I finally ruined a $400 sheet of walnut plywood last week and had to get creative

I was working on a built-in bookshelf for a client in Portland and had this gorgeous sheet of walnut plywood I'd been saving. I set it up on my saw horses and went to crosscut it on my track saw but I forgot to check the blade depth. The blade went right through my sacrificial foam board and hit a concrete floor underneath, chipping the hell out of the last 6 inches of the board. I was so pissed at myself because that ply cost me $400 and I needed every inch for the project. Ended up salvaging it by cutting out the damaged section and using it for the top shelf where the chipped edge would be hidden by the crown molding. Took me an extra 2 hours to rework the cuts but it saved me from ordering another sheet and waiting a week. Has anyone else had to fix a dumb mistake like this on expensive material and found a workaround?

3 comments

3 Comments

victorh811mo ago

Wait you paid $400 for one sheet of plywood? @gracec16 that's insane.

gracec161mo ago

Smart move using the crown molding to hide that mess. I've gotten creative with trim before to cover up my own stupid cuts on expensive wood, makes you feel like a genius when it actually works.

jakejones1mo ago

The real genius move is that crown molding can double as a built-in wire channel if you leave a small gap behind it. Nobody thinks about that until they're trying to hide speaker wires or TV cables on a finished wall. I've seen guys notch out the back of crown molding to run low-voltage stuff through it, then caulk it up so it looks seamless. You basically get a hidden raceway for free without having to cut drywall or fish cables through studs. That's the kind of hack that pays for itself when you sell the house later too.