Ideas for affordable cabinet cases?

[Derek Larson]

OK folks,

I have made a few simple cabinets and now I am ready to try and make some for a small kitchen. My friend owns an apartment and needs some new cabinets and I pitched the idea to him to let me try to make them, however he wants them as affordable as possible (typical landlord). So I was looking around in some of the big home improvement stores (lowes and HD) and I noticed almost all there cabinets were made of 1/2" particle board or mdf and it looked like it just had a hard wood veneer. So my question is three fold
1.) are those cases in fact 1/2" mdf with a veneer?
2.) if so is this a good option for my friends project ? or
3.) should I use a 1/2" cabinet grade grade plywood vs 3/4" (is there much of a savings)?

Thank you

[Lee Koepke]

I am not an expert or a cabinet maker, but CHEAP and HANDMADE arent generally the same thing.

Its hard to beat some of the prices if thats what the driving factor is. If you want the chance to build experience, thats a different story ....

[Jim Becker]

I've started doing uppers with 1/2" veneer core plywood to lower the cost (and hanging weight), but prefer 3/4" (18mm) material for the lower casework, especially since I construct them with pocket screws. For the uppers, I also do face frames and that helps keep the lighter boxes nice and stiff. I would not use particle board, but some budget mass-produced cabinets are made with it...as thin as 3/8", even. I have a friend who does high-end cabinet work and builds with MDF core all the time. Heavy, but absolutely consistent material in thickness and quality.

[Derek Larson]

I should have clarified this, I am not doing this for any type of profit (maybe beer). I would be doing it for experience only and he would be buying the materials. But I still would like to keep the cost as low as possible, so are those viable options. Now I have read elsewhere that some people say 1/2" plywood cases are more than sufficient so I might be leaning towards that unless the mdf method is OK.

[Derek Larson]

Thanks Jim, any reason you are not using the 1/2" veneer cores on the bottoms?

[Jim Becker]

Thanks Jim, any reason you are not using the 1/2" veneer cores on the bottoms?

I'm more comfortable with the heavier 18mm BB ply for the lowers...a personal choice and also easier to use my preferred assembly method as stated. But 1/2" material can be used if you engineer the boxes well to keep them stiff.

[Chris Sedore]

Some may cringe at the suggestion, but I've seen some cabinets built with BC plywood (with 1/4 oak veneer ply overlay on exposed sides). With a dark stain on the interior (B side in, of course), they didn't look bad at all. Exterior was top notch (oak face frames, oak RP doors, etc).

[Joe Chritz]

It is unlikely you will beat the price of melamine for cabinet boxes. The white interior is preferred by some people. I priced out sourcing maple looking veneer but it was over $15 a sheet more than white last time I tried to get any here.

I only use 3/4 material since I assemble cabinets with zip'r style screws through the sides. When I used dados I used only 1/2 material and the savings in weight was nice. The savings in material was minimal.

Roo glue, zip's screws and 1/4 skins for the exposed sides and you are GTG.

Joe

[Josiah Bartlett]

How bad are the cabinets that are there? It may be less expensive to just build new face frames and doors and leave the carcasses there. You will get most of the experience you want (the carcase is the easy/boring part), and you will be saving a lot of dough by recycling material.

All my garage cabinets are homemade out of 3/4" sheet melamine from Home Depot/Lowes. They have held up well in an unheated garage and I have a 100 pound cast iron transmission sitting on one of the shelves. I used the pre-drilled adjustable shelf material for the sides, build face frames, and used 1/2" CDX plywood for the back. Pocket screws and rabbits work pretty good.

[Hans Braul]

Check out CABPARTS - they make 3/4" high quality boxes that they ship to you in pieces - you assemble on site. I can't imagine you will make them any better or any cheaper, and it will be a lot faster. Download their catalogue. I used them for my kitchen and was very impressed.

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=76936

Hans

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I should have clarified this, I am not doing this for any type of profit

I suggest that you re-think this.

Long after your friend is gone that LL will be making money from your hard work and loving labor.

[Joe Chritz]

You should be able to make enough cash to buy a new tool for the shop. Generally something fairly large if you have a decent size kitchen to do.

Materials is almost always the lowest cost on a full kitchen, even using good hinges and runners.

Joe

[scottj owen]

I build all my cheaper boxes out of 3/4 inch melamine , you can get quite a few solid colors and different types of woodgrain finishes. The companies that make really cheap boxes use 5/8 material with a 1/8 inch back around here. the fasten all there boxes with dowels. My concern with 1/2 would be the joints, after you screw it or dowel it , there can't be much material left to give it strength. Also with the european style hinges you have to make sure you don't drill to deep. Obviously guys are using it and having success so go with it.

[Roland Chung]

I've also used Cab Parts and was very happy with their price, quality and customer service. It does kind of run counter with what we do and talk about on this forum.

If you really plan to go ahead and do this as a freebie for your friend, then consider having him cough up a little extra dough in materials in a way that would cut down the amount of work that you will need to do. He may not have a lot of money, but he apparently can afford new kitchen cabinets. Anyway, I understand that any woodworker salivates at the chance to build cabinets with someone else picking up the tab for materials.

What I meant by spending a little extra on materials to cut down on labor would be purchasing the pre-drilled and pre-edgebanded 3/4" (or 5/8") melamine from HD. I have been able to find this in a little better quality from a local material yard. It comes in 24", 15.5" and 11.75". You can crosscut the parts and put together Euro style cabinets with sharp point screws or pocket screws. Then hang the boxes and order doors from one of the custom door companies. There is a thread started by someone that is titled something like "Euro cabinets 101" that you should read. Try a search of this forum or with your browser's search engine to find it.