[DKinYORKpa]

My 40-190 has those vertical, cross-grain stripes in the center. They are a blondish photo-finish. Where the photo-finish rubbed away, I can clearly see another layer of cross grain wood underneath. It is not blond but rather a shade the same or darker than the main mahogany on the cabinet. What's with that?

[Steve Davis]

DK, Generally, the panels in our cabinets are constructed with a core material that has a thin layer of wood on each side. The thin layer will have the grain running perpendicular to the core grain. This thin layer is called "cross-banding", sometimes simply referred to as "banding". The purpose of the cross-banding is to prevent splitting/cracking and warping of the core. I believe the wood you are seeing under the photo finish is this cross-banding.

Steve

[DKinYORKpa]

Yes, I understand how plywood is made:

Plywood is made of three or more thin layers of wood bonded together with an adhesive. Each layer of wood, or ply, is usually oriented with its grain running at right angles to the adjacent layer in order to reduce the shrinkage and improve the strength of the finished piece.

But if I understand you correctly, that layer under the top mahogany veneer would have to be mahogany for me to be seeing open grained wood running perpendicular to the top under the faux wood. In which case, they would have had to remove the top veneer for those two stripes of faux cross banding. And from my experience, those stripes of faux wood are not that thick. I have a Motorola wooden table radio that had a 1" horizontal stripe of faux cross banding along the bottom and the middle. The case was terribly degraded, so I stripped the whole thing. The area with the faux grain was left with a very faint shadow where the wood was protected from UV. If you look close and I don't point out what I removed, you wouldn't know. But it's all nice smooth mahogany. My point is that the faux wood was merely applied over the wood. There's enough finish missing on my Philco where the missing faux wood grain meets the top veneer and I can see the edge of the top veneer. Look closely: don't you see an inlaid stripe of cross banding under the faux finish:

[Image: http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z309/...le-153.jpg]

[Image: http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z309/...le-154.jpg]

[Steve Davis]

OK, it is not what I was thinking. It looks to have an inlay made of real wood with a photo finish.

Steve

[DeckApe]

I was thinking--consulting my 40-190 cabinet--that it's an inlay with a darker grain filler, myself. Mine has been stripped completely of its original finish and instead of being lacquered was rubbed down with multiple coats of tung oil (it looks good enough that I'm not messing with it) and the mahogany pores are still there, just without the dark filler.

[DKinYORKpa]

So in this instance, if you didn't know that photo finish comes off with stripper, you would still have cross bands running down the front quite nicely! But what's up with having the photo finish over the inlay? They wanted more contrast?