Build Your Own Kitchen Cabinets (February 28, 2009)

Now available, this fully updated revision is in full color, drawings are now 3D with cut lists for 5/8" (16mm) and 3/4" (19mm) sheet stock, the latest hardware information has been added, an expanded door building section, and a chapter on frameless cabinet construction is included. Author Danny Proulx is a longtime professional cabinetmaker who specializes in kitchens. His construction procedures, perfected over his career, will make a daunting proposition (building a kitchen) into a reasonable task.

In This Book You'll Learn to:

• Design and build face-frame and frameless kitchen cabinets
  
• Build kitchen islands, basic countertops and microwave cabinets
  
• Make custom doors and drawers
  
• Install all the special hardware found in kitchens
  
• Finish your cabinets for maximum durability
  
• Install an entire kitchen

The best of both worlds. The genius of the construction system in Build Your Own Kitchen Cabinets is that the cabinets look like traditional solid wood units from the outside, but the interiors are made using durable, easy-to-clean and inexpensive melamine-coated particleboard.

Proulx's system combines the best parts of the face-frame cabinet-construction system that's common in North America and the European frameless cabinet system developed after World War II. The result is a cabinet that's easy to build, easy to install, easy to clean and looks like a traditional wooden cabinet. What's the secret? Proulx has found a clever way to combine modern materials and hardware with solid wood in all the right places.

Build any cabine t, any size.  to make cabinets to fit any home (and use material efficiently). Decide on how big a cabinet you need, and then consult the easy-to-use chart to find out what all your part sizes are. This book does most of the math for you. Corner units might seem tricky at first, but by sticking to the same principles used with the other cabinets, they are remarkably straightforward. 

The tricks in this book will cut construction time in half for these corner cabinets. Woodworkers who are unfamiliar with modern cabinetmaking techniques might be unfamiliar with using plastic adjustable legs instead of a traditional separate base for each cabinet. Even if you are a "woodworking purist" you'd be silly to ignore the advantages of these legs.

Reviews:

By Chris Schwarz - Senior Editor Popular Woodworking Magazine

Save thousands of dollars by building your own custom kitchen cabinets - it's easier than you think with an ingenious construction system devised by Danny Proulx, a lifelong professional cabinetmaker.

Proulx's system combines the best parts of the face-frame cabinet-construction system that's common in North America and the European frameless cabinet system developed after World War II. The result is a cabinet that's easy to build, easy to install, easy to clean and looks like a traditional wooden cabinet. What's the secret? Proulx has found a clever way to combine modern materials and hardware with solid wood in all the right places.

As a bonus, this system is fast and doesn't require a lot of tools. A table saw and drill handle most of the chores. And once you get comfortable with the basics, you'll be able to construct a cabinet in just a few hours. Plus, after you build one simple base cabinet, you'll use the same methods to build every other cabinet in a kitchen: corner cabinets, over-the-range cabinets, refrigerator surrounds, microwave cabinets, sink cabinets and even kitchen islands.

When we first reviewed this book, we thought that surely there would be a lot of math to develop all the customized cutting lists needed for a kitchen. Boy were we wrong. Proulx has developed a series of charts that make all your cutting lists a piece of cake. First measure the room where the cabinets will go. Figure out how big each cabinet will be. Find that size on the chart and you'll see all your part sizes listed there. Set the fence on your table saw and go to town.

Hardware is the Heart

The system explained in Build Your Own Kitchen Cabinets is unique because it fully exploits the versatility of modern hardware to make things faster, stronger and better. Instead of building a separate base for each lower cabinet, Proulx plugs you into the world of adjustable feet. These gizmos take just a minute to install and take most of the headaches out of installing cabinets. In fact, these legs can still keep a run of kitchen cabinets perfectly in line even if the floor is out of level by more than an 1". Try doing that with traditional shims.

The European hinges in Proulx's system make fitting doors a breeze. Many woodworkers rightly fear the process of fitting doors. And traditional butt hinges make this tough chore even tougher. European hinges (sometimes called "cup hinges" or "concealed hinges") are a godsend for door installations. After the hinges are installed, you can adjust the doors in three axes using just a screwdriver. That means all the gaps around your doors are a cinch to line up. With the help of the European hinge you'll get perfect results in less time than butt hinges.

The drawer slides in Proulx's book cut down on the time and material needed for building traditional drawer runners. Screw one piece of the slide on the bottom edge of the drawer box. Then screw its mate to the cabinet. That creates a drawer that will roll open and shut for a lifetime of use.

Other Ways to Save Time and Money

Because Proulx makes a living at building and installing these cabinets, he's always looking for ways to do things faster, easier and in a way that pleases his customers. So for those of you who are thinking about going into the kitchen cabinet business, Proulx recommends that you purchase your doors (and some drawer fronts) commercially from custom door makers. He's done the math, and these people can do it cheaper and faster than he can.
But if you're a home woodworker and time isn't as critical as saving money is, Proulx goes into great detail about how to build modern and traditional kitchen doors. You don't have to purchase hundreds of dollars of custom router bits or shaper cutters to make raised-panel doors. Proulx shows you how to do it all on your table saw.

And building drawers is easy, too. Proulx makes his drawers with melamine sides that are trimmed with solid wood. The result is easy to clean (thanks to the melamine) and the wooden accents are a nice custom touch. There's also a great section on installing the niceties that make the modern kitchen a great place to work: shelves that roll out from the cabinet, lazy Susans in corner cabinets and flip out storage spaces in the fake drawer fronts in front of the sink.

Beyond the Basics

Of course, building kitchen cabinets requires a good deal of planning. There are lots of guidelines and rules of thumb that govern how a kitchen should be set up. Whatever you do, don't even try to design a new kitchen without knowing these time-tested rules. Cabinets on top of refrigerators have to be built to a certain dimension to work. Fitting a cabinet around a range hood properly is tricky unless you know the secrets to getting a good tight fit. And installing your newly built cabinets is a lot easier with the proper planning and the wisdom of a guy who has done it all before.

There's even advice on how to design your kitchen so the cooking flows smoothly from one place to the next. And there are photos of dozens of finished kitchens so you can see how Proulx has put his system to work for him.

In woodworking, there are lots of things that you can teach yourself by giving it a try and learning from your mistakes. Building kitchen cabinets is definitely not one of these things. You can pour a tremendous amount of time and money into a kitchen project and come up empty-handed - or even worse, you might have to call a professional to sort the mess out. If you're planning on building any kind of built-in storage in your home, whether it's in the kitchen, laundry room or bathroom, this excellent book will help ensure your success.

Features:

• paperback
  
• 128 pages
  
• 8 1/2 X 11 format
  
• color photos
  
• color line drawings.

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