Shop Drawers

[Matt Day]

I'm building some shop drawers for my cabinets I built last year, and was wondering about the height of the sides/front/back. Let's say I want to have 10" clear from the bottom of the drawer to the top of the drawer above it. The sides/front/back don't need to be this height right? Would 5" suffice? Is there any kind of standard here?

The drawer construction will be tongue and dado joint, with a dadoed 1/4" bottom. I think for now I'm just going to leave any kind of front off for now, but might put on some MDF fronts at some point to keep out dust.

[Dave Houseal]

I made my front/sides/back all the same height, and I did not make them the full height. My 4" drawers had 3" sides, 6" drawers had 4" sides and my 10" drawers had 6" sides.

these are just numbers I came up with. I think the big question is how will you use them. The boxes really just need to be tall enough to keep things from falling out. If you have a drawer that is going to hold nothing but parts bins, boxes of screws or cans of finish, a 2 or 3" side on your 10" drawer could be fine. If its a junk drawer it might make sense to have 8" sides.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Do you pack stuff in drawers, closets and freezers so they erupt every time you open them - like my wife does?
If so, then go full height...

[Todd Burch]

Interesting thread.

I always make my drawers about an inch shorter in height than the opening, which, actually works out well for my memory, since the width has to be 1" narrower than the opening when using slides.

Most of the time, I too make all 4 sides the same height.

Todd

[Matt Day]

Sorry my original post wasn't clear, but I'll have all 4 sides the same height for sure. Just wondering how big they should be in relation to the available clearance. Sounds like it's subjective, which is what I thought.

[Bernie LeBlanc]

You got it - it's subjective and decided by what are you making the drawers for? I usually make mine about an inch clearance, but I'm building a dresser for a grand daughter and I've built a web system for each drawer to slide on and installing a center guide for the drawers to slide on (like a mono rail). Because she's 6 years old, I'm making these about 1/4 shorter then the openings. Kids like to stuff their drawers full, to the max.