Jewelry Box ... drawer slide method question

[John M Snyder]

Hi guys - it's been 6 years since I was here last. Went through some life changes and fortunately I'm now able to get back into woodworking again. I was a neanderthol, but fortunately, kept all my tools and am anxious to get sawdust in my hair again.

Which brings me to a design question thats driving me nuts - I'm going to build a dovetailed "jewelry" box with 3 drawers and a top compartment (similar to the picture below) - will actually be used to organize my pocket knife collection. My question is I'm really struggling to find the best way to mount the drawers - it's much more difficult without horizontal drawer separators ( how to mount a drawer stop is especially puzzling without horizontal drawer separators). I've searched every drawer construction video on youtube and am striking out. If anybody can point me in the right direction on how I should approach this kind of drawer mounting, I would really appreciate it, thank you.

John

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[william watts]

Looking close at the picture there are groves visible in the drawer sides. The drawers slide on runners attached to the box sides. The runners will be cross grain so should be joined to allow for movement.

[Andrew Pitonyak]

I agree with Bill that there are runners milled into the drawer slides. Looks to me like they are not cross grained.. The sides have horizontal direction, not up and down. Same for the drawer sides and I would expect the runners as well. The dado in the drawer side looks very thin to me.

I have done drawers like this, but never as inset drawers. If you do not use inset drawers, then you can make the drawer sides "not as tall" as the front, which then means that you do not need to cut a dado in the side. I have done both.

[Wayne Lomman]

Grooves in the drawer sides. The side of the box and the runner have the grain in the same direction so no issues with cracking from that source. Its a good project. Cheers

[Lee Schierer]

Here's what I did for a jewelry box I made for my wife. Note that the top drawer is a fake as the lid lifts up.
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There are dados in the drawer sides that fit on the rails you see in each opening. The ends of the separators and runners are set in shallow dovetails. Since the drawers are small I didn't worry about drawer stops. Just for scale, the whole cabinet is about 16" tall.

[Marty Schlosser]

I'm with Lee (post #5) on this. I would consider using UHMW material (http://www.leevalley.com/en/hardware/page.aspx?p=32045&cat=3,43576,32045) for the slides as this material is quite slick and very durable. When you install the plastic slides, ensure you elongate the screw holes to accommodate expansion of the wooden cabinet sides.

Hope this helps.

[Prashun Patel]

You have two options:

1) Side mounted runners, which support the drawers. Ideally, the runner doesn't support the weight of the drawer, but on a small jewelry box it doesn't make a big difference.
2) Add vertical dividers and do false, overlaid fronts to hide the dividers.

The dividers will allow you to add stops, but would sacrifice storage space.

I made a similar box like this with side runners. I made that without stops. It's actually better, because the whole thing can be taken out for convenience.

[John M Snyder]

Thanks everybody - really appreciate the replies !