Kitchen Cabinets - yuk!

[Don]

Hey, Guys. I've been around cabinetry all my life. I'm drowning in it right now. I got into the trade just after your kitchen cabinets were actually built on site by the trim carpenters. Now you can't turn around in a home center without bumping into great looking cabinets.

But are these cabinets good stuff or junk? What you you think?

Can you do better? Have you done better? I've made 'em by the thousands, good stuff and "junk."

Show us your kitchen cabinet project.

All the best, Don

Welcome to WoodworkingBuzz.com, the newest Woodworking forum and community. Use this area of the discussion forum to post about kitchen cabinets.

[Dagster]

Moved outside this thread...

[jcclark]

Well, I made mine.
But I didn't have many to make.:D

http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f386/jcquack/Furniture/DSC02139.jpg

http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f386/jcquack/Furniture/DSC02143.jpg


But I have to say, some of what I looked at were pretty good for
the money, just depends on what quality (price) level you look at.
I figure I can't compete on the lower priced ones for people.
The more expensive ones I can match the price but give a little
more quality, like all wood shelves and drawers, a little thicker, etc.
But it's hard to compete against a factory.
I have the edge when a customer wants something different.

[Don]

Pretty nice, JC. You've got the talent!

dawjr

[Pat]

When a client is on tight budget I still do build-in the carcasses carpenter-style, and then make up the fronts in the shop. I always buy the drawer-boxes - I can get dovetailed maple, sprayed with lacquer for not a lot more than it would cost me to buy the stock here. Full-extension ball-bearing slides makes a pretty decent cabinet for an affordable cost.

[Deadbolt]

When you build your own carcasses, you have the advantage of filling exact spaces. Store bought cabinets need special tweaking in weird dimensions. The time I spend tweaking costs the customer more than if I build to the exact measurements. There's a good cabinet shop in town and my customers pick out the door style, I order the right sizes and hang the doors. My customers and I like this system.

[dpmcreations]

Well to tell you the truth, the quality of "big box" style cabinets has improved, but to tell you the truth, I have still found that I can make a cabinet for less than most of the Big Box cabinets and!!! one of the big things is that I don't have to tweak it like I would have to with pre-mades... In other words they are built to exact size needed...

Oh yes, I can add and/or subtract options to and from the cabinets...

AND THE BIG ONE!!! They are of a much better quality, because at the very least they are all plywood and NOT that damn particle board....

Have a great time and enjoy...

[Pat]

I find the worst thing about cheap to mid-grade prefabs is the drawer boxes and slides (total garbage), and of course hinge hardware is junky. Not surprisingly, they put most of the effort into the fronts.