What not to do when building kitchen cabinets

[Travis Porter]

Trying to remodel my kitchen, and I am following the school of hard knocks like I always do.... Things I should know better:

Do not use dull shaper cutters....
375837375838


Do not stack doors on the floor where they can be stepped on....

375834

Don't underestimate how much wood you are going to have to glue up for panels as you really don't have as many wide boards as you thought you did.
375839


Don't under estimate how much waste you are going to have if you are trying to minimize sapwood.

375840

[George Bokros]

Been there done that except for the shaper cutter issue since I do not have one.

[Bill Dufour]

Before starting clean out the trash then do not throw away any scrap until you know you have no need of little pieces with matching grain to patch mistakes.

[Jerry Miner]

Travis, I feel your pain. Learning the "hard way" is often the best way. I'll bet it will be a while before you forget those lessons!

[Andrew Seemann]

I'll add:

Do not assume the floor where it is going is remotely level or the wall plumb.

Do not forget to account for the thickness of the lip on the countertop. That was a long string of 4 letter words and "creative" problem solving.

Do not assume the next batch of #1 Common cherry will be as great as the last one that you raided every good board out of.

I don't have pictures because they are from my old house.

For most of us, "wisdom" is mostly a matter of already having made enough stupid mistakes to have finally started to learn from some of them, or in my case, hopefully remember them ahead of time:)

[Ron Citerone]

It's all part of growing up. Stuff like that used to tick me off.....................now I just remind myself that I am still learning no matter how long I've been doing this stuff!

[Jim Becker]

My current favorite that I'm living since 2003 and about to rectify...don't underestimate how much depth upper cabinets should have in a modern kitchen. I made the mistake of "duplicating" the old-school cabinets that were trashed from a sizing perspective and it's been frustrating. Once I'm done with the two commissions I am working on, I'll be building all new upper cabinets. Same footprint, but a few more inches of depth. It's time. :)

[Bruce Wrenn]

My current favorite that I'm living since 2003 and about to rectify...don't underestimate how much depth upper cabinets should have in a modern kitchen. I made the mistake of "duplicating" the old-school cabinets that were trashed from a sizing perspective and it's been frustrating. Once I'm done with the two commissions I am working on, I'll be building all new upper cabinets. Same footprint, but a few more inches of depth. It's time. :)It's kinda hard to fit 12" dinner plates into a cabinet that is 12" deep overall. We always ask customer to get their finest or largest dinner plates, and measure them. It's a heck of a lot easier to adjust a drawing than rebuild a box. Many years ago, Norm addressed this on a kitchen remodel on TOH. Walls were 14" deep, and bases were 26" deep.

[Victor Robinson]

Here's another that I kick myself over everyday:

Don't forget counter-to-upper height includes any molding you might apply under the upper cabs! We can't easily slide our most used appliance (Vitamix) under the uppers thanks to the molding hanging down. Have to tilt it back, slide, stand it up. Just annoying!

[Rich Engelhardt]

LOL!
You think it's been fun and games now, wait till you get to the finishing part!

:D :D :D

[Ron Kurzius]

Make the draws in the base cabs 5+ inches. Stock cabs all seem to be 3 1/2.

[Jim Becker]

It's kinda hard to fit 12" dinner plates into a cabinet that is 12" deep overall. We always ask customer to get their finest or largest dinner plates, and measure them. It's a heck of a lot easier to adjust a drawing than rebuild a box. Many years ago, Norm addressed this on a kitchen remodel on TOH. Walls were 14" deep, and bases were 26" deep.
Exactly the mistake I made "back then". The new uppers will have about 14" usable depth inside. :)
-----

One other tip...favor drawers over doors in the base cabinets. Drawers are a heck of a lot easier to use. I'm so glad I made that decision back when I renovated our kitchen.

[John Gornall]

New fridge is deep so made the base cabinets 30" deep and the uppers 18" deep with 31" deep counters on that side of the kitchen - fridge doesn't stick out and really like the deep cabinets and counter

[Osvaldo Cristo]

LOL!
You think it's been fun and games now, wait till you get to the finishing part!

:D :D :D

Also for me the worst part of the game is the finishing... PITA!

[Chris Hachet]

I built the boxes a few with fixed shelves and then added face frames and doors. Hung boxes and then added face frames. Wife had preloaded cabinets before I put the face frames on. Had a row of glass jars that would not come out because of the face frame...we both laughed at that one.

[Jerry Miner]

I built the boxes a few with fixed shelves and then added face frames and doors. Hung boxes and then added face frames. Wife had preloaded cabinets before I put the face frames on. Had a row of glass jars that would not come out because of the face frame...we both laughed at that one.

LOL. Are the jars still there?

[Martin Wasner]

This thread reminds me of one of my favorite quotes: "the amateur practices until he gets it right, the professional practices until he can't get it wrong."



One other tip...favor drawers over doors in the base cabinets. Drawers are a heck of a lot easier to use.

My jobs have very few doors in base cabinets.

Roll out trays are ridiculous. Opening a door to pull out a drawer? Crazy talk. People still want that madness though.

[Jim Becker]

My jobs have very few doors in base cabinets.

Roll out trays are ridiculous. Opening a door to pull out a drawer? Crazy talk. People still want that madness though.

Yea, I see many folks going for the door thing on base cabinets and don't get it. I only used doors in the places that I really had to (under the sink, area where sheet pans, etc., are stored) and am very glad I did. The island, which was the prototype for the cabinetry, does have a couple doors and if I decide to replace it, things will change in favor of drawers on that, too.

[Victor Robinson]

My jobs have very few doors in base cabinets.

Roll out trays are ridiculous. Opening a door to pull out a drawer? Crazy talk. People still want that madness though.

I always thought people tended to favor doors over drawers on the bottom to cut costs.

And older drawer slides didn't fare as well carrying the heavy loads people typically put into base cabs - pots and pans, etc. Now that you can soft-close a drawer carrying a hundred pounds of cast iron, it's a lot more desirable.

As for the roll-out drawers, I guess folks are just used to the visual of doors on the bottom. I doubt they're much cheaper than full drawers?

[Jim Dwight]

When we redid our kitchen I tried talking my wife into drawers in the bottom cabinets but she insisted on one drawer plus a door for almost all of them. I still do not know why. I guess she just likes the look of doors. At least in the cabinets we used, drawers definitely cost more. She hasn't asked for roll out shelves in these cabinets, at least not yet.

[Chris Hachet]

I had to break them to get them out....and then utilize smaller jars.

[Travis Porter]

This thread reminds me of one of my favorite quotes: "the amateur practices until he gets it right, the professional practices until he can't get it wrong."


At what point were you comfortable in calling yourself a pro, and I by no means question that you are a pro as that is a given. How many sets of cabs did you build or how many months/years did it take before you reached that level of confidence and know how to be comfortable with doing it and not second guess yourself on every little thing?

I ask as This will be 4th kitchen I have built. It has been quite a number of years since my last one. I had forgotten how many little things you have to consider and allow for... toe kick dimensions, stile and rail widths, back attachment, drawer slide allowances, allowances at the top of uppers for crown, etc,etc.

[Martin Wasner]

A couple years I suppose. I went from helper to running jobs in about six months at the first cabinet shop I worked at. I wasn't really refined at it until about a year into working at the next shop. Two(ish) years.

I can do basic kitchen cabinetry with almost zero thought, after almost 20 years of woodworking the numbers and math are memorized so there's not much for figuring on that normal stuff. I'm good at basic math and am really good at spatial analogy stuff. I also blame playing with Legos too much as a kid for making me cut out for this work. I wish I were cut it to be a lottery winner.

[fRED mCnEILL]

We I redid our kitchen 15 years ago one of our research projects was to go to a "renovation" display home.My wife asked the owner how she liked ALL drawers in base cabinets. I'll never forget her response. She said to my wife" honey, Im too old to get down on my hands and knees to find something is the back of the cupboard" We put in ALL drawers. Another thing we did was to pull our 24" lower cabinets(standard construction size to maximize plywood sheet usage) out 6" from the wall to give us a 25% bigger counter top. Also gave a nice area to put in a knife rack with blades extending down from counter top.Oh, and toe kick drawers are handy as well.

[Vince Shriver]

I built the boxes a few with fixed shelves and then added face frames and doors. Hung boxes and then added face frames. Wife had preloaded cabinets before I put the face frames on. Had a row of glass jars that would not come out because of the face frame...we both laughed at that one.

Chris, your post is a CLASSIC; thanks for a good chuckle.

[Justin Ludwig]

Roll out trays are ridiculous. Opening a door to pull out a drawer? Crazy talk. People still want that madness though. And then get upset when the drawer or hardware scratches the inside of the door.

[Martin Wasner]

And then get upset when the drawer or hardware scratches the inside of the door.

Yep, though using undermount slides has helped greatly with that.

[Peter Kelly]

And then get upset when the drawer or hardware scratches the inside of the door.https://i.imgur.com/xD1YE7k.png

https://www.grassusa.com/downloads/zargen/mobile/index.html#p=21

[Travis Porter]

I LOVE ME SOME LEGOS!!!! I have a Millenium Falcon and a Star Destroyer. One day when I grow up I want a Super Star Destroyer...

I digress....

Two years from entry level to pro. Impressive.

[Martin Wasner]

Two years from entry level to pro. Impressive.

Not when you're motivated. As a teenager I had beer and motorcycles to purchase.



Some people are just good at things. Like throwing a ball, or cutting open someone's head and removing a tumor, or acting, or flying airplanes. Things that make money.
I'm blessed with the ability to watch pieces of wood go through machines then putting those pieces together sometime after they come out the other side.
:D...:)...:o...:(.....

[Martin Wasner]

As for the roll-out drawers, I guess folks are just used to the visual of doors on the bottom. I doubt they're much cheaper than full drawers?

Using inset, and a flat paneled front(s) as an example.

two drawers from me costs $333.90

one door and two roll out trays costs $257.25