MAKING MDF PANELS - Part IV

While we were sleeping, the DIY fairy godmother visited our house sprinkling magical green stardust over the walls. 

 

Painted as if by magic

With a flick of her wand, a fabulous parrot paper feature wall morphed into being with not a decapitated bird in sight. 

 

Wow!  Parrots

Wow!  I said waking up the next morning to discover this miracle, half expecting to be kissed by a handsome prince with a mug of tea in hand and a bulging pocket of IKEA pencils.  Wow! 

Feature wall all ready for panel assembly

Pfffftt!!  It’s back to reality and time to finally assemble our MDF panelling.  

Firstly, let’s check the checklist:  everything primed (tick), painted (tick), glue gun cocked (tick), spirit level, tape measure and IKEA pencil to hand (tick, tick and tick) then looks like we’re ready to rock. 

Clear the decks and make sure your work space is free of anything that might mark the front of the panels.  Use a fresh dust sheet and give yourself plenty of space.  Open the windows too as some of these adhesives are pretty smelly. 

In my world, panel assembly begins bottom up.  Baseboards first then the individual bars in order from bottom to top.  I never glue anything in place until I’ve dry assembled the panels on the floor or against the wall to make sure everything lines up and will neatly fit into position. 

 

Preparing the baseboards for assembly

Using Grip All adhesive or a similar super strength fast drying adhesive, run a bead of glue all the way round the edge and through the middle of each individual baseboard panel.  Stick each panel onto your wall or in our case, onto our pre-built stud wall box.  To ensure the panels were well secured to the plasterboard, I also hammered in small panel pins in the corners and along the join lines.

 

Apply a good quantity of glue to your pieces

Grip All - let's hope it does

Once you have a nice flat baseboard area, you can begin to add all the horizontal and vertical MDF bars.  Begin with the bottom horizontal MDF bar.  Glue into position, using the spirit level to check that it is level and straight. Press firmly into place and hold for the time it takes for the adhesive to set.  Wear gloves to prevent sweaty finger marks.

 

Add the bottom horizontal bar first

With the bottom bar in place, then glue into position the first vertical bar using a spirit level to ensure the bar doesn’t lean to one side.  I started from the outer bar then worked my way across to the wall. 

 

Add the first vertical bar - work in from the edge

Check your gap measurements to your design diagram (see previous posts) as you add each vertical bar to ensure these are equal. 

 

Keep adding vertical bars adjusting as you go

When you have added all your vertical bars, glue the top horizontal bar into position to complete your wall panel section.  Everything should look evenly distributed across your wall space just like your design diagram.

 

Everything should look evenly distributed

You can use decorators caulk to fill in any large gaps where the MDF bars join together then touch up using a fine paint brush.  These should be minimal if you got your MDF pieces professionally cut to your project design sizes.

Using this type of wall panel design flat against the wall should require no additional dado rail or beading on top of the last horizontal bar but you can always add one if you wish.

I’ll be adding a flat piece to close the top of the stud wall box and create a decorative shelf to display all my Art Deco bits and pieces.

The finished feature wall