Assembling an IKEA kitchen - how long to allow?

[D.M. Procida]

I need to work out roughly how long it will take to assemble a kitchen from IKEA. Based on experience, is there anything as conveninet as a rough formula along the lines of, say, 1 hour per cabinet?

Daniele

[The Medway Handyman]

Might be easier if you told us what you have to assemble.

[D.M. Procida]

Let's see...

4 tall (larder-style) cabinets 9 base cabinets 2 wall cabinets

oven combination microwave oven sink gas hob small fridge

The kitchen is an empty shell at the moment, with nothing in the way. Most of the stuff is going in a nice straight line along one wall. There are hardly any fiddly bits to be dealt with.

The worktops can come a bit later, and I don't need to worry about plumbing in the gas and so on.

So it's mainly to estimatye how long it will take to assemble the cabinets, put them together and put them in place. Even fitting them out with their shelves and doors and so on can follow later.

Daniele

[Andrew Gabriel]

I would say much less than that (at least, after you've done the first one), but the fitting time can be much longer than the assembly time. If you look at the total time to fit out a kitchen, the unit assembly time is probably quite a small part of it. The longest bits are probably the things you have to customise, such as fitting worktops, insetting sinks/hobs, any units you have to modify to work around limitations in the room, all the trim pieces which need cutting to length, etc.

If you also add in any replumbing, rewiring, tiling, painting, etc, the unit assembly time has probably become insignificant.

[A.Lee]

My only experience of an Ikea unit was a chest of drawers I had to assemble recently. I do kitchens for a living, it still took around 75 minutes start to finish. It was not easy, with instructions needed, as it was not obvious where which bits went where. Plain kitchen units may be quicker. Alan.

[pete]

When I had my new kitchen, it was installed "professionally" by that I mean by people who did it for a living and had the right tools, not that the standard of work was high. 2 of them: a gaffer and a labourer took

2 days to do the work. That didn't include installing a fridge, cooker or microwave, though they did install the worktops - including the sink which involved routing out the holes and jointing an "L" shaped section.

So that's 4 man * days. If this is your first time I'd say to expect twice as long: from unpacking the cartons, through to disposing of the packaging.

[The Medway Handyman]

Assuming just the carcass, doors & shelves later. What about drawers? They can take up a lot of time. And assuming two people, including unpacking, with somewhere to dump the large amount of packaging, so you don't end up tripping over it. Don't underestimate the amount of packaging, you are going to have a cardboard mountain.

Say 35 mins each, roughly 2.5 hours.

30 mins each, so 4.5 hours

An hour.

So, I reckon its a good days work for two people.

Two tips I can give on assembling flatpack, which I do a lot of; Get some kind of divided tray or container to sort the bits into. IKEA frequently use two sizes of locking cam for example, easy to get bits mixed up. I use a cheapo plastic nibbles tray I got from a supermarket. Much easier when all the bits are pre sorted.

I use a small driver to do up the bolts, screws, whatever. Get a 'bit' set from SF with hexagons etc. Much faster than using the supplied key. I love my Makita TD020DSE impact driver for this. If I were assembling that much I'd justify buying one for the job.

Is it just unpacking these? If so, I'd guess 3 hours.

Yeh right :-)

You've never met the fiddly bits fairy have you?

[the realfictitious]

The first thing is always the one that takes longest but once you know where everything goes the next ones should be quicker( in theory anyway) .Base units with doors will take less time than base units with drawers but then again base units have legs which C od D's don't have .

[Steve Walker]

Agree with above, plus -

Assemble each unit type in batches, much quicker. Do this in another room if possible, with an old rug or blanket on the floor so you can slide & invert carcasses without worrying about marking.

Run a line of glue along critical joints during assembly (eg the main outer panels that make up the 'box'). Result is much stronger than relying on gimmicky fast-fit cams & self-tappers.

I would aim to assemble the units in a day. Then allow a second full day for aligning & levelling, notching for cables, planing for fit, fixing to wall and nailing on the worktops, adding doors etc.

[D.M. Procida]

I've seen this mentioned several times, as an IKEA-furniture-building technique.

Is it really necessary, for items that will be screwed to each other and a wall, and to a heavy worktop?

Daniele

[Andrew Gabriel]

Not at all -- I've never done it. They're rock solid if you've put them togther and fixed them correctly.

Very occasionally, you might want to take a unit apart again, e.g. to cusomise it, and you'd be screwed if you'd glued it (well, not literally;-)

[Steve Walker]

I agree that it's generally not 'necessary', especially with a great big worktop running across the top of them. I just like things to be strongly built, and I have an particular aversion to rickety self-assembly units of any sort (they remind me of my failure every time I use then).

[geoff]

Or the fuckit factor - missing and / or damaged parts

[Owain]

nods sadly.

Owain

[Mike Tomlinson]

In article , Steve Walker writes

If you used a rubbery glue, it'd also help seal the edges of the chipboard so that if they got wet they wouldn't self-destruct.