Creative design ideas to fix newbie mistake

[Larry Browning]

Well my inexperience as a cabinet maker really came to the surface this weekend. I am reworking an old give-me cabinet for use in the shop. One of the things I am doing is adding slide out drawer/shelves to each of the 3 door bays to hold all my portable power tools. So I measured and figured and made the shelf boxes just the right size, complete with dovetailed joints. I bought full extension slides and got them installed and working great! Then I installed the doors. This is when I discovered that the shelves wouldn't clear the doors unless they was opened all the way. Now this is not really a problem except for the door bay which is right next to corner of the shop. The door cannot open all the way due to it hitting the wall.
What to do? What to do? I guess I could rebuild the pull out drawer/shelf to be about an inch narrower, but I really don't want to have to redo the dovetails. I could move the cabinet down so that the door will open, but I would then have to move the sander down etc.. etc..

I was thinking that since I haven't actually made the doors for this bay yet, I could make three doors instead of 2. The 2 doors that swing open like regular doors would be about 3-4 inches shorter at the bottom and a 3rd door would fill the space and be hinged on the bottom of the cabinet This door would swing down which would allow the drawer to slide out. Is this just another one of my really lame ideas, or will this work? Also, do you have any other ideas to solve my problem?

Thanks

[Jim Becker]

LOL! I did the same thing on my kitchen island project a few years ago...can't open the internal drawers and trays without the doors being fully open. Silly Me. Maybe articulating the door would give you the opening you need...kinda a bi-fold for that particular offending door?

[Mark Singer]

There are many hinges that pivot outside of the normal center....knife hinges , Euro Hinges etc.....check Lee Valley hardware and others. You can also extend the stile to swing outside

[Ted Shrader]

Larry -

Can you have the doors swing the other direction?

What if you left the pulls off and just cut a finger recess in the door frame?

Ted

[Larry Browning]

Ted,
I do not understand either one of your ideas.

Larry -

Can you have the doors swing the other direction?
Do you mean swing Inward? No, you don't mean that. Maybe just one door that swings away from the wall?

What if you left the pulls off and just cut a finger recess in the door frame?
The pulls are not the problem. What is a finger recess??? and how would that help? It's the door that in the way.

I'm soooo confused!!!!

Ted

[Larry Browning]

There are many hinges that pivot outside of the normal center....knife hinges , Euro Hinges etc.....check Lee Valley hardware and others. You can also extend the stile to swing outside
Mark,
The old cabinet used piano hinges, which I am hoping to reuse. I am trying to keep costs to a minimum.
However, if I removed the stile all together and had the door hinge on the side of the cabinet, I would only need to set the cabinet away from the wall about an inch or so. Hmmm.

[Steve Clardy]

I think I know what yer talking about, as I've done that before.:rolleyes: :)

Pics would help

[Larry Browning]

Steve,
I don't have any pics right now, but if I can get the camera away from SWMBO I will try tonight. No promises though.

[Christopher Stahl]

Larry,
Instead of having the last door on hinges, attach it to the bottom drawer and allow it to slide out. It should fit perfectly and you'll have access to all the drawers when it's pulled out. It will basically be a face to the bottom drawer.

chris

[Michael Ballent]

Doors, who need stinkin' doors, remove them bad boys and there you are... all done, time for a cold one :D Why would you want to hide all that work you did inside the cabinet. You were looking for creative and easy ;)

[Larry Browning]

Chris and Michael,
I like both of your ideas. However I think I like Chris's better. I am going to look at maybe removing the stile that is right next to the wall and attaching the door to the side of the cabinet.
However this may all have to wait until Tuesday evening, as I have just been informed that I have other plans for tonight that do not involve shop time:(

[Chris Dodge]

Just so you know you are not alone, I made the same mistake once too. I made some drawers for a cabinet that would be hidden by a door, calculated how much room I was going to have to leave so that the drawers would clear the cabinet door hinges and calculated a half inch for the drawer runners. The only problem was, I needed a half inch on each side of the drawer for the drawer runners. Of course I did not discover this until I had completely built the drawers. I had to tear the drawers apart and rebuild them a half inch narrower.

[Andy Hoyt]

Been there too.

I ripped the appropriate amount of door/drawer discrepancy out of the middle of the drawer. Biscuited drawer back together. Added a shim of that same dimension between the cabinet side and the drawer slide. Worked like a charm and no one was the wiser, except now for you folks.