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Finger Jointing

Finger jointer
Finger Joint cutter head

The finger jointing process takes pieces of wood called blocks and joins them together. This involves two additional steps. First any unacceptable wood deformities must be cut out of the lumber “rips’ by cross-cutting these out at the “cut-line”.

The remaining strips or blocks of clear wood are then passed through a finger jointer which cuts out small male and female fingers into the ends of the wood pieces. Trees do not always grow to long lengths that are typically required for mouldings and some production processes develop shorter peices of wood we must collect and save these smaller pieces for use in the finger jointing process.

Finger Jointing is type of joint; much like a splice joint, butt joint, or 45 degree mitre joint. As per below:

  • Green Splice Joint
    Splice
  • Green Butt Joint
    Butt
  • Green Finger Joint
    Finger
  • Green 45 degree miter joint
    45 Degree Miter Joint
  • Green Dado Joint
    Dado

Finger Jointing is utilized because of the strength of the joint that it creates by the many contact points created by the fingers. This gives the water based adhesive Alexandria Moulding uses to create a fast secure bond.

To manufacture this joint, wood is optimized at our cut line where skilled employees scan the wood and stream the wood pieces into conveyor belts where the wood pieces of sufficient quality will be used in the for finger jointing process. This involves cutting out knots, bark, an other wood deformities.

Cut line workers putting the wood pieces on a scanner
Cut Line Workers
Cut line workers scanning the wood
Cut Line Worker scanning for deformities

From this point the cut pieces are sent via conveyor belt to have finger joints cut into both ends of the wood. A male and female joint is precision cut into the wood.

Directly after flowing through the conveyor belt a water based adhesive is applied to the male and female ends and they are joined together with a hydraulic press to maintain a satisfactory interlocking of the fingers. Before they are sent through one further quality control check is made on the finger jointed pieces to ensure they meet our standards.

After the finger jointing process is completed, these finger jointed blocks are usually resawn and transformed into blanks ready for the moulders.

Cut blocks of wood on a conveyor belt
Cut blocks on conveyor belt
Wood pieces on a conveyor belt getting adhesive applied on
Water based adhesive application
Worker cutting the wood piece
Non conforming quality finger joint piece pulled
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