Cutting a laminate countertop (hardwood, washers, Home Depot, color)

[cgar22]

I picked up a "L" shaped laminate counter at the closeout bin at Lowe's. Only problem is that it was made for a bar to it is 27" instead of 25" so I need to rip it down. What is the best way to make a good cut?

I also need to shorten the left side. I plan on just re-mitering the left hand piece so that the finished end will still be used. The pieces currently are routed out for bolts on either side of the miter so that you can tighten it together, when I cut it the left side will no longer have the routed out holes. Is there another good way to hold the piece together tight? What type of saw do I need to make a perfect 45" miter? Will a sliding compound miter do a 25" countertop or will I need something else?

Thanks for any help or advise.

[Barking Spider]

This is kind of like, "If you have to ask how, you probably shouldn't attempt it".

Is this a normal kitchen counter top that has a finished lip on one edge and an upturn on the other? IF so, you will probably have to cut off the front lip that comes over the front of the cabinet. If you do that, you will need a way to finish the edge. If you cut off the back upturn, then it is a little harder to cut.

Anyway, here goes. You should probably have a skill saw with a fine tooth blade that is made for laminate material. You should also have a router with a laminate bit. You will need a good straight edge and some clamps.

Figure out where you want to cut it. Use the straight edge to mark the line. Use the skill saw and cut within 1/8" of the mark, then use the router to make the finish cut. The miter cut can also be done with a straight edge and clamps and run the saw and router along the edge of the straight edge. Now matter how good the skill saw blade is, you will probably have chipped edge, thats why you finish it with the router. Much easier to just cut off the end and put on a new edge trim, and leave the mitre alone.

As far as bolting the two pieces together without the bolt slots go. This is a tough one, but you can configure something out of scrap blocks and screw them together. Not an easy way to describe this.

[jimboburnsy]

Originally Posted by cgar22

I picked up a "L" shaped laminate counter at the closeout bin at Lowe's. Only problem is that it was made for a bar to it is 27" instead of 25" so I need to rip it down. What is the best way to make a good cut?

I also need to shorten the left side. I plan on just re-mitering the left hand piece so that the finished end will still be used. The pieces currently are routed out for bolts on either side of the miter so that you can tighten it together, when I cut it the left side will no longer have the routed out holes. Is there another good way to hold the piece together tight? What type of saw do I need to make a perfect 45" miter? Will a sliding compound miter do a 25" countertop or will I need something else?

Thanks for any help or advise.

Barking Spider is pretty much spot-on.

As far as joining the mitered portion is concered, you can bootleg that (depending on the thickness of your laminate) with a forstner bit, a skillsaw, some threaded bolts, washers and nuts. Use the forstner bit to carve out two hollows on either side of the miter joint (on the underside, of course), use the skillsaw with a shallow depth setting to nibble out a channel between them (a router is pretty handy for this as well), lay the bolt into the channel and use the washers and nuts to compress the opposing sides of the miter together. Make sense? Pretty cheap and simple and no one will ever see it. Dry-fit it to check the appearance of the miter and fit on the cabinets, then take it apart and apply caulk or glue for the final run.

[desertsun41]

I cut those tops upside down. I also push the saw so very very slow. I clamp a straight edge and ride the circular saw along it. By cutting the back side the blade is pulling up thereby almost eliminating any chipping. I will line up the blade to cut a sixteenth heavy past the line. Then I take the big belt sander to clean it up. It's not 100% perfect but it's close enough to iron on the lam edge strip.

Those grooves you are talking about are called draw bolts. Jim B has a good idea to make them yourself with forstner bits. Yikes I cant spell that word. You can also buy the little kit to make this keyhole shape from Rockler Woodworking for....hmmmmm $40 or so? Of course you need a router and a router is not always in every handymans tool box.

That all said I advise you NOT to cut that miter. The machine that cuts miters on lam tops cost $26,000. No home owners tools or contractors tools can do it well. Even my method of belt sanding to the pencil line just is not close enough to acceptable.

If you do it anyway, you can buy a product called seam filler. You get the color keyed seam filler to your color laminate and rub it in the seam which does a pretty good job of filling imperfections and seals it from water intrusion. I would also like you to backcut your cut. On a miter you can not set your saw on an angle so cut it straight and then belt the bottom without touching the laminate. In other words when you fit the miter you would like the laminate to touch and NOT the wood. This too will allow for a tighter fit. Im talking just a little back cut maybe a degree or 2 on each side. Does that make sense? Not sure if I explained that real good.

The piece that is 27", I assume that was meant for a penninsula. What are you going to do for a back splash? Especially when the other piece has a built in one with roundover edges.

[jimboburnsy]

Originally Posted by desertsun41

Those grooves you are talking about are called draw bolts. Jim B has a good idea to make them yourself with forstner bits. Yikes I cant spell that word. You can also buy the little kit to make this keyhole shape from Rockler Woodworking for....hmmmmm $40 or so? Of course you need a router and a router is not always in every handymans tool box.

It's funny that you mention that little $40 kit. I learned how to bootleg a joint like that when I was messing with some butcherblock in my early 20's. I spent some money on a jigset for the miter joint (at Rockler in Houston), went back to the job, very carefully clamped an old aluminum 4' level as a guide for my skillsaw, made a German scientist precision cut, hand sanded any hangers and then realized that I needed a router. I went to the Pin Oak home depot and looked at some routers. The bolts, washers and nuts were much cheaper. Kept the jigset, but have yet to use it. It just isn't very often that your average joe needs to join butcherblock/laminate. By the way... DRAWBOLTS. Thank you. That word was stuck an inch or two behind my tongue and I couldn't find it.

[mawipafl]

All great advice. I emphasize *take your time when cutting* and not zip through it with the saw and router as you would with a sheet of plywood. What also helped us to minimize chipping was to place a length of masking tape along the cut line and sawing through it.

[cgar22]

Thanks for all of the replies. Since this counter was originally meant for a free standing bar there is no backsplash. I plan on taking the left over 2" (minus blade thickness) and turning it on edge for the backsplash. If it looks too small then I'll probably and a row of tile above it.

As for not cutting the miter, I don't have any extra laminate to piece on the end so maybe I'll over hang the counter by 2-3 inches so that I have a couple of tries to get it right.

This project is a rec room for the kids in the basement. While I want it to be nice, I am trying to do it as low budget as possible.

[Cosmic]

Cutting any type of laminate / formica is fairly high risk with a saw blade. You can mininize it by turning the work up side down, using the masking tape, letting the blade project thru the work only by 1/4", use a *** with straight edge guide with the new right blade. With all those precautions, there still is risk, especially if there is not material to retry, the one cut basically ruins the work. Got one chance to get it right.

The idea of cutting short and then tuning by sanding is sound. You can do it with a faily light belt sander, I would finish it by hand sanding, you get much better control.

The far better choice is using a router with a straight bit / collar that again is used in a guiding ***. I still would use the masking tape over the cut line. Again use the sanding method to tune the cut if required. Using a new very sharp bit. Having a speed control module for the router also helps.

One sort of neat way to approach trying to join two laminated counter sections after having to cut them in a field environment is never try join them directly like is available using factory prep'd cuts. I've done it making up a hard wood splice piece that fits in between the two counter sections. Sort of difficult to describe how to do it. The splice piece extends down under the counter tops, You glue on blocks to each counter section on the undersides. Those blocks allow you to squeeze each counter section up hard against the splice section, unlike the other counter section, the wood splice piece will compress and give a tigher looking fit up. The splice piece also looks more fancy, about like you had the better mousetrap and knew exactly what you were doing.

Using the splice piece idea also allows you to make it up after the cut and maybe make up any difference in one counter top section length if you had to do it twice or cut off more than planned. It also unlike another countertop section can be fine tuned for depth fit after installation.

The trick if there is one, is being able to fine tune the splice piece extremely flush after the fact. Again masking tape and very careful hand sanding is what works best. I've done a lot of these tricks in making furniture with formica tops. The same risks are involved. You can get a formica top banded by hardwood stripes without the formica edge showing. That same technique can be used to do a splice piece in a counter sections.

Even if just making end pieces for counter sections, I almost never use those store bought end pieces. They never look good, you can make far better ones yourself and make the counter look more custom and classy with less expense.

The other big advantage with these methods, you can have other chances to redo it, if the first attempt fails. Lot more possible chances to correct screw up's that might doom other methods. The normal way to do the counter sections if it not exactly perfect, it will not be acceptable.

[cgar22]

Everyone probably knew that this post was coming but here it is anyway.

What is the best filler material to put in the miter gap?

I made the cut and it is pretty good except for a 2" section in the middle where the piece I cut is slightly concave.

[Omaha Rocks]

Originally Posted by cgar22

Everyone probably knew that this post was coming but here it is anyway.

What is the best filler material to put in the miter gap?

I made the cut and it is pretty good except for a 2" section in the middle where the piece I cut is slightly concave.

This is great - not because of your personal misfortune, but because every single one of us has been there!

I think that Do-It-Yourself Projects may very well have been the original source of swearing and self-loathing.