FF cabs and drawerslide hardware holes

[Gene Davis]

It's probably the engineer in me, but for me the beauty of frameless cabs is the elegant solution the design presents for hardware holes. It is all about holes in the sides, and with CNC control of 5mm boring, you arranges your arrays, and you drills them holes.

So other than just biting the bullet, and resorting back to the basics of cabinetmaking (gasp!), and drilling holes with EHC (eye hand coordination) post-CNC, what are you all doing to use the CNC for drawerslide hardware holes when doing . . .

1. Faceframed jobs with overlay drawerfronts.

2. Faceframed jobs with inset drawerfronts.

I know I can use the PE with constraints to do hole groups in backs for rear brackets, but what else is there to know?

[Brian Shannon]

For overlay, I use a FLUSH Partition or Drawer Support(short partition).

For inset, I do the same but have a different hole pattern setup for 3/4" spacer blocks.

[jerry johnson]

Gene, we use all flush partitions. We end up with double partaitons a lot of the time but the labor savings in using the 5mm holes to mount hardware to more than pays for the additionl material. If the job is flush inset we just set the drawer boxes and doors into the cabinet the thickness of the doors and drawer fronts and the hardware holes move.

[Gene Davis]

OK, Jerry, I roughed out a basic 1-drawer-over-two-drawers basecab. Sides are flush to the inside faces of the 1.5" FF stiles, so my slides will fix to the sides and the array of 5mm slide holes will be drilled in the nest.

Same for the doors and their Blum hinges and plates.

What are your settings for door and drawerfront margins? This model uses 1.5mm (about 1/16") all the way around. I am thinking I may boost it to 2mm.

Also, what is your preference for door close fixing? Self close hinges and blocks with bumpers? Or do you do free swing hinges and catches?

Furthermore, what cab configs need the doubled partitions? I can imagine a base with side-by-side drawers, but that gets one into funky joints, the need for a heavier back than the 1/4" captured deal we prefer, etc. What else is there?

[jerry johnson]

Gene, check out these images

cab sample 1.jpg (40 KiB) Viewed 3781 times

sample cab 2.jpg (34.62 KiB) Viewed 3780 times

Hopefully you can see where we use double partitions and how we handle double drawers. Your door margins are up to you. I typically use a 2mm margine if the cabinets are to be stained and at least a 3mm margine if they are being painted. The hinges and closers are up to the customer but I like to raise my bottom shelf up and drop the shallow mid shelf down for door stops instead of adding blocks. The drawers stop on their own within the hardware. We use a 1/4" thick back also and it works fine because of the full cabinet top.

Hope this helps.