Exterior Door Construction with Domino 500 opinions...

[Svar]

Cheese, it's a screen door ~1/5 the weight of the regular one. But if you are that concerned about longevity skip DF700 gizmo (which is for wimps)  [poke] and do proper pinned M&T joint.  [big grin]

Ahhh...missed that one simple word Svar...screen. [doh] 
I was actually responding to the 2nd part of the question which was would the DF 500 be suitable for regular exterior doors.

First post third paragraph,
“ My thoughts then turned to exterior doors. I have a back and basement door I would like to try my hand at. Would the 10mm dominoes work for these types of doors if I pack a bunch in each stile/rail?‘

Ok. You guys win.  [bite tongue] Are you suggesting I have to read the question before answering?

 

[ChuckM]

And this excerpt is from an 85 page Festool Domino catalog.

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The door joint shown is a M&T joint reinforced by dominoes (XL). Not much different from this using dowels:
https://www.woodgrain.com/breaking-down-doors-stile-and-rail-doors/

That makes me wonder if it's for reinforcement, the shorter (DF500) dominoes might even work like the dowels (never built or plan to build a big door, so just a guess here).

 

[mwolczko]

Nice job on the door Mario.  [big grin]  Very nice.  Is that some inlayed material along the front stile or is it a routed groove?

Thanks!  It’s hard to see on the low-rez photo but there are small strips of walnut inlaid above and below the door knob.

 

[JimD]

I bought the XL and the Seneca adapter so I wouldn't have to try and make 25mm penetration for the mortise work.  I am still happy with that choice.  But when I make myself a new front door, I will not use pre-made dominos in it.  I hardly ever use them but have tenon stock on hand in a bunch of sizes that I made and use.  But for an exterior door, I would plunge on about 1/2 inch intervals to make oversize mortises and then make custom tenons to match.  In a 4 inch wide rail, I will probably use about a 3 inch wide tenon.  That will not solve the issue of the limited 25mm depth but would be stronger than multiple dominos IMHO.  3 inch wide by 2 inch long tenons in 10 mm might work.  Modern glues help a lot.  I once made an entire kitchen of cabinets that had only little 3/8 stub tenons made by a cope and stick bit.  They worked.  But if I make raised panel doors these days, I would not make them that light. 

 

[smorgasbord]

The door joint shown is a M&T joint reinforced by dominoes (XL).

That's not the way I see it. I see a door rails/stiles that have a profile and so the joint is coped to accommodate the profile without using a miter, which might gap with wood contraction/expansion. Yes, coping can give you some strength, but you have to watch out depending on the width and it's not very deep.

The article is showing how the extra depth of the DF700 enables you to cut the mortises deep enough even though the coped joint is taking up 12mm-18mm of depth. If you tried that with the DF500, you'd have a weak joint.

 

[afish]

simple answer is 500 for cabinet and light work like "screen door" 700 is for most other things.  If I was worried about cost I would try to pick up a used 700 and sell it after I was done.  you might be able to break even or lose a little worst case scenario.  even if you bought new you wont loose that much.  The cost of wasted lumber would far outweigh the loss on the 700 if it doesnt hold up. 

 

[luvmytoolz]

+1 for afish's comments above!

Aside from the elements, an exterior door also needs to withstand slamming, being accidentally bumped into, etc.

I think any exterior door made with a DF500 would be quite trivial to fail if the strength of it was based on the dominos. In fact I'd be worried enough just about the sheer weight of a solid timber door made with a DF500.

I'm making a 38mm thick Tas Blackwood door using 14 x 140 dominos, and I'll still be re-enforcing it additionally to be safe. Even though it might be over engineered, I wouldn't consider using anything less myself.