Attaching drawer fronts to drawers

I'm just an amateur, wouldn't claim to be a "cabinet making guy" but how about clamping the drawer front to the drawer, then using a transfer punch or dowel center in the 1/4" holes to mark the pilot hole center?

:wq

I had a similar thought last night after stopping work.

Normally I don't like wiggle room on drawer fronts, I like it to stay exactly where I put it. I always figure a way to insure the fronts are where I want them before drilling/screwing. If I ever screw it up, I could enlarge the hole later for needed wiggle room.

I have put 1/4" holes in the drawers. I have washer head

Vix bits are used for centering holes in hinges, drawer pulls and what not, but the accuracy of a vix bit would diminish the thicker the material. You should get reasonable results if you are careful. Anyone installing hinges, drawer pulls etc. should have vix bits. Not sure if mine would work in a 1/4" hole, they might slide right in, but would probably still work.

I've watched a lot of professional trim carpenters do this in various ways. Their preferred method is as you're doing, except they use a cabinet screw made by FastCap, with a big head, for the hole that is much larger than the shaft of the screw, giving them the wiggle room for which you're seeking ... the size of the hole they use means they don't need the precision in locating the hold.

I'm not enamored of this method unless you really need 1/32 adjustment precision, which occasionally happens.

Now what you're asking for, but my favorite method, particularly for overlay drawers, is to pre-drill two holes in the drawer; screw in a sharp pointed drywall screw, with just the sharp point sticking out; then, with the drawer closed and using a shim cut for the purpose on the bottom of the drawer front, align the drawer front and press it hard into the sharp points of the protruding screws; remove the drawer, holding both pieces together, and screw the drywall screws in just far enough to make an indention to start the real screws; remove the drywall screws and replace with the desired screw.

I've tried every method there is and the above is still my standby; and you can do it much faster, and with a lot more precision, than you can explain it.

Swingman wrote in news:l7ednbWY0JyNLUrQnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@giganews.com:

I need to remember that, Karl. Seems easy, maybe add some double-stick tape to hold the front in place on the drawer.

Like Swingman I have done it the way he had described for many years but I am currently working on 8 drawers on 2 tower cabinets and am going to try out a new method that I dreamed up.

First off, decide where your drawer pull hardware is going to go on the outer drawer front and predrill small holes in the outer drawer front, just large enough to guide a couple of screws and put in a couple of screws in that location but "just past" the back surface of the outer drawer front.

Place the drawer front where you like it and screw the 2 screws into the drawer. Your drawer front is now attached to the drawer in the correct location. Open the drawer and put in permanent attaching screws from the inside out.

Remove the first 2 outer screws and finish drilling those holes all the way through and attach the handle.

If I can get things aligned quick enough, I like a couple of dabs of hot melt glue. Position the front, let the glue set, drill the holes, remove the front, peel away the glue, reassemble.

-Bruce

That works very well providing you're careful, but is not as fast, IME ... and the thickness of the tape can be an issue with the fit and finish, although that's not a serious consideration with most projects.

I think Leon's new method is great, particularly if you have full say so where the hardware is going ... but, and there is always a gotcha in most methods, often our clients don't know where the hell they want their hardware to be situated until they see the cabinets installed, and this is something you can't change your mind on.

AAMOF, we've got one client right now that changes her mind 11 times in

There are at least three of Leon's beautiful "Domino Drawers" that have gone to waste ... even on a cost plus job, that aggravates my sensibilites to no end. My tongue is almost bitten through at this point.

Bruce wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@maha.sdc.org:

Bruce's method seems to me (a newbie, really) similar to the double stick tape idea. But I like Leon's approach best ... I'll use that next!!

OK for what it is worth, I tried my method and it works like a charm. I attached 4 drawer fronts to he first tower using the method mentioned above and results were exactly as expected. The second set of 4 drawer fronts with no fuss or tweaking took 4 minutes for all 4 drawers.

I'll attach pictures at a.b.p.w.

Thanks to all of you for your help. I have posted three pictures of the finished project in alt.binaries.pictures.woodworking if you are interested.

Dick Snyder