My (Dutch) tool chest is on the floor. This is not very good for getting things out of the bottom storage compartment. As that bottom compartment is full of metal planes... almost too heavy to lift for me to get it up on the sawbenches for a more comfortable reach. Also, then I find I need the sawbenches for... sawing.
The top compartment is fine to access from the floor.
2020-09-11 16.59.40.jpg
I see Mr. Schwarz built a thematically similar base cabinet for his. However, my needs are different, and I want to have a bank of drawers or compartments. (Maybe I would still do the fall front?)
https://www.popularwoodworking.com/w...-storage-unit/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_c...ature=emb_logo (1:10 sec into the video)
I dug out a set of rolling tool cabinet plans from Veritas I bought ages ago. Other than being made of wood, it was essentially redundant to my Craftsman metal rolling tool cabinet, so the plans laid dormant. Now I fished them out for another look. (I now have too many hand tools, and I want them all to be with the Dutch tool chest). I've decided I want to have many 1-3/4" high drawers, as the deeper drawers on my Craftsman (2-1/2" and bigger) are wasteful of space. To get more tools in, I have to stack them which I don't really like doing. Modifying the Vertias plan to have more shallower drawers is no big deal...
https://www.leevalley.com/en-us/shop...n?item=05L1701
...but the Veritas plan makes very heavy use of plywood sheets. I don't want to use plywood, so kind of back to the drawing board if I'm going to do something with solid wood only. The Schwarz bottom cabinet is built like the dutch tool chest with side/top panel grain parallel, but back is opposite (but nailed in place tongue and groove smaller boards as the back to keep things from splitting. But the Schwarz one doesn't have a carcase for drawers... the rails would have to have grain running vertically, as are the case sides so... wondering if that should be fine from a wood movement perspective, right? (Seems obvious it should be OK, but I'm in new design territory here. In the past, I'd have just used plywood).
I'd like the drawers to be pretty gapless so as to minimize dust & moisture entry. The fall front 'a la Schwarz could accomplish this however.
A drawer bank behind a fall front could look like one here (about halfway down, by Lance Shields): https://www.popularwoodworking.com/w...hests-readers/
Any suggestions/tips? Anyone have links to plans for solid wood tool cabinets you've bookmarked for something like this application? I'm not married to the look & feel of the Dutch chest, but I kind of like things to match... so maybe. Regardless I'll paint it blue!