Dresser out of melamine?

[Justin Foley]

My wife would like me to make a dresser that would match our daughter's Ikea desk. I assume this means making it from melamine or laminate wood. Are there any considerations I need to worry about before looking for plans or designing one? I've never really built actual furniture from the stuff.

[Joe Hendershott]

Around here the lumber store sells birch ply and MDF with melamine on one side so at least you do not have to use it on a pressed substrate like the stuff you buy at the big box stores. I think the main difference you will find is that it likes to chip so you would want a nice melamine blade to work with.

[glenn bradley]

Some people make their living with it and that's great. If making something for my home and melamine was required, I would just buy the matching dresser from Ikea. This is because I get no real enjoyment out of working with sheet goods but, that's me. If you're bound and determined, get the right blade, use the best material you can and you might want some Roo glue around just in case. I think if you add it all up including the hardware (minifix fittings or confirmat bit and screws/caps), buying one will start to look pretty good. If you plan to do more melamine pieces in the future, forge ahead

[Robert Engel]

It will all depend on the design, but construction is pretty much cabinet techniques. A simple desk could just be two drawer boxes covered with a top and a pencil drawer.

I've got a fair bit of experience with melamine, so here are my suggestions:

Buy a double sided melamine blade. The Freud is a good one. Even if you won't be using melamine again, it will make an excellent plywood blade. A track saw can be used to break it down rough.

Source your melamine from a hardwood or cabinet supply. The big box stuff is pretty inferior.

You'll need to learn how to edge band and get some edge banding tools.

Fastening methods -- I almost always butt screw. Although other screws will work, I perfer the Confirmat screws because they don't split the edges. They make caps to cover the screws which sound cheesy but may be perfectly acceptable if your matching Ikea.

Other alternatives would include pocket screws & biscuits or Dominoes.

Last but not least, before you do it, I would check the Ikea prices. It may not be worth your time and expense of buying blades and tools.

[Art Mann]

All the Melamine I have ever seen has either a MDF or particle board substrate. These materials can not be reliably assembled using normal joinery techniques. They will chip out or crumble. You need to use the special fasteners and joinery techniques developed for this type of material.

[Jamie Buxton]

A couple times I’ve priced out the materials to build an IKEA design. It always turns out that IKEA will sell me the complete furniture for less than my cost of materials.

[Justin Foley]

Awesome. Thanks for the input! It may just be worth keeping my sanity (and money!) by buying one instead of building.

[Curt Harms]

I built a couple book shelves out of borg melamine to match existing. I removed the melamine coating where there were joints - I didn't know about melamine glue at the time - and glued with titebond. Coarse thread drywall screws, I countersunk and filled the screw holes. Yeah you can see the screw holes but they're not that obvious and there may be better choices in fillers or use a cap. Certainly not heirloom furniture and yeah, Ikea may well be better and cheaper.

[Robert Engel]

I removed the melamine coating where there were joints - I didn't know about melamine glue at the time - and glued with titebond.

Curt,

Future reference, you don't need to do this. Just screws are enough. Besides, gluing PB is not doing much.

IMO Confirmat screws work better. Also, there are caps that fit in the heads to hide them. Often I will use biscuits or Dominoes for alignment aide.

In the future, source your melamine from a commercial supplier the PB in the stuff at HD is pretty poor quality.

Recently, my wife decided to redo my son's room. Without asking me, (guess why? LOL) she bought a bunch of stuff from Ikea. Have to say, I was pretty impressed with the fit and finish, and the price.

So we want to redo our closet system and I'm going to purchase it and build a few addons rather than the whole thing.

[Edwin Santos]

Curt,

Recently, my wife decided to redo my son's room. Without asking me, (guess why? LOL) she bought a bunch of stuff from Ikea. Have to say, I was pretty impressed with the fit and finish, and the price.

So we want to redo our closet system and I'm going to purchase it and build a few addons rather than the whole thing.

I've saved myself quite a bit of money and brain damage by buying IKEA components (boxes) and using them as the bones of built-in projects where I made and added drawers, fronts, moldings, connecting shelves, LED lighting. The IKEA stuff is always dead square and the line boring is a big time saver by itself. I think they have an ingenious rail system for wall mounting for uppers and lowers too.

[John Blazy]

It will all depend on the design, but construction is pretty much cabinet techniques. A simple desk could just be two drawer boxes covered with a top and a pencil drawer.

I've got a fair bit of experience with melamine, so here are my suggestions:

Buy a double sided melamine blade. The Freud is a good one. Even if you won't be using melamine again, it will make an excellent plywood blade. A track saw can be used to break it down rough.

Source your melamine from a hardwood or cabinet supply. The big box stuff is pretty inferior.

You'll need to learn how to edge band and get some edge banding tools.

Fastening methods -- I almost always butt screw. Although other screws will work, I perfer the Confirmat screws because they don't split the edges. They make caps to cover the screws which sound cheesy but may be perfectly acceptable if your matching Ikea.

Other alternatives would include pocket screws & biscuits or Dominoes.

Last but not least, before you do it, I would check the Ikea prices. It may not be worth your time and expense of buying blades and tools.

Robert is right on. I used to be pro cabinetmaker and used tons of melamine, and still do in my shop and at home - very convenient material - no painting needed, high chemical resistant finish. The greatest secret few know is that PL Premium polyurethane construction adhesive literally welds to the melamine surface. So much so that I did right angle "T" shaped test joint samples comparing simple butt joint glued with PL compared to screws, dado, dowel and biscuit joints, then did one extra sample of butt joint with added 3/4 x 3/4 cleat to underside (like inside tow kick or under shelf span - easy during box assembly). Then I did break tests recording threshold weight limit at breakpoint over a scale in a hydraulic press. Butt joint with PL actually held same weight same as Dado (90 lbs), and those two joints beat biscuits, screws and dowels. Realized that the melamine face skin is an important part of its structural strength, so when you mill through it (dado, biscuits, dowels, etc) you weaken it. ALL, and I mean ALL PL butt joints ripped the melamine face right out of the PB core, taking with it about 1/8" of PB - never joint failure (substrate failure in every instance). The sample with the cleat PL'd to underside held to 132 lbs before failure.

So as a result, I built all my cabinetry (that called for the $ saving melamine interiors vs veneer ply) with PL butt joints with cleats pinned together with finish nailer only, no screws, no clamping (two pin nails hold til glue sets). The PL expands to fill joint. Super easy to carve off squeezeout - even though it welds to surface - it carves off with chisel leaving invisible residue.

Kitchens still hold together to this day, even double oven cabinets in which the butt shelves holding the ovens had 2" wide cleats pinned underneath. Kitchen below had melamine interiors to save $ for the client

Ludgin kitchen.jpg

[Mel Fulks]

Love those cabinets ,John. And you can't beat a nice vertical design. Sadly no one will use cabinets that once held
someone else's canned soup, so reliable adhesive instead of joints is a great idea.