Quilted maple bonanza? Or am I kidding myself?

[Wayde Christie]

It's council clean-up time this weekend in my area and this morning I woke up to a bigger pile than the day before.

Someone had dumped an old credenza on my front lawn, which annoyed me at first until I looked at it closer...

It was covered in book-matched quilted maple veneer!

On first inspection I thought the veneer was 3mm thick but it turned out it was a 0.5mm veneer on a substrate.

I sanded the old, cloudy finish off a piece, gave it a couple of coats of shellac and then hit it with some Danish oil and the result was amazing.

Unfortunately the pieces are too small for guitars, but they are perfect for concert or soprano ukuleles. There are 10 book-matched pieces which are each big enough for a back and sides.

Should I be stoked? Is commercial veneer like this cheaply available?

Any advice on how best to salvage it?

Cheers guys

[Wayde Christie]

Of course I meant flame maple

[charangohabsburg]

Is commercial veneer like this cheaply available?

Here in Europe, flamed (and also quilted) maple veneer goes for about 8€ per m², Bird's eye maple for ca. 12€/m².

Any advice on how best to salvage it?

Keeping in mind the price of new maple veneer I have no idea how to efficiently remove the veneer from the chipboard substrate. I in your place probably would use the veneered panels as they are for something else than musical instruments, or restore this piece of furniture and then sell it off, or keep it if there is some use for it.

[ernie]

You might ruin the piece by trying to get at the veneer.I had a previous incarnation as a cabinetmaker for 25 years.Markus/s idea is a good one sell the credenza and buy some maple to make instruments with

[dshaker]

Mostly I think you are kidding yourself, but if you wanted to take a serious try, you could laminate the sides with the veneer and layers of spruce and then do a double-top style back with the maple, then nomex, then spruce. It might be crap, but it might be amazing.

[hooked]

Would it be possible to remove most of the chipboard on a band saw and then through a drum sander veneer face down to clean off remainder of chipboard?

[ernie]

yes , you can but it/s a lot of work to get a thin veneer . That can be readily purchased for little $$ unless you have way more time than money.

[charangohabsburg]

Would it be possible to remove most of the chipboard on a band saw and then through a drum sander veneer face down to clean off remainder of chipboard?

Not sure how a 0.5mm thin veneer behaves when shoving it through a drum sander. But I imagine the worst!
Although it may work tack-gluing it to a thicker board.
As Ernie said: it would be really a lot of work for "saving" very few dollars!

[Wayde Christie]

Thanks for the advice guys. I attempted to remove a small piece of the veneer - it didn't work out.

Maybe I'll make some jewellery boxes or something!

[kiwinoz62]

How about using a Hot clothes iron, applied over a damp cloth?
It might be enough to release the veneer, but then it might cause it to curl as well.

[Wayde Christie]

How about using a Hot clothes iron, applied over a damp cloth?
It might be enough to release the veneer, but then it might cause it to curl as well.

I tried that Wayne but it's just too much work. Way easier to just buy it if I ever need it.

[Nick]

Sorry Wayde, just couldn't resist the temptation to include some clips from my favourite movie

youtu.be/