Problems with Painted Solid Wood Cabinet Doors
Updated December 2, 2024
Painting solid wood cabinet doors can lead to issues like cracks in the finish and moisture damage due to wood’s natural movement.
As a cabinet maker or contractor, offering painted solid wood cabinet doors might seem like a great way to impress your customers and elevate your reputation. Painted finishes are timeless and elegant, but is painting solid wood truly the best option for your projects? What hidden challenges might come with this choice?
At Cutting Edge Doors & Woodworking, we’ve spent over 20 years crafting and finishing high-quality cabinet doors. With our in-house finishing booth, we’ve seen firsthand the common issues that arise when painting solid wood, from cracking and warping to inconsistent finishes. These challenges can negatively impact your projects, your timelines, and ultimately, your client relationships.
Keep reading to learn:
Solid Wood Cabinet Doors Move; Paint Doesn’t
Solid wood cabinet doors are solid wood; that’s the entire point of the product line. They are a way for you to upsell your customers. Pay a little bit more, and you’ll have a kitchen made of solid Maple, Walnut, or Cherry – no cheap materials.
At some point, most cabinet makers and contractors consider applying the same theory to painted kitchens. Just paint the solid wood doors, right?
The problem is that wood was once a living material. Once upon a time, it was part of a tree that grew and responded to environmental changes. All the cells in wood still remember how that works. So, as temperature and humidity change, those cells shrink and expand, causing the wood to shrink and expand accordingly.
We aren’t talking a lot of movement. A single board might move by at most 1mm. However, paint does not move once it has dried. So, you have this stiff outer layer of paint above mobile wood.
Eventually, the movement of the wood will stress the paint beyond endurance, and the paint will crack along that stress line.
Now, it wouldn’t be a big deal if it was just a crack along the stress line. However, there are other problems you need to know about as well.
Painted Solid Wood Cabinet Doors Have Four Problems
Painting solid wood cabinet doors opens up the potential for three additional problems. But before we dig into the other three, let’s take a closer look at the main problem – cracks in the painted finish.
1. Cracks In The Paint
When you paint solid wood cabinet doors, you will first notice cracks in the painted finish. Usually, within a year, the paint will crack along the main stress areas – the stile and rail joints.
As you can see in the picture below, there is a slight crack along the four stile and rail joints. These are called hairline cracks. Alone, hairline cracks aren’t a structural issue. The problem is that those cracks mean the painted seal around the cabinet door isn’t intact. And that causes the next problem.
2. Moisture Damage
As the painted finish cracks, it reveals the solid wood underneath. Exposed wood isn’t always a problem. However, if the cabinet door is in a high-moisture area, for example, a bathroom vanity or under a sink, you might notice another problem.
The paint along that crack may begin splitting and cracking even more.
This occurs because moisture has sunk into the wood beneath the hairline crack, causing the wood to swell. Soon, this becomes a vicious cycle. The wood swells, cracking the paint. The paint then falls off, exposing more wood to moisture – and repeat.
Excessive moisture will eventually weaken the joint, causing it to fail and let go.
Now, you might think this isn’t a big deal. You can repair the doors if this happens – problem solved. Unfortunately, it’s not as simple as that.
3. It is Difficult to Repair Painted Cabinet Doors
Even highly experienced carpenters avoid repairing a painted cabinet door.
First, your repair jobs must match the original painted finish. But, because the paint ages and changes colour over time, you must get a custom paint match for any large repairs or risk having a visible colour difference.
Plus, if you attempt to repair a crack in the finish, your repair job will fail the next time the humidity or temperature changes. Whatever caused that crack (the underlying issue) is still there; all you’ve done is temporarily hide the problem.
4. Shrinking Panels Can Expose Raw Wood
Like cracks in the paint, this final problem can also lead to moisture damage.
When your cabinet door manufacturer builds a solid wood cabinet door, the wood still contains moisture. Once you paint the cabinet door, the painted seal helps to hold this moisture in place.
The problem is that it is impossible to get paint on the entire centre panel because some of the centre panel hides inside the stiles and rails. This means that moisture can sneak underneath the stile and rails into the wood of the centre panel.
As long as that moisture level stays around, or slightly higher than, the original moisture level, you won’t have a problem.
But (and this is a big one), you have a major problem if the moisture level decreases because the environment is dry. Typically, the dry winter months are when this problem becomes apparent.
As the moisture level falls, the wood shrinks, and you will begin to see the unfinished wood around the edges of the centre panel.
Unlike the other issues, you can usually fix or prevent this problem. All it takes is increasing the humidity levels in the surrounding areas enough to make the wood expand back to its original size. Or, wait until the weather changes (in the spring and summer), and the doors will return to normal.
Offer Other Painted Options Instead of Solid Wood Cabinet Doors
Any of those four problems you just learned about can result in unhappy customers, warranty claims and repeated trips to your customer’s home for troubleshooting and repairs. All of these result in lower profits and harm your reputation.
So what can you offer instead of solid wood cabinet doors to claim that chunk of the market?
Good news – there are two good options for you.
MDF Cabinet Doors
The best option is to offer MDF cabinet doors. You have three separate options within this category:
1. 1-Piece MDF Cabinet Doors
First up is 1-piece MDF cabinet doors. These doors have no seams, which means no stress areas that will crack.
However, 1-piece cabinet doors have limited profile options. Plus, they don’t look like 5-piece solid wood cabinet doors.
2. 2-Piece MDF Cabinet Doors
2-piece MDF is a controversial option. Some customers prefer 2-piece MDF over 1-piece MDF doors because they find them easier to finish. However, 2-piece MDF does have seams that may show up over time.
Like 1-piece MDF, 2-piece MDF doors also have limited profile options and are noticeably not solid wood doors.
3. 5-Piece MDF Cabinet Doors
Finally, you could order 5-piece MDF doors. Cabinet door makers make 5-piece MDF doors using the same processes as solid wood cabinet doors – thus, they are the most similar option.
You will have fewer problems with 5-piece MDF doors than wood doors, although hairline cracks could appear eventually.
Paint-Grade Wood with MDF Panels
You could also order paint-grade cabinet doors. Typically, this type of door has a solid wood frame (Maple or Poplar) with an MDF panel.
This option replaces the soft and easy-to-damage MDF frame with a more durable hardwood frame, and a stable MDF panel replaces the trouble-making solid wood panel.
However, it doesn’t prevent hairline cracks and the possible resulting damage.
There is no perfect solution. At the end of the day, your decision will hinge on which product is easiest to work with, combined with your customer’s preferences.
Learn How MDF Compares to Paint-Grade Wood in Cabinet Doors
As a contractor or cabinet maker working to bring in more customers and increase your profits, you can’t risk harming your reputation. One of the easiest ways to uphold your reputation is to ensure you only offer products you know and trust.
So, now that Cutting Edge has explained why painting solid wood cabinet doors is a bad idea, it’s time for you to look at other options. Start by learning how MDF compares to paint-grade wood in cabinet doors.
