Stupid, stupid, stupid!

[Michael Weber]

Spent many hours the last few days building my first lower kitchen cabinet beaded face frame. Got it square and the bead detail looks pretty good. Lots of test fitting on the beads. Nail holes and any dings filled with Bondo and the whole thing sanded to 180. Bring it inside for final test fit. Measure things one final time and realize I have made the top drawer openings too small height wise. Now I'm left with the choice of considering this one practice and using it for firewood if it ever gets cold enough here. Or, just saying 3 inch internal depth drawers (instead of the 4 1/2 I intended) is a special feature. Thought I had it all worked out. Stupid, stupid , stupid.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

We've all done it, been there, earned the t-shirt and didn't want it in the first place!

Hang tough Michael!

[Wade Lippman]

I had to burn my first chair. It happens.

Start over or you will always regret it.

[Mike Heidrick]

I have a dovetail tall drawer from a lateral file job that houses my HVLP. We all make mistakes.

[Allan Speers]

Definitely start over.


Someone, somewhere has a sig line that quickly comes to mind: "I cut it three times, but it's still too short!"

[Andrew Hughes]

Sounds like a do over.🚶

[Ben Rivel]

Hey at least you can "redefine" success so you dont have to scrap the whole thing. Could be worse.

[Todd Burch]

You will definitely build your second one faster than the first. Been there, done that. A couple times.

[Michael Weber]

As a 60's school friend was fond of saying "If I had a brain, I'd take it out and play with it". I got hung up on figuring the necessary drawer width and totally missed the required height requirements. Golly, using the Blum under mounts you loose 1 9/16 inches between opening height and internal drawer depth. That's with a 1/4 inch bottom. Bad as that is,it still might have been acceptable except, evidently, i forgot to figure in the thickness of the bead detail when I located the rails. Thanks for letting me know I'm not alone.

[Peter Quinn]

It happens. Sucks. Best advice I ever got, don't back up a mistake with a mistake. If the drawer height is not right on this first cabinet, either deconstruct, repurpose to the shop, or wood stove.....don't let a mistake design your kitchen. This is a good time to talk about story poles. Ever meet somebody that can add long strings of numbers together in their heads? Most of us can't. Some people can see every aspect cabinet construction in their heads from a single elevation sketch...most can't. First step for me on all but the simplest jobs is a story pole. From finished floor to counter every thing gets drawn full scale, plywood indicated, beads, etc. I'll layout drawers too if something is tricky there. Then I step back and ask "does this look right, do these heights make sense". I do this at work because somebody else has done the drawings, me redrawing it in basic elevation for height and length gets it in my head, works out all the transitions, construction details that aren't indicated on plans, etc. When I draw my own plans I may still lay a job out manually to confirm I like the details full scale, to "prove" the concept. A mistake is only tragic if you don't learn from it, so step back, take it in....move on in good company!

[glenn bradley]

Not stupid, over-focused ;-) I'm with Wade. I have learned to accept my mistakes as mistakes and have a do-over. Otherwise I will dwell on it 'ad infinitum'.

[ken masoumi]

I bet you'll never make that same mistake again,just a different one lol. , just redo it and you'll soon forget what you just went through.you wouldn't believe how many half built projects I've repurposed.

[Brian Tymchak]

I refer to those efforts as "prototypes"....

....I make a lot of prototypes.. :rolleyes:

[Ben Rivel]

I refer to those efforts as "prototypes"....

....I make a lot of prototypes.. :rolleyes:
I like it! Sounds technical!

[John Goodin]

One thing woodworking has taught me is patience and the ability to deal with frustration. Now if I could just learn to count.

[Dave Arnett]

I have a "dang it barrel" for that kind of stuff.

[Frederick Skelly]

Man, that's a bummer. I've done it too. Let it sit for a day and work on something else to clear your head. Then make it again, the way you intended it to look. Don't accept 3" drawer height if you wanted them deeper.
Fred

[Andrew Pitonyak]

Glad I never made that mistake :D

Made many others :eek: but not that one.

I once verified the polarity on a connector three times, then dutifully wired it wrong and blew out a $20 device.

Most recently, I simply cut boards to the wrong length for a drawer. You know something is wrong when you have three different lengths for your doors. Off hand, I think that I took my two "longer" boards, cut them to be the shorter ones then I walked away without cutting the longer ones, but the two remaining where not long enough to be the longer boards. I was distracted when my family came home and decided to all come down and greet me.

The worst, I did not make sure that my miter gage was square and I managed to do hand cut dovetails in four largish boards. Everything fit great, but since they were not square, the final product was very much perpendicular anywhere after assembly. Hand cut dovetails in hard wood is not a fast process for me. Well, ok, it is significantly faster than it was some years back, but still, I lost a couple of evenings and then I still had to mill new wood and start over.

[Wayne Jolly]

The top drawers in my kitchen are only 3 1/2" deep and I complain about that constantly. What's worse, so does my wife. So while I agree that a 3" drawer depth is kinda shallow, I would also have to take a good look and see what the impact will be on the other drawers if you increase this one from 3" to 4 1/2". It just MIGHT be that you are more OK with this drawer being too shallow than changing the drawers below.

Wayne

[John TenEyck]

What Peter said about story sticks. If you force yourself to make one you won't make that kind of mistake again - ever. I had a kitchen remodel job where I used the existing cabinet boxes but made new drawers, and drawer fronts and doors with a new overlay. I measured everything and drew it up in SketchUp, but for the life of me I could not resolve the exact dimensions of the doors in the 45 deg corner. I finally drew a plan view full size and the answers were obvious.

John

[Bill McNiel]

"mistakes" are how we learn.

[Jeff Duncan]

Golly, using the Blum under mounts you loose 1 9/16 inches between opening height and internal drawer depth. That's with a 1/4 inch bottom.

Hmmmm….I think you need to go back and re-check your math. If you really lost 1-9/16" from the bottom of the opening to the top of the drawer bottom you've done something wrong. For a 1/4" bottom it should be about 3/4" or so. The slides need about 1/2" from the bottom of the opening and the drawer bottom sits directly on top of these. Hence, 1/2" for slides + 1/4" for drawer bottom = 3/4". You don't lose anything on the top outside of clearance for the drawer box to move without rubbing.

As far as do-overs that's just part of the process. I rarely get through a large project, like a kitchen for instance, without at least 1 frame do-over. Not a big deal, just knock another one out and move forward;)

good luck,
JeffD

[Jerry Olexa]

We all make mistakes regardless of our skill levels...No problem..Move on....next one will be better

[Michael Weber]

Hmmmm….I think you need to go back and re-check your math. If you really lost 1-9/16" from the bottom of the opening to the top of the drawer bottom you've done something wrong. For a 1/4" bottom it should be about 3/4" or so. The slides need about 1/2" from the bottom of the opening and the drawer bottom sits directly on top of these. Hence, 1/2" for slides + 1/4" for drawer bottom = 3/4". You don't lose anything on the top outside of clearance for the drawer box to move without rubbing.

As far as do-overs that's just part of the process. I rarely get through a large project, like a kitchen for instance, without at least 1 frame do-over. Not a big deal, just knock another one out and move forward;)

good luck,
JeffD
Sorry, that was a typo. I meant to type 1 5/16. I arrived at that by taking the bottom clearance shown on the Blum instructions of 9/16 plus the 1/2 for the bottom inset plus the bottom thickness. So if my drawer opening is now 5 7/8 high, at that dimension leaving 1/16 top clearance I should get 4 1/2 inch inside drawer depth. (5 7/8- 9/16- 1/2- 1/4- 1/16). If that isn't right please someone tell me before I build my drawers. Maybe I'm confused by the Blum instructions.