Crown Molding to Wall Cabinets.... HUH?????

[infiniteMPG]

We just got our new Cardell cabinets and the 3" crown molding. The upper part of the wall cabinets doesn't have any extra material to fasten the molding to and the small lip of the crown molding doesn't have anything we can see to rest upon. The crown molding does not appear to have room to sit on the face of the cabinet boldy as the doors are full overlay and there's barely any face showing at the top face of the cabinet body. The top is flush.

Is there some secret to attaching crown molding to the top of the wall cabinets that we're missing? The crown molding is going to sit against the ceiling so anything that would require accessing the top of the cabinets after installing can't happen.

We were thinking of fastening a small strip like 1x2 down the top of the cabinets and then fasteneing the crown molding to that but it seems there should be some proper way of doing this.

Any help?

[Joe]

Truss movement or uplift is a common problem with ceilings these days, so crown molding is installed snug to the walls and fastened to the ceiling. That may apply in this case, Worth checking that possibility for a tidy installation.

Joe

[SteveBell]

I hear you saying that you have European-style cabinets where the door completely covers the upper rail, leaving no place to nail the crown molding. Please correct me if this is wrong.

The proper way to install the crown molding is any way that works. Your proposal to install blocking should work.

I'm a big fan of try before you buy: * Cut a short piece of crown to play with. * Put the blocking in place temporarily with tape. * Hold your piece of crown against the blocking and ceiling to verify that it looks the way you want. Check against the ceiling, against the wall, and at the front edge of the cabinets. * Move the blocking in and out, up and down, until everything looks the way you want. * Permanently attach the blocking. This may be difficult. Sometimes it's easier to take the cabinets down. Construction adhesive and clamps may be your only option.

Buy the straightest blocking and crown you can find, otherwise you have those problems in addition to all your others. Put the finish on the crown before you install it.

[infiniteMPG]

completely covers the upper rail, leaving no place to nail the crown molding. Please correct me if this is wrong.

The cabinet doors cover the face of the cabinets side-to-side completely, but at the top and bottom there is 1/4" of the face showing. Not a complete coverage but enough to make it near impossible to attach to. In fact seeing you're in TX, the cabinet company is Cardell, also in Texas.

proposal to install blocking should work.

Kind of getting that feeling about a lot of parts of this project :O)

problems in addition to all your others. Put the finish on the crown before you install it.

Sounds like a good plan, the molding came with the cabinets so they were very good material and also pre-stained to match the cabinets.

Thanks for your help!

[David Starr]

I glued a 1x1 strip to the back of the crown molding - made a jig to hold everything in position while the glue dried, then glued the strip to the top of the cabinets. Worked perfectly. I glued the strip 1/4" up from the bottom of the molding.

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