay banding incorporated into the design of the front. Inlay banding can be purchased from veneer suppliers, and specialty woodworking and luthier suppliers, but it's really not complicated to make your own, especially if it's composed of a simple geometric pattern.



The tools needed are a table saw, a planer, a small miter box, and various clamps and scrap glue blocks.

When making custom inlay banding, generally there are 2 styles: side grain (best) and end grain. A lot of woodworkers have a tendency to make end grain inlay simply because it seems to make more sense the way that the strips are cut and glued (like making an end grain cutting board) but once you know how side grain inlay is made, you will see that it's almost the same process, and it gives much better results (especially when it comes to staining and finishing the banding).

Here's how I make mine.



The image above shows the basic steps for a fairly complicated-looking, but ultimately quite simple banding. The banding is made up of 6 layers of thin stock (1). Three are dark (cherry, mahogany, walnut, etc), and three are light (holly, maple, satinwood, etc). The wider the strips, the more finished banding "layers" you'll be able to cut from it. I generally aim for around 1.5" wide and around 12" long. The thickness will vary depending on the pattern you want to make, but 1/16" is a common thickness for most banding.

For this alternating checkered pattern, you will need 2 separate "sandwiches": light-dark-light, and dark-light-dark. Once those are glued and dried (2), they can be cut into segments (3). The segments can vary in width, or they can all be the same. Generally the width of segments will range between 1/16" and 1/4". The segments are cut in a small mitre box which is shop made (I use the mitre box with a thin cutting Japanese saw) along with a small stop block for consistent segment widths.

Once all your segments are cut, you can just quickly take the rough sawn edges down with some sand paper. Take the time to do this step, because you want to avoid as many "glue gaps" as possible.

Gluing the segments together can be a bit tricky, but one easy method is to stick them down onto some double sided masking tape attached to the bottom gluing block. Each section is laid out beforehand so that everything can be glued fairly quickly. Try not to make your inlay strip overly long, since the glue starts to firm-up after 5 minutes or so. I aim for about 12 inches max (as stated earlier). If you only need a small section of banding for a repair, you can make it only a few inches long.

I glue each section in order, end-to-end, pressing them firmly together, and down on the tape, and then I glue the top "facing veneer" (4) down over the entire row of segments. To clarify: all the centre segments, plus top facing veneer is glued in one operation, so work quickly. Once that has been clamped and has dried for about 20-30 minutes, I'll take off the clamps, remove the bottom glue block and the tape, and I'll glue the facing veneer on the opposite side. The finished banding will then be left to dry for several hours. Once it's thoroughly dry, the banding is removed from the clamps, the excess overlapping facing veneer is trimmed off, and each edge is cleaned up either on the joiner, with a hand plane, a belt sander, or on the table saw. The finished banding can be sliced to whatever thickness you need, and used on all sorts of projects.

Note: The sample piece of inlay (5) has a doubled facing veneer (cherry, then maple). These were both glued together in one shot, following the same procedure I describe above.

There are very few limits as to how far you can tweak this technique. You can mix 1/16" thick "main strips" with layers of thin veneers, you can cut the designs into triangles, and the "Barber Pole" inlay seen in the first image at the top is nothing more than a large stack of 5 or 6 layers that is then cut on the diagonal and then glued side by side between facing veneers. You can also use much more than just 2 colours in your inlay. Often traditional inlay banding will mainly stick to 2 or 3 colours, but there are a ton of variations using very complicated designs. If you think you might be interested in making more patterns, or are looking for other ideas, there are a lot of tutorials on YouTube.

Another small note is that when you are using facing veneers, you can cheat quite a bit with the wood species. I used cherry veneer, with pale mahogany as the main "dark" wood. Since the facing veneer is so thin, it's impossible to tell that it's not the same wood.

Finishing-up The W. Allan Longcase

Alright, I've been dragging my feet when it comes to this particular blog, because I don't currently have much feedback on it. The beautiful Scottish longcase clock that I had been working on since February (2013) is finally finished, and set-up in the clients' home. I managed to have everything done and ready for them just before Christmas (about a week before).

In the last post, I discussed the repairs to the feet, and the beginnings of the complex repairs to the corner mouldings of the swan neck crest.

One of the two blocks that I had glued into place was too short, and I had to remove it, and re-install a larger piece of mahogany.

I also really didn't like how this entire corner had turned out:



So I removed all the varnish, re-puttied it, and block sanded it completely smooth. New stain, and toned lacquers were added instead of the hand-brushed varnishes, which gave a far superior finish. But before I get to that, I first made the columns.

I wasn't really sure if my client wanted to spend extra money to cover the costs of the column tops/bottoms, but I decided to go ahead and order them regardless, since the clock hood simply couldn't go without the columns.

Column tops and bottoms for this style of "plain" post columns (based on photos and research) use the same parts for the top and bottom pieces. The originals on this clock were 1" square, but the closest available equivalents were 1 1/8" square with a 3/4" column.

I ordered these through Timesavers, and I was really impressed with the quality. They aren't cheap, but they are exceedingly well made.







Rather than hand-turn plain blank columns, I simply used 3/4" hardwood dowels. I picked one that was as clear and straight as possible, and stained it a very deep mahogany brown. Additional toned varnish was added to get a near-perfect colour match. In this photo, they only have the stain applied.



The brass column tops and bases came without mounting holes, so I needed to drill a pait of very small holes into them to accept some tiny steel finishing nails (smaller than 1/16").

Here you can see the re-sanded cornice, and the finished (installed) columns.









Before I glued the swan neck moulding in place, I needed to attach a reinforcing brace behind the break, patch the chipped chunks on either side of the break, and rough carve the corner patches.



The original crest used 3 small square glue blocks, but I decided to use 5 triangular ones. These were patinated (with a vinegar and iron solution) before installation, then they were stained/painted to match.





After the swan neck crest assembly was glued back to the hood with hide glue, and plenty of clamps (and left to dry overnight), the mahogany patches were hand carved, sanded, and cracks/small gaps puttied.

Note the large patched section of the cornice above the column, which is now nearly invisible.







Stain, varnish, and coloured lacquer were used to blend-in the repairs.









The next part (no photos) was to re-fit the hood door. The hood was reglued solidly as close to "new" as you could expect, however, the hood door had slowly expanded (slightly) in the joints, meaning that it no longer fit into the original opening.

Since the door had the original puttied glass in place, I couldn't take it apart to re-clamp it, and I couldn't throw it on the table saw either, because the vibrations could potentially shatter the glass.

To trim down the door, I had to do it carefully by hand using a hand plane, and a bit of sand paper. In the process, I discovered that the door appears to be made from Cherry, which I thought was incredibly unusual.

With the door carefully re-installed, and waxed on all sides to prevent rubbing at the top and bottom, I turned my attention to the movement.

As you may recall, most of the damaged components were already repaired, and I just had to clean the movement. You can see how dirty and dusty it was, as well as some of my cleaning routine, which involves keeping the individual levers and gears separate and labelled for easier reassembly.



A lot of clockmakers chose to put different artistic twists on common pieces such as this beautifully detailed lifting piece (which raises the hammer for striking the bell):



As well as these two gracefully curved pieces (the rack hook and rack):



The movement has a few previous repairs, and I found this one on the centre wheel. It's a very ugly repair (for a broken leaf pinion) but it's very solid, so I left it as-is. I could have improved the repair but it wasn't worth spending one or two hours on it for a minimal aesthetic improvement.



Another simple repair that I needed to do was to replace the broken pin on the calendar wheel. This pin advances the calendar hand on the dial by one tooth every 24 hours to indicate the date.



Here are two photos of the finished/cleaned movement on the original (repaired) seatboard. You may note two (less than perfect) existing repairs to the rack tail (solder) and the rebuilt gathering pallet. You may also see that the bell stand now has 2 nuts on it. This is because the threads on the bell stand are completely worn down at the base.





Lastly, here you can see the back of the finished hood repairs. All the glue blocks and patched sections have been antiqued to match the back and top of the case.



The next (and final) post about the Allan longcase clock will show the photos of the finished clock.

Longcase Clock Overview

Before I start on any major project or restoration, I like to take detailed photos of everything, and noting down as much information as possible.

On this longcase, I took over 200 preliminary photos, so these are just the more important ones (around 50), along with some quick notes.

Overall view of the case "as-is". Note the huge bubble in the glass.



Unusual triple cove profile under the hood. Reeded 1/4 columns on trunk.





Both back feet are broken, and will need to be repaired.



All the trunk and hood mouldings are solid all the way through, and are each made of two laminated boards. This particular moulding is loose, and will be removed and reglued.



Here you can see that the backboard was slotted into the bottom board. The entire back is mainly one large board, except for this bottom rectangle, and added narrow side pieces on the top.





Note 2-piece laminated block for moulding.




I am usually very confident in identifying woods, but I'm not 100% sure what this clock case is made from. This is the only clear view of the wood grain, which is on the interior of the trunk door. From a distance the wood resembled mahogany, and it is stained/coloured like mahogany, but it doesn't have the open grain and characteristic markings of mahogany. It almost looks more like poplar, but it's not greenish/pale enough to be poplar. It's not heavy enough to be birch (and birch is not a common wood used on longcases). Any thoughts? Is this just a very poor quality mahogany?



The trunk door is missing its lock.



I am now certain that these hinges are not original.





The seatboard mounting blocks are also very suspicious looking. They are held in place with large clot head screws. Also note old candle wax drippings.



Here are details of the hood. The entire thing is in very rickedy shape currently. You can partially see the 4 holes caused by incorrecty chosen hinge screws.



Right hand fretwork.





The left side has a different fabric.



Unusual door hardware (missing).



Very sturdy door construction.



Sewing pins are the only thing holding this small piece in place. The upper crack cannot be repaired without disassembling the entire door (including removing the original glass and putty), so it will only be wax-filled to minimize the defect.



String inlay detail.



Same problem on this side.



Evidence of a column base (both columns and all associated hardware are missing).



The entire right side dial surround is missing and will need to be recreated.





Original coloured putty around glass. Also note how the door was made. It's too difficult to cut a square corner in a sheet of glass, so a gentle curve was used.



The pendulum was dropped and/or mishandled at some point, resulting in several issues. The rating assembly is bent/mangled (but not broken), and the tip of the rod is broken inside the lower assembly.



The original suspension spring (which fits perfectly in the bridge notch).



Hands "as received". Note the repair to the hour hand, and the snipped-off tip of the minute hand.





The hands have beautiful "carved" details filed into them.



Original crank key with slight bend in the narrow shaft.



Crest



Current pieces are glued crooked (this is how it lines up at the moment). Note shadow of correct location.



The entire corners of the cornice (on both ends) has been chewed/broken away, and will need to be recreated, as will the bottom 1/4 of this moulding.



Detail showing poorly aligned previous repair.



A very nice detail is that the centre plinth fits into the upper crest with dovetails cut into the edges. These are TINY (maybe 1/8" deep)!



Parts of the main (top) cornice.



The arrow shows a tiny remaining sliver of the string inlay to the front (sides are plain).



Evidence of column, as well as marks from a swivel hinge.





Front (left corner).



Hood lower side mouldings (I'm very glad I won't have to recreate these from scratch).



Dial details.









Upper foot is bent and loose, and lower foot was torn out (I have it, and it's another piece that I'm grateful wasn't lost).





I also suspect that this clock could be a marriage. Note how the door doesn't line up with the dial.



So there you go. The clock has definitely had a hard life over the past century, but hopefully I can put it back together in a way that makes it fairly presentable.

Stay tuned for additional posts soon (hand repair, pendulum repair, seatboard repair, and some photos of the movement).