Do a stick and cope door instead of a mitered door with the maple frame and MDF center panel. You'll be much happier without a mitered frame in paint.

Not going to get that profile in a stick and cope, will either have to be mitered or french mitered (see link)â¦or made out of MDF

The problem that I have found using one piece MDF doors that have been milled to profile is that they do tend to not stay perfectly flatâ¦when the center section is milled out it is creating a unbalanced panel and could be a problem eventually

What I have requested when having MDF doors made is have them made in 2 pieces, the frame to be milled with one piece of MDF, back is routed to accept the MDF panelâ¦.the nice part about that is the panel can be painted separate from the frame so that when the panel does move a bit with seasonal change everything is finished and you will not see that raw panel as it shrinks in dry conditions

Here is a link that might be useful: french miter

Elmwood has a fair number of 5 piece MDF doors. Note that their standard door backs are melamine for MDF doors. You have to specify matching backs as an upgrade.

As said miter on paint is not a good idea.

Nice idea about the 2 pc MDF door.

There is MDF and then there is MDF- grading varies enormously- what changes he most is the density of the mdf in the interior compared to near the surface. This leads to the warping that ajc is referring to. There are companies that only make MDF doors, some of those exercise great care in ensuring consistent density of the material when it ships in. I doubt that most wood door mfg do that. I toured a mfg in Canada that has stringent standards for density consistency, of course it costs.

Until I started with Elmwood I'd done very few painted MDF doors, didn't like the quality of what was ever available to me. My experience with MDF was generally working with it, not in doors.

So far I've only done the one piece MDF-no problems with warping after a year, we'll see. So it I'm not going to offer a suggestion as to what you should do. I personally think that painted doors should show the seams with age on rail and stile doors. We've been looking at them that way for centuries. Not everyone feels that way though (guess you don't :)

Thank you very much for your replies.

@ajc71 Thanks for the link about French Miter...I had not heard of that before. I was also unaware of the warping issue with the 1 piece MDF door. That's kinda worrisome.

@jakuvall I looked into Elmwood but they don't have any dealers in my neck of the woods (Vancouver). Based on what you're saying, I need to be very concerned about the quality of the MDF.

The cabinet makers I've dealt with so far seem to offer MDF as some "new" thing and don't fill me with confidence - for example I asked about brands of MDF and I was told "don't worry, we've been using this for a while. Ignore the people on the internet who try to make you worry about MDF quality" !

As far as the seams showing paint cracks, yes I know many people see that as a positive. I would actually be okay with it myself, but DH's position is that if there is a material that doesn't cause paint cracks, why wouldn't we use that? Also he just generally doesn't go for anything "old". It doesn't help that the cabinet makers have flat out told us they will only warranty MDF doors if we're going painted.

If in Vancouver area, have you checked out Redl Kitchens?

They offer a fantastic product and exceptional finishes, I would put their finished product up against any cabinet line out there

@ajc71
Thank you SO much for the tip about Redl. I hadn't heard of them. It turns out that they offer profiles in both one-piece and five-piece MDF. Another avenue to explore for me. THANKS!

I talked with the cabinet shop today that I've been dealing with (whom I'm not committed to yet) and they said they don't sell 5 piece MDF because they don't see an advantage over 1 piece.
No one seems to have heard of the 2 piece idea.
I will keep at it.