Thread: Shop cabinets, What is the best way to build them? Plans? Ideas? What works/doesn't?

Ok. I am a little stuck and I could really use some help.

I have a 3rd car bay in my garage that I use as a shop. I have over the last few years I have realized that I am doing this wrong as far as it goes. I have limited "floor" space and, while not much of a revelation, I have come to realize that 8 shelves over the same floor space gives you 8x as much storage. Kind of a leap I know but there you go.

So I have started looking at what I can do to get lots more storage. I have gone thru lots and lots of options as I have looked at the best way to go about this. Cost is an issue but so is wanting to build out my shop thru my own hands.


The first option I looked at was building them myself. But I have spent almost all of my time turning wood so I have a very limited understanding of how to build them.

The second option I looked at was Big Box cabinets. I was unimpressed. They seem flimsy and are't what I want. I found limited options on drawers and shelves and what not.

The third option I looked at was Ikea. I know I know, Ikea is well Ikea. But it had lots more options, mix and match to get as many drawers as you want etc... But even still it was largely still limited. And the cost was still high.

Which took me back around to building my own. The more I think about it the more I would like to do so. But I don't know how... So I started reading up on how to do so. Oddly enough here on the creek I found lots of posts showing pics of what people have built. But nothing that really talks about how to build them. So either it is so simple everyone assumes it is something everyone knows or ??? I dunno.

So I guess the question I have is what is the best way to go about it? I have a decent Tablesaw. I have a Ridgid granite topped saw. I tried to break down a sheet of plywood on it and clearly I don't have enough infeed and outfeed support. It worked but it was... scary. I need a better way to do it. I have been thinking about either making a guide for a circular saw or getting a track saw. It just seems better to move the saw over the wood than to move the wood over saw in this case. Once it is knocked down it seems like it will be easier to manipulate all around.

Over all I have been thinking melamine and pocket hole joinery. Shelves on the upper cabinets and drawers in the lower cabinets.

So if anyone has any suggestions on tools? Processes? Designs? What is the best way to do this? What are bad ways to do it? Anything really? I do want to build them but I would like to do it right, and I don't have a clear plan on how to proceed.

Would love any advice or information anyone would care to share.

Thanks!
Joshua

+1 on a tracksaw. I have a festool and no real experience with others, but if they're anything similar they're very worth it. I also have the festool router and hole drilling jig for making shelf pin holes and its also pretty sweet for making things go fast. I actually "abuse" the shelf pin plate which rides on the track as an easy way to run long dados into sheet goods. I'm sure many people will (probably rightly) disagree with me, but I'm not personally a huge fan of most pocket hole work and prefer the dados for sheet good joinery. I find it easier to hold things in alignment because you have a positive connection point for stuff to fit into.

For breaking down sheet goods I have an open "table" made from two 8' 2x4's that site lengthwise across a couple of saw horses and then have four more 4' 2x4's notched into them. This makes a fairly stable platform to set the plywood on, supports it all the way through the cut and if you cut through a little its not cutting into your sawhorses (I can't take credit for this - some smart fellow on some other forum showed how to do it.. really a great idea). I also use this as a large cabinet glue up platform because you can easily clamp from the top, bottom, sides, etc...

I built a pair of rolling cabinets (18" deep, 36" wide and 7' tall) in a lazyish weekend with festool track saw and router setup the first time I had those tools together (and about 1/2 that time was spent scratching my head at how to properly use the guides - they could definitely use better instructions or maybe I'm just thickheaded ). I basically made the whole thing out of 3/4" "cabinet grade" plywood from HD (how they call it cabinet grade boggles my mind - but its fine for a rough shop cabinet). They're split into an upper and a lower with 2/3 being below a fixed shelf (also set into dados in the sides and back). The lower part I put shelves and drawers in, the shelf areas are 18" wide, the drawer areas I made narrow (a bit less than 6" wide). For the drawers I actually ran three sets of holes into the upright pieces with the festool jig and then cut some thin (1/4" thick by 3/4" wide) pieces of oak strip and drilled holes in them to match the pin holes (basically made a small indexing jig for the drill press). These are held in place with dowels (just pressure fit, no glue - the hard part was finding true 1/4" dowels to fit in the 1/4" holes - thanks lee valley!!) and used those as guides for the drawers which have a matching groove cut in the sides. That idea wouldn't work for really wide drawers, but I find that ~5-6" wide drawers are better for shop use anyway and they work fantastic for that. I made a bunch of the drawers at about 2.5" high and about as many at about 5" high. With the guides just pressed into the holes if I decide I want more 2.5" drawers or whatever I can just pull the guides and move them easy.

I didn't put shelves into the upper part of the cabinets, instead I put pegboard in the back and am planning on eventually adding a swing way "door" slightly inset with various holders and what not on the inside and the outside of it (inset so the stuff on the outside didn't stick out - not sure that is a great decision.. but we'll see..). I could see an argument either way and whatever works best for you.

The cabinets were all glued together, clamped and I drove some brads in for good luck. I made a base under them from 2x3's and some casters from northern tool (not the best casters but pretty good at $7 ea..). They aren't fancy (understatement), but they sure work fine. I really like having them mobile so if I need to shuffle things they're easy to move (usually they sit in one spot, but shops evolve..)

I've certainly built nicer cabinets with less capable tools (and crappier with more capable tools for that matter ), but the track saw and track router setup made this really easy. You can accomplish the same thing with a bunch of boards/clamps and a regular skilsaw + router but it won't be as easy to get spot on. I cut all of the boards and rabbets/dados to measurement and was only off by about 1/32 anywhere.

Send $13.35 to Tom Clark to buy his booklet Practical Shop Cabinets:

http://www.tomclarkbooks.com/tomclar..._Cabinets.html

Best $13.35 you'll ever spend. Makes building shop cabinets simple for those of us who don't do cabinetry. All you need is plywood, glue, brad nails, staples, drawer slides, hinges, and knobs. The most useful piece of advice was to use drawers for anything below waist level. Makes that space much more usable. Everything he builds is also designed to make maximum use of the plywood (e.g., all cabinets are 23-1/2" deep).

Also, I have a tracksaw and it's great for breaking down plywood, but except for the 1/4" plywood you need for cabinet backs, I usually have the lumber yard break down the other plywood into 2' x 8' strips to avoid borrowing a truck to get them home.

Steve

I'm going to build some cabinets, too, so I'll watch the replies here but can't help you much.

If you don't want (or have the $ for) a nice track saw, you can make your own. Take a piece of plywood (or MDF) of whatever length but at least 4' and about 10" wide. Screw and glue a piece of hardwood to it about 1/2 inch farther from the edge than your circular saw is wide. Leave enough of the base board behind the guide board for clamping. Then run your circ saw down the guide board and cut off the extra 1/2" you included. You now have a guide for your circ saw and the edge is exactly where it will cut. Not a track saw but it will allow you to break down sheet goods acxcurately.

I'm an advocate for pocket screws over glue and nails for shop cabinets. They are a very positive mechanical fastener. The hanging tool cabinets in my shop are put together with pocket screws and no glue. Use 3/4" plywood - stay away from the cheap Chinese ply in the BORGs. It warps something terrible, has lots of voids, and makes assembly difficult. Use full extension slides on drawers. Costs a bit more, but you will like them a lot better. Build your wall cabinets to mount with a French cleat system. Usually easier to mount on walls and IMO, distributes the load on the wall better than straight fasteners to studs.

IMHO, unless you plan to regularly work with plywood sheets in the future, you can save quite a bit of money by breaking down plywood with a $100 circular saw and a $25 clamp guide. You wont get the cleanest cut with that set up but you can cut a 4x8 into 4x4s and easily handle that size on a tablesaw for final cuts. Or break it down even further if you like. I'm not trying to start any disputes with those that have tracksaws. I'm sure they're great to use. Just want to point out that there are (much) less expensive options for just an occasional need.

Originally Posted by Brian Tymchak

I'm an advocate for pocket screws over glue and nails for shop cabinets. They are a very positive mechanical fastener.
IMHO, unless you plan to regularly work with plywood sheets in the future, you can save quite a bit of money by breaking down plywood with a $100 circular saw and a $25 clamp guide.

this is a good plan

but,

I build my own guides for my skillsaws and routers out of 1/4" and 1/2" plywood 3" wide factory edge plywood with a 10 -12" 1/4" ply wood underneath cut off the excess by running down the 1/2"

use a good saw and more importantly a good blade 40+ teeth on a 71/4" blade

I sometimes clamp but most of time just drive a screw into the guide at either end into the plywood or door

rememember if you want a very clean edge cut the plywood with the good side down


picture is worth 100 words?
saw guide.jpg

For me my first step was to build a book case and screw it up...my dado jig wasn't square and all my dados had slope . I milled some scrap hardwood I had lying around and filled in the "bad" dados in my 3/4" maple plywood sides. Then I cut a "good" dado a couple of inches for the bottom, a rabbet on the top, and still had the original rabbet up and down the back edges for the back. I used my Kreg pocket hole jig setup for 1" screws to attach the top and bottom to the sides then cut a piece of 1/4" plywood for the back and screwed it into place. For the doors, I made down and dirty frame and panel versions using more of a slip joint than a mortise and tenon. Cut them with my Delta tenoning jig, Freud dado,Freud cross cut,and Freud Rip blades. Glued and pinned them with a piece of 3/8" dowel. For the panel, I used some pegboard that I bought off CL accepting that the sellers 4" x 4" description was correct, it wasn't and therefore wouldn't fit my walls. Bought some piano hinges at Lowes and still need to attach the doors to the cabinet. I'm about to buy an Earlex HVLP and think I'll use that to spray shellac on this thing. It will mount using a French cleat and replace some ratty looking shelves that were present when we moved into this place.

This thing is far from perfect, but it is going in the shop and is basically build from scrap that I had screwed up one way or another. If anyone wants to see this Frankenstein's monster, I'll try to take some pictures If nothing else, it would make you feel better about your own projects!

Since I cracked all but two of my eight door joints setting the pin, I'm thinking of buying one of those giant pencil sharpeners on my next LV order. Knocking the leadig edge off those dowels would have prevented the cracking. Of course having enough scrap that was thick enough instead of planing it all down to about 7/10" might have helped too!

Originally Posted by phil harold

this is a good plan

but,

I build my own guides for my skillsaws and routers out of 1/4" and 1/2" plywood 3" wide factory edge plywood with a 10 -12" 1/4" ply wood underneath cut off the excess by running down the 1/2"

use a good saw and more importantly a good blade 40+ teeth on a 71/4" blade

I sometimes clamp but most of time just drive a screw into the guide at either end into the plywood or door

rememember if you want a very clean edge cut the plywood with the good side down


picture is worth 100 words?
saw guide.jpg

That's what I'm talking about - yeah, a picture really helps.

If you modify your saw a bit you can actually get pretty reasonable chip collection, too. On a saw like this, you might be able to modify a crevice tool to cover the rear chip ejection slot. On my circular saw, I cut a chunk out of the front portion of the upper blade guard and modified an unused vacuum attachments to fit over the hole.

Originally Posted by Steve Friedman

Send $13.35 to Tom Clark to buy his booklet Practical Shop Cabinets:

http://www.tomclarkbooks.com/tomclar..._Cabinets.html

Best $13.35 you'll ever spend. Makes building shop cabinets simple for those of us who don't do cabinetry. All you need is plywood, glue, brad nails, staples, drawer slides, hinges, and knobs. The most useful piece of advice was to use drawers for anything below waist level. Makes that space much more usable. Everything he builds is also designed to make maximum use of the plywood (e.g., all cabinets are 23-1/2" deep).

+1 on this.

If you'd like a preview on this, you can pop over to familywoodworking.org and look up Tom's posts there. He posted a pretty detailed photo essay there which will give you a quick overview of his methods.

(disclaimer: haven't built any cabinets like this yet, but I am definitely interested in his methods!)

Check out Sommerfeld Tools. I was in the same situation as you with my entertainment center, I knew what I wanted to do, but I didn't know how to begin. I saw Marc's demo at a woodworking show, realized how easy it was, bought his router bit set, went home, and went to work. It's basically six cabinets and two bookshelves on a 16' X 9' wall. People can't believe I made them from scratch. So when it came time to do my garage cabinets, I knocked those out without breaking a sweat. Table saw, router table and a pocket hole jig are your main tools. If you can't cross cut plywood on your saw, then pick up a clamp edge guide and use a circ saw. Sommerfeld has instructional dvd's, worth checking out.

Joshua, whenever someone wants a floor to ceiling set of shop cabinets, everyone starts thinking about 8 foot long sheets of material.

Everyone except me that is, I can't handle that size of material so I start small.

1) I make a 3 or 4 inch high ladder type base to sit on the floor, with 3/8" UNC cap screws threaded into propel nuts to level it on the uneven floor. Your sheet good supplier will rip you the strips, all you have to do is cross cut them to length.

2) I have sheets "crosscut" at the material supplier so that I have 3 pieces about 32" X 48". These fit in a mini van, I can carry one piece and manipulate it on a contractor style saw.

3) I make my cabinets in 30" wide modules maximum, that makes efficient use of the chunks, and I can actually handle that size of a piece.

4) Once the modules are made, I can lift them by myself and stack them on my nice flat, level ladder base. A couple of screws to tie them together and to the wall, and I'm done.

5) drawers and doors are dropped in after the cabinets are up.

You will have no problem building this sort of box with your table saw, and the pieces are a nice size to work with.

Regards, Rod.

P.S. I usually use rebates and dado construction unless it's melamine coated particle board. Then I use #8 X 2" particle board screws and but joints.

I will have to check that site again. I went to it a few weeks+ ago now when I was swinging back towards making them myself and it said he was out and there was an unknown amount of time before he would have more in stock. I will have to check again to see if I can purchase a copy of it.

Out of curiosity which tracksaw do you have? I have read up on the 3 options but as with anything reviews on amazon 33% love it, 33% like it and 33% hate it and think the inventors should die. I read up on the makita and the thin initial cut to prevent veneer destruction seems interesting as does the lower price. The Dewalt was interesting I guess mostly because I have a fair number of dewalt tools and really like them. And of course Festool I have read created them and does a great job with them... So I guess I just wonder what kind people have and like.

Thanks for the advice!

Joshua

I always try to keep in mind that all cabinets are; in there simplest form is a box. Break everything down in your mind to boxes. Even the parts you use such as the 4’x8’x3/4” panel is a box, it has width, depth, and thickness. Hence a rectangular shaped box. We take boxes and put them together with other boxes to make bigger boxes.

For example I will use a 24” wide cabinet, made for a counter top height of 36” with a depth of 25”. The cabinet is 1 inch less in depth that the counter top, so it is 24” deep, which includes the doors/drawer, fronts. The cabinet is comprised of parts that are easier to keep track of if we give them names. I will list out the names of the individual components as I have named them and also the abbreviations I use on my cut sheets.

The cabinet is comprised of:
2 end panels called wall ends or WE
1 bottom or BOT
2 sub-tops or ST
1 back or BK
2 nailers or NAIL
To support the cabinet and hold it off the ground I build a box and call it a base and all the parts are called BASE. The base is comprised of:
2 pieces that are the width of the cabinet at the front and rear
4 spanner pieces similar to the ST
Here is a picture showing the parts and their names.

3d.jpg

Using the dimensions listed above we can figure out the parts sizes. If the cabinet is 24" wide, we would deduct the thickness of the two WE, each being 3/4" thick would = 1 1/2". So 24" - 1 1/2" = 22 1/2", this is the width of the BOT and ST. The depth of the BOT is figured after deducting the thickness of the BK, NAIL, and the DR or doors. So 24" - 3/4" (DR) - 1/4"(BK) - 1/2"(NAIL) = 22 1/2". I always cut my ST to a depth of 4". The depth of the BOT is also the depth of the WE. The length of the WE is figured by deducting the height to counter top (36") - the base height (4") - the counter top thickness (1 1/2") which would give us 30 1/2".


front.jpgThis is the front view of the cabinet.

side.jpgHere is a side view.

top.jpgHere is a top view.

Now we have to translate these parts to a 4’ x 8’ panel product. The picture below gives you an idea of how the parts are configured on the panel. You cross cut with a circular saw to get the manageable pieces to cut on the table saw and rip these down to final sizes for the cabinet parts. Here is a possible picture of the layout.
panel.jpg

I for one to don't invest in too much complicated joinery for shop cabinets. If these are to be a showcase of your work then by all means have at it, but if the point is to gain storage room so that you have the organization to work smarter and cleaner, then build easy and strong. My shop cabinets are butt jointed, glued and screwed. They have been treated rather roughly and they are holding strong. After I have my carcasses together then I can make them more attractive by adding nice door and drawer fronts. Extra door panels can be applied to the WE of cabinets that show to finish those off. If you wish I can go into the assembly process, but thought this might give you a ball park feel for things.
Take care,
Dennis

http://cabparts.com

You won't likely be able to make cabinets on your own cheaper or faster. If you're in Utah, shipping from Grand Junction, CO ought to be minimal.