Hey guys, My 4th of July Holiday was used to get started on the "built-in" my lovely wife wants for our 3rd bedroom/craft room.

It won't be anything fancy. Her design criteria were: Fill the hole, give me two drawers and at least 5 shelves and paint it white to match the rest of the trim and the other shelves in the room.

The morning started out with making a "story pole" and getting the dimensions of the hole, followed by sketching up a quick drawing of what I thought she wanted. What a surprise, she okay'd the first draft. Life is good.

Two sheets of 31/32" maple ply were used for the case work. Today I managed to cut all the stock to size and run the rabbets on the pieces for the sides, top and bottom pieces.

My process was:

Step 1: I cut the two 4' x 8' sheets of ply into 16" strips by laying four 2x4's on the shop floor, placing a sheet of ply on top of the studs and using my circular saw to rough out the strips.

Step 2: The four pieces with the factory edges were then run through the table saw to a width of 15.5", then flipped and re-cut to a width of 15". Two of these pieces will be used for the 92" tall sides.

Step 3: My chop saw was used to rough out the top, bottom, fixed shelf and one adjustable shelf from the other two 15" wide pieces.

Step 4: Still on the chop saw, I cut the two remaining strips (without factory edges) in half and then jointed on edge on all 4 pieces.(I cheated and used my Delta 6" jointer. It was too damned hot to do it by hand.)

Step 5: Using my Table Saw/Sled, I squared up one end of each piece and then cross cut the shelves, top and bottom to 45", then removed the sled and ripped the pieces to a 14.25" width.

Step 6: Back to the chop saw where I cross cut the 15" wide sides to 92".

Step 7: With all the pieces cut to size, it was time to cut the rabbets in the sides, top and bottom pieces. The TS with a stacked dado and sacrificial fence made quick work on it. Each of those pieces has a 3/4" x 1/2" rabbet along its back edge.

Sorry about not providing pics, but hey, you have all seen sawdust and pieces of wood before.

Can't wait to see it. Are you also doing sliding drawers under the bed?

No Under-Bed-Drawers planned yet. Of course, there could be a request in the future.

You'd be amazed how far you can get in one day building cabinets from sheet goods. The real slow down is the face frame and/or trim work. waiting for the pics.

Barry,

I was amazed that I survived! It was a bit hot (High 80s Low 90's both temp and humidity) in the shop yesterday. The most difficult part was handling those large sheets of ply by myself. I have no idea how much a 48.5" by 97" sheet of 31/32" solid core maple ply weighs, but they sure are HEAVY. Since a man my age definitely has to know his limitations, I made sure I took lots of hydration breaks. All in all, I was very happy with my progress. Hopefully this week I can get all the pieces ready for assembly this coming weekend. I still have some small pieces to cut out, put veneer tape on all the edges and sand, sand sand.

Bruce,
Happy 4th of July mister! Sounds like you're making great progress on the lil'mrs' built'in. Keep up the progress reports!

Bruce,

No pictures?

Didn't I see you at the beach yesterday with the Mrs and the dogs?






It was a good time to do a little work in the shop. Spent my morning doing the same, until people started arriving for the picnic.

OOPS.. caught.. But you have to admit, the beach here in Jensen Beach, FL is really beautiful.

Hi Bruce.

Off the top of my noggin, I'd guess-timate the weight of that sheet of 31/32 at around 90 pounds. It's 2 2/3 cubic feet and is probably about half the density of water, so I get 80 to 90 pounds. Serious sheet of splinters on the hoof.

Paul
the little guy

Got some more work done on the built in today. Ran a test fit of the sides in the hole. OOPS... Just a little too tall, so I decided to cut an inch off each one. Did a few more measurements (just to confirm those on my story pole) and then cut a hole in the left side panel for an electrical switch and duplex outlet.

There will be five adjustable shelves in the unit. I'm using standard shelf standards. My plan is to route stopped dados in each side panel. Here's the question: How far in from the front edge and back edge should they be placed? Any guidance you can provide is appreciated.

Bruce.

1 1/2 off the front edge. why do you need a stopped dado in the back for?

NYNY,

Thanks for the setback information for the shelf tracks. There are two tracks on each side, thus two stopped dadoes on each side. I planned to use stopped dadoes because I did not want to run the dadoes or shelf standards (tracks) down past the fixed shelf, which is also the top of the drawer section.

Of course it would be a lot easier to just run the dadoes the full length of the sides. I'm open for opinions on that too.

Wow........ hold the fort. thought you were asking about stopped blind dado's for cabinet construction.

as for the standards anywhere from 2 to 2 1/2. sorry about that.

NYNY.. No problem. Thanks for the correction. Have a great day.

Bruce

UPDATE: I got some more work done today. After spending some time cleaning up the shop, I disassembled my router table. I had to take that router motor off to put it into a plunger base. With that done, I milled out the stopped dadoes for adjustable shelf standards. A little chisel work later and the ends were squared up. Next up was cutting the standards to size. Its a good thing I checked them. One was almost a quarter inch shorter than the other three and the holes did not line up. A short trek to Lowes I had a replacement. Anyway, I cut all four to the final length, filed, sanded and primed the raw ends. Tomorrow I hope to be able to start some assembly.

Hi Bruce.

A bit late for this project, but for future reference here's how I like to install shelf standards:

I surface mount them and notch the shelf ends to go around them. This keeps the shelves even with the sides and keeps them from moving in and out on the supports without needing a face frame.

One more method for your archives...

Paul
the wee lad

Tiny, thanks for the helpful hint. However, I've already cut the dadoes for the shelf standards and assembled the case. Next step will be to rip the back panel to width and attach it. Right now the case is sitting in the room and SWMBO'd is happy with the way it looks. It's been a great day.

Afternoon Update: Got my second wind, ripped the back panel to width and installed it. Next up, Install the lower divider.

Here are a couple of pics of my progress:

The basic carcass without any trim


The lower storage section. It will have two full extension drawers

FL Rat - looking good.

LOL.. Thanks Bud....Truthfully, it doesn't look like much. However, I can tell you that handling all the wood and assembling it by myself was a bear. What you can't see in the picture is that the entire room is filled with boxes of stuff waiting to be unpacked and put away that SWMBO'd did not want removed from the room.

Tonight when I get home, I have to do a little electrical work before I can set the cabinet in its final position. Once that is done, I can set the cabinet flush with the left side divider.

Bruce

Got some more done on the built in today.. sorta.... Left work early and went to the 'wood store' and bought 37.5 bf of 4/4 poplar for the drawers and all the trim.
Nice thing about it: After THEY picked through the inventory to pick out the best boards, the salesman said.. listen, the ends of these boards aren't that good. I'm only going to charge you for 33 bf.

By the way, the name of the place is "The Cabinetmakers Ware House" in Stuart, Fl. Even though I only buy a few sticks a year, they treat me well. I will definitely keep going back.

Got some more done on the built in today.. sorta.... Left work early and went to the 'wood store' and bought 37.5 bf of 4/4 poplar for the drawers and all the trim.
Nice thing about it: After THEY picked through the inventory to pick out the best boards, the salesman said.. listen, the ends of these boards aren't that good. I'm only going to charge you for 33 bf. They even sold me two pair of Accueglide Delux full extension guides at a discount.

By the way, the name of the place is "A Cabinetmakers Warehouse" in Stuart, Fl. Even though I only buy a few sticks a year, they treat me well. I will definitely keep going back.

And Neil, the next time you come down here to visit the area, I will take you by.

Bruce.

UPDATE: After allowing my trim materials to acclimate in the shop for a week, I spent most of the day milling it with a mix of power and hand tools. I can tell you this, working the fore plane and then the jointer plane in 95+ degree weather kicked my A$$. I'm so glad my power planer works because it got a good work out today too!

I asked myself, is it worth buying rough cut 4/4 poplar and doing all this work at $1.75 a board foot vice paying the Big Box Store $6.50 a board foot? To me it is.

Not only do I save $4.75 a board foot, I get a great work out.

UPDATE for July 30, 2011:

It was another productive morning in the shop. Got most of the trim materials cut to their final dimension and installed. I had to scribe one edge on the center partition and didn't quite get it to the final width. Hence, tomorrow I will pull out the block plane and clean things up.

Hopefully tomorrow will be cool enough to spend some more time in the shop. The plan is to mill the lower rail/base board then install it. Unfortunately, it will be too wide to flatten on my 6" jointer so it looks like the hand planes will get another workout.

UPDATE for July 31, 2011:


I guess I didn't wish hard enough for cooler weather today. When I went out for coffee at 0415 this morning, it was already 86 degrees and humid. Go figure, it's the end of July and I'm in Florida.

Anyway, i was able to hand plane down one side of a four foot piece of poplar for the lower rail piece then run it through the planer to flatten the other side of it. A quick couple of cross cuts and a rip later, it was ready to install.

Now all the trim and the drawer divider are installed. Now it's time to clean up some edges flush, do a little sanding, fill some screw holes and get it ready for paint. That will give me something to do while Celeste is away visiting our Son and his family in Jax.