Now dry, I could manipulate the furniture and so I put it in place. I'll fasten later and continue the build-up, but for now, this gave me a nice visual - and cleared the work area.
Shuffling through the doors and drawer fronts I started sorting into two piles. Those that appear tight and close jointed, and those that have plastic framing in need of one treatment or another.
Like this one - arguably being the worst. What happened? How did it spread like this? I haven't thought hard about which door this is, but now I suspect it was close to a heat source. The catalytic heater perhaps? Just a guess, but it was an obvious repair to do. I started with it.
With a little pressure applied in the right spots it came apart here first and I was surprised. Nice metal corner fasteners!
I know I'd seen plastic corners on some I had already taken apart for some other reason in the past. But this was a positive revelation!
Notice on the framing profile, the two grooves on the right are the ones that go over the paneling. The hollow on the lower left receives the metal (or plastic) corner bracket.
The sides with the hinges were a little tighter. At first I felt it was the "hang-up" of the screw hole distortion doing the grabbing, and it was in part, but it turned out to be more likely a little glue along the longer runs. But I started with a gentle punch tapping to release the ends, allowing a prying type pull to seperate the pieces. I was pleased that the plastic was considerably less brittle than I thought it'd be.
The inside looks like this.
I located one of the "extra" doors from the parts shelf that I won't be using. It's the one that originally fit the opening where the new battery tray will be. That opening went all the way to the floor with no bottom cabinet face - perhaps a toilet closet? Or some such original purpose. At any rate the original door had no bottom framing; it was left open. Here's how that looked after 45+ years.
Notice the factory staple on the first photo securing the plastic framing end in the absence of a corner. It is that staple the led me to conclude the design was factory original.
I decided to remove the remaining plastic edges to have on hand for extra parts. I also located a few extra edges I had already removed from another drawer or door and that's where I re-discovered the plastic corners.
By this point I had discovered that some frame segments were easily removed, and some were very tight. I decided to check each corner for tightness. If it was tight and fit good, I set it to one side and will likely finish those as is. Those that were loose or had damage or some sort of gap went into another pile and I planned to repair those, likely finishing them with all or some of the frames removed, depending on how easy any particular piece came off.
But first it was time to remove all the stuff from my top shelf, where most of the doors and drawers had been parked since last summer. I removed from the extra parts pieces all the hardware, drawer guides and drawer fronts, allowing for better flat storage.
Some of the drawers are a little nasty inside. I discarded those and they will be burned. The good drawers were stacked here for future use in one way or another.
Incidentally, I will not be using the plastic drawer guides, but I'll save them for future need for somebody. I plan to use roller guides as I rebuild the galley cabinet interior parts.
The extra doors I stored here. I'll take parts as needed, and leave the rest assembled.
From just these two doors (and a few loose pieces)...
I got this stack of parts.
From my extra parts I found one piece that was the exact length I needed for the original warped piece, including the miter!
After touching steel wool to that piece I sanded wood, now with the extra exposure, first with 100 grit, followed by 220.
Ready now for finish and reassembly, I set it aside.
Then I started the tightness check mentioned before, making my two piles. Here's one I found that by now I was curious as to the reason for it's strange gap at the miter joint (bottom right). Why would it warp like that?
Well now that 'splains it. Notice the proximity of the propane lantern. Heat is trapped to the left side due to the ceiling arch/channel. Now we know where to locate a shelf for the butter dish!
Doing some deep engineering thought (I do that sometimes) I pondered the metal corner pieces. Why are some loose, why are some tight? How to tighten the loose ones? I've concluded some plastic runs will require a little glue, like a thin watery clear glue run along the groove where wood meets plastic, but on the corners I think a slight bend to less than 90 degrees applies the right pressure in the right places for a tight joint. Expanding the piece to greater than 90 gives no "extra" surface for the bracket to press on, and leaving the 90 intact might place the piece into the same slightly worn channel of the plastic.
Here's a visual.
Now more work. I have a couple of additional groupings (single door with parts) set aside for finish. In those cases there are ends removed, and longer runs retained, but at least that assists some of the sanding with the grain for a nice finish prep.
