Drawer Slide Front Mounting Hole - Incorrect Orientation

[Gary Campbell]

Kerry...
I cant speak to the MDF door question(s), but can elaborate, at least to our "wished usage" as it applies to draw boxes.

Allow the slide (runner) hole pattern to work exactly like the Hinge pattern works. You have a set of holes that drill in the side of the case AND an editable pattern that is bored into the backside of the Draw front. These could be saved similar to hinges that have same case pattern but varying on the draw front geometry. And since I am looking into my wishlist, I would like to be able to apply hole patterns without a draw box if needed. this works good for outsource boxes AND would allow the placement of closet parts etc, without mucking up the render speeds by adding a number of moot draw boxes. Might as well throw in the ability to cut around to the back plane also. This allows hole patterns and back cut thru for support hardware, even if constrained by side depth.

I dont know about the rest of you, but lately I am very hesitant to take items, especially draw boxes, to the PE or DBE. A majority dont ever come back on my machine, if they do, they are so slow I wish I hadnt.

Even tho it is a workaround, we metal box users could use a draw box could be made that uses NOCUT materials for the sides and has propererly sized materials for bottom and back. That way those pieces could cut in the nest.

As far a dovetails go, we use them, probably more than most, but they are not cut in the nest from sheetgoods. They are either cut on a DT machine or in the traditional vertical/horizontal orientation on our ShopBot in pairs for solid lumber or PF solid sides. I treat the metabox front boring like a FlipOp, where I place the fronts in the pins and then input pertinent sizes and the fronts are bored. Not the fastest way, but does allow us to get it done accurately.

[Kerry Fullington]

Rick,

I would think that the holes would need to be in relation to the drawer box even though the box is only a front and back.
If the holes are calculated from the drawer box then it wouldn't matter what kind of reveals that are set for the front the holes would line up.

I think Nat Wheatley has been working around this for quite a while, maybe he would have some input.

Kerry

[Sean Jakob]

First let me say that Neville is essentially talking about two different things:
a) the inabililty of the program to AUTOMATICALLY apply the front fixing bracket boring holes to the back of the drawer front (during the same process as the boring of the slide holes into the carcase) This is the same as my complaint and the true nature of this topic.

b) The limitations of MDF door options. I believe that Neville wants the ability to design any mdf door style, not just the basic cathedral, arch, square etc AND the ability to apply sets of tools to the operations. THIS DEBATE SHOULD REALLY BE MOVED TO A NEW TOPIC FOR CLARITY.

-------------------------------------

Kerry,
You have hit the nail on the head when you said:

I have been looking at this and I thought you should be able to place holes in the part editor and constrain them and everything would be OK. The problem I think comes from the multiple reveals that one uses in frameless. You might have one reveal on the right side of a drawer and another on the left. There are also changes in top and bottom reveals so any constrained holes set for one reveal will not work when the reveal is changed. The holes in the drawer front need to be positioned by the drawer box and slide. This would require eCabinets to create a hole pattern in two different axis planes.

Let me break this down piece by piece:
1) You said -

I have been looking at this and I thought you should be able to place holes in the part editor and constrain them and everything would be OK.

My answer is, yes you can, and I have, but that relieves only a small part of the problem as your next comment, combined with those of Barry start to really uncover the true nature of the problem at hand:
You said:

The problem I think comes from the multiple reveals that one uses in frameless. You might have one reveal on the right side of a drawer and another on the left. There are also changes in top and bottom reveals so any constrained holes set for one reveal will not work when the reveal is changed.

When you couple this with Barry's comments:

they are using several differnt metal sided drawer systems as follows:
hettich innotech
hettich multitech
blum tandembox
blum metabox
harn impaz
grass novapro

many of these drawer systems come with a few optional types of actual runnser (slides as the american call them) many of which will have a different drilling pattern,.

the relationship between the centrline of the runner holes into the cabinet and the drawer front clip holes (in the back of the drawer front) and the distance to the bottom of the drawer front is critical and beyond the limitation of my memeroy. i tried to add the front holes the same as the hingge hols like sean did and had the same result.

my customers also use a variety of cabinet depths and heights, and drawer combination configerations. this means that there are hunderds if not thousands of combinations

You end up with an almost infinite number of possibilities. Whilst I personally only use the Hettich brand, they have 2 different options, cheap and expensive, each with their own unique front fixing clip drilling pattern, this coupled with the reveal changes, congfiguration changes (ie a drawer bank might consist of four different drawer heights, all using the same type of drawer "system", however each needing a different hole pattern/front fixing clip drillling). In my case, it is unmanagable, I'd hate to think how anyone who contract cuts for other cabinetmakers, like Barry might feel.

2) You also said:

The holes in the drawer front need to be positioned by the drawer box and slide.

Essentially what you are saying is correct, although if I were to elaborate, I suggest that it should be dictated absolutely by the slide pattern.

3) You said;

This would require eCabinets to create a hole pattern in two different axis planes.

This is absolutely correct, exactly like a hinge hole pattern does.

Rick..... you asked;

The main thing that will have to be decided is where to position the drawer front holepatterns (patterns on the -X side of the axis) from: the drawer front, the drawer box, the side of the cabinet?

The answer is universal irrespective of the type of metal sided drawer system you are using. The drawer front drilling pattern MUST be referenced from the inside of the carcase. (I note that the hinge cup holes in the back face of the door are referenced from the edge of the door)

Rick, you also asked:

What if there is no drawer box with the drawer front but it does have a slide pattern?

My answer is that you would simply use a different slide pattern which does not include front fixing holes.

Whilst we are on that topic however, the fact is that we may have a drawer box added to an opening without a conventional drawer front, however when using a metal sided drawer system, this would simply become similar to an inset drawer, however you'd still have the ability to place a door over the face of the opening. In this case, the user would design an "internal" metal sided drawer box which would comprise of a back, base & front. The drawer box's front could then be edited in the part editor and constrained. This would work perfectly adequately.

Please note that "internal" drawers (when using metal sided drawer systems) do not throw up the myriad of combinations and issues that conventional drawers do. In the case of internal drawers, Kerry's comments:

I have been looking at this and I thought you should be able to place holes in the part editor and constrain them and everything would be OK.

do certainly apply.


I hope this is clear enough

Sean

[jason galbraith]

Thanks Sean, I hope that non-metal sided draw users are getting an understanding of the amount of frustration this is causing us.
Totally these two lines from your excellent last post that i have highlighted in bold sum it up for me.

2) You also said:
The holes in the drawer front need to be positioned by the drawer box and slide.

Essentially what you are saying is correct, although if I were to elaborate, I suggest that it should be dictated absolutely by the slide pattern.

Rick..... you asked;

The main thing that will have to be decided is where to position the drawer front holepatterns (patterns on the -X side of the axis) from: the drawer front, the drawer box, the side of the cabinet?

The answer is universal irrespective of the type of metal sided drawer system you are using. The drawer front drilling pattern MUST be referenced from the inside of the carcase. (I note that the hinge cup holes in the back face of the door are referenced from the edge of the door)

[Nat Wheatley]

Kerry,

I've only been able to work around this by creating the holes in the PE and constraining. But as mentioned, it doesn't allow for adjustments in the side reveals of the drawer fronts.

Adding this feature definitely has my vote, as it takes a prohibitive amount of time to add these patterns manually.

Nat

[Kerry Fullington]

Nat,

How do you think the holes should be referenced to be placed properly?

Kerry

[jason galbraith]

The drawer front drilling pattern MUST be referenced from:

A:The slide pattern/height

B:the inside of the carcase

[Nat Wheatley]

Kerry,

I'd agree with Jason. Side to side, it may be that they could be referenced from the side of the drawer front, but the drawer front's side overlay would need to be factored in.

Nat

[Kerry Fullington]

Dennis emailed me earlier about this and he had an interesting thought about this problem. I hope he doesn't mind me sharing it to get some feedback.

It sounded pretty simple to put the drawer pattern on the x- side like the
hinge hole pattern, but what happens to the hole pattern when the drawer
changes heights. The metal sides only come in specific heights, thus the
pattern would have to change or the user would have to change the pattern
to accommodate the change in height. And the user would have to restrict
the height of the drawer box to only those being offered by the
manufacturer.

What I am getting from this is that even when you can drill into the drawer front there will still be quite a bit of work and restrictions by the user to make it function properly.

[Nat Wheatley]

Kerry,

I can only speak for the Grass Zargen system, but the hole pattern for the back of the drawer front is the same regardless of the height of the side.

Nat

[jason galbraith]

Yes i have come across this problem, ie changing heights and having the draw box height change etc.. But if I had the ability to choose what draw slide pattern i wanted and it would drill the backs of the fronts, I would have no qualms about having to put in new draws every time i wanted to change heights or overlays.

The laborious part, is having to manually put the holes in the back of the draw fronts in part editor and then constrain them.

[Kerry Fullington]

Hopefully Rick can use this information and they could go forward with this.

Kerry

[Sean Jakob]

That is a simple, no brainer for us metal drawer users.

Lets say we take my preferred drawer system, Hettich. It comes in a variety called Innotech (expensive) MultiTech (cheap). For the remainder of this post, we I will focus only on the cheaper variety called Multitech.

Now MultiTech is available in the following height options:
54mm
86mm
118mm
150mm

(Most of the above are also available in different lengths, but we will ignore that for now for the sake of simplicity)

Lets say that the program does support drilling into the back of the drawer (being activated via the slide hole pattern), then all we need to do is:
a) specify each of these drawer sides as a piece of hardware
b) Create 4 differernt slide patterns, each of which incorporates the relevent front fixing clip boring

Then all we do is take a cabinet,
c) specify the drawer slide
d) specify the hole pattern and
Bob's your uncle.

If we want to create a drawer configuration that uses 4 drawers of differnt heights, we would simply:
1) specify the drawer slide for the first drawer
2) specify the hole pattern for the first drawer
3) select the opening
4) dictate the height of the drawer face
5) click OK

then we would add the next drawer by the following:
6) specify the drawer slide for the next drawer
7) specify the hole pattern for the next drawer
select the opening
9) dictate the height of the drawer face
10) click OK


cthen we would add the next drawer by the following:
1) specify the drawer slide for the next drawer
2) specify the hole pattern for the next drawer
3) select the opening
4) dictate the height of the drawer face
5) click OK

then we would add the fourth drawer by the following:
1) specify the drawer slide for the fourth drawer
2) specify the hole pattern for the fourth drawer
3) select the opening
4) dictate the height of the drawer face
5) click OK

then JOBS DONE!


Dennis, lets say that the height of the cabinet changes, then no problem. The drawer cabinet changes in height, the distance from the bottom of each drawer box / hole pattern to the bottom of the drawer front remains constant, and the drawer fronts increase / decrease accordingly. No problem.

Should we decide to pull a drawer cabinet from the library which was pre-saved, we can then change the reveals, cabinet heights, bottom lip (distance from bottom of drawer box to bottom of drawer front) reference etc, and its all done. Under the current scenario, it is a unbelievably complex, cumbersome and prone to errors.

In summary, changing a drawer height should be no different to the user than changing a door height.

Dennis's comment: [quote}And the user would have to restrict
the height of the drawer box to only those being offered by the
manufacturer.[/quote] is correct, but I can assure you that no metal drawer side user would have an issue with this compared to what they currently deal with.

Sean

[Sean Jakob]

ANOTHER SIGNIFICANT THING NOT PREVIOUSLY MENTIONED IN THIS POST
===============================================================
Changing Door Styles


I think one of the sad things here is that when you are using metal sided drawers, you are unable to utilise the "Change Door / Drawer Style" within the program.

That's right, whether it be from within layout or from the batch cabinet area, this functinoality, whilst brilliant in theory is pretty useless to those of use who are struggling with the hole pattern in the back of the drawer face problem.

You see, don't get me wrong, I'm sure all metal sided users would love to be able to use this, but the reality is that any manually placed holes into a door or drawer are lost during the process of changing door styles, so even if we have gone to the trouble of adding the holes manually, constraining them etc, we simply can afford to change the drawer style because it will take too much time to go back through and re-add all of the manually added holes.

The implication here is that those of us using metal side drawer systems generally have to create a multitude of different libraries simply to cater for different door styles. For example, I need to create an absolute minimum of 3 virtually identical libraries because I need to have doors slab style doors with 2mm edging, 1mm edging and no edging. then within each of those libraries, we need to manually add the holes to the drawer fronts in each library so we can somewhat efficiently produce a job.

I could go on an on about other implicated areas too, such as a wall over tower cabinet which has a drawer at the bottom. I end up having to create a multitude of almost identical cabinets simply because it is too cumbersome to create them on the fly. Anyway, sorry to sound like I'm bitchin, cos I ain't I would just like to see this diffulcult area bought in line with the rest of the program which is simply awesome!

Sean

[Sean Jakob]

Kerry / Nat

Just for the record, the Hettich MutiTech uses different front fixing bracket hole spacing for the 54mm, than what it does for the 86,118 & 150mm.

In many brands such as;
a) Hettich Multitech
b) Blum Metabox
c) Hafele Innobox
d) Hafele Optibox

the location of the drawer front fixing clips, whilst mostly the same vertical spacing (for the locating dowels), the Y position in relation to the slide holes change according to the height of the slide.

Therefore in each of the above drawer systems, multiple hole patterns would need to be created.

Sean