how much clearance for inset doors

[Al Bacon]

I have a pair of opposing inset doors made that fit the opening exactly. How much clearance do the doors need to open and close with out binding? I think the doors need to have a 3 or 4 degree angle on the styles that meet in the center.

[George Bokros]

Sounds about right to me.

[Peter Quinn]

What kind of hinges? How thick are the doors? 3 degrees is appropriate for an entry door 1 3/4" thick with 1/8" gaps. Typically cabinet doors don't need a bevel if under 1".

[Jim Becker]

Yes, you need a slight bevel on the side you reference to avoid binding while closing. A few degrees like you mention should be about right and you can check it by mounting the doors before finishing so you can fine tune it with a hand plane.

'Just as an aside and relative to the gap around the door, the decision is more complex than just picking a dimension. "Technically" you need to take into account the wood movement properties of the wood species you are using as well as the seasonal characteristics of when you are doing the build. It can actually be a math exercise! That said, I personally prefer a 1/16"-3/32" average opening and base my decision on that. If I'm building in the humid, hot summer, I'll build with a tighter gap because when winter and dry heat come along, that door is going to be smaller and the gap wider. Etc.

[julian abram]

On cabinet insert doors I tape pennies inside the frame and fit the doors to the remaining opening.

[Al Bacon]

I should have included the following:
1" thick Poplar doors
each approx 12" wide
hinges are on the face not mortised in
being built in the summer in New England = pretty humid time of year.

[Curt Harms]

A rule of thumb I remember - because it's easy. Dime in the summer, nickel in the winter.

[lowell holmes]

+1 for Julian and Kurt. I use dimes.

[jack duren]

Yes, you need a slight bevel on the side you reference to avoid binding while closing. A few degrees like you mention should be about right and you can check it by mounting the doors before finishing so you can fine tune it with a hand plane.

'Just as an aside and relative to the gap around the door, the decision is more complex than just picking a dimension. "Technically" you need to take into account the wood movement properties of the wood species you are using as well as the seasonal characteristics of when you are doing the build. It can actually be a math exercise! That said, I personally prefer a 1/16"-3/32" average opening and base my decision on that. If I'm building in the humid, hot summer, I'll build with a tighter gap because when winter and dry heat come along, that door is going to be smaller and the gap wider. Etc.

He shouldn't have to bevel the cabinet doors if he understands his hardware specs. Its a cabinet door not a house door...

[Jerry Miner]

I like about 1/16" also, but remember to allow the door to swing.


I should have included the following:
1" thick Poplar doors
each approx 12" wide
hinges are on the face not mortised in
being built in the summer in New England = pretty humid time of year.

Yes. That information is critical, because the clearances needed are dependent on the relationship between door thickness, door width, and pivot (hinge) location. Wider, thinner doors need less clearance. Narrower, thicker doors need more. It's a geometry thing.

Here's a sketch of a 1" thick by 12" (net opening) wide door, a surface mounted hinge, and the resulting "swing arc" created. You can see that a 3 degree bevel on the door allows it to swing clear of the adjoining door.

315948

[Jerry Miner]

He shouldn't have to bevel the cabinet doors if he understands his hardware specs. Its a cabinet door not a house door...

I disagree. With a 1" thick, 12" wide door and 1/16" gap, his doors will not have swing clearance without a slight bevel.

[Warren Lake]

you need to bevel them with clearance and thickness you are talking about but you dont need to bevel the whole edge surface, lots of time i leave a certain amount 3/8 , 1/2 flat cant remember and the bevel starts from there, I think it makes a bit better joint when viewed from the front, probably splitting hairs but found that works fine

[David L Morse]

I like numbers so let's put some to this question. Al asked "how much clearance" and then talked about angles, so I'm going to set up the problem as "given a door width of W, thickness T and hinge pivot distance in front of the door d what is the required relief angle on the swinging edge of the door?"

After a bit of trig I came up with [arctan(d/W) +arctan((d+T)W)]/2. (It would be good for someone to check this; my math skills aren't what they used to be :()

Applied to Al's door we have W=12", T=1", and d is assumed to be 1/8". I get an angle of 2.982° (arctan(.125/12)=.598°, arctan(1.125/12)=5.356°, (.598°+5.356°)/2=2.982°) which rounds up to 3°.

Multiplying the tangent of the relief angle by the door thickness gives us the amount by which we reduce the door clearance when opening it if the relief is not cut. (It also gives the scribe measurement if you want to hand plane the relief.) For Al's door that's .052". A dime is .053" thick so with a dime's spacing there is no clearance without a relief cut.

If that cabinet door were only 3/4" thick the angle is 2.145° and the clearance reduction without relief .028". Is .025" clearance enough to skip the bevel?

For Peter's door we have T=1.75", assume W=32" and d=.625". The formula gives 2.682° which again rounds up to 3°. The clearance reduction is .082" leaving .043" without the bevel cut.

[Scott Austin]

I forgo the math and give it about 2-3 strokes with a hand plane, eyeballing the angle.

[julian abram]

+1 for Julian and Kurt. I use dimes.

Pennies will save you money when you lose then in the inch of sawdust on the floor.:D

[Phil Thien]

A rule of thumb I remember - because it's easy. Dime in the summer, nickel in the winter.

It is funny that you say that because my kitchen cabinets are Wood-Mode (which is supposed to be pretty good stuff) with inset doors and I'd say the dime/nickel is nearly spot-on in terms of what they delivered.

The sorta neat thing is that as seasons change, the doors expand/contract in a sort of uneven way. That is, where two doors meet, the gap at the top may open up faster than the gap at the bottom, but over another few days, it evens out.