Max size for cabinet door?

[gw]

I'm in the process of designing a pantry for a kitchen remodel. The pantry cabinet will be 30" wide, 84" high, and 24" deep. I was planning to use the lower 60" of the cabinet as pantry space, with a double-door cabinet above.

Due to the cabinet's right edge being against a wall, I would like to use a single door on the cabinet, hinged on the left. The door would have a 4" deep set of wood shelving on the inside for storage of canned goods and small items. If I use a double door, the shelving on the inside of the right door would block access to the cabinet shelves, as the door will not open past 90 degrees.

This would give me a door approx. 29" wide and 59" high. I'm using a frame-and-panel overlay door, in birch. I was figuring on using a center stile and making it a 2 or even a 4 panel door to avoid having a huge panel.

Any other suggestions - is this a bad idea? How many hinges should I use to support the weight?

-Gary

[mare]

IMNSHO it's a bad idea. Not because the door would be too heavy, but because you need also 30 inches in front of it. And having a door on the right of a room that opens towards you (hinges left) is also not very practical because it means you need to evade the door and so you need even more room to open it. Since pantries need to be accessed often this takes just too much time, effort and walking.

Suggestions:

- use double doors and don't attach anything to the right door.

- use a caroussel type shelving unit with only one door (right hinged but on the left side of pantry) if you open that door the shelves open up.

- use a slide out larder unit; this gives you easy access to the pantry shelves and gives you way more practical storage.

[Leon]

Like mare has indicated, do you have 30" of room to swing the door with out YOU having to move out of the way when you open it?

[Richard Cline]

The 24" depth makes it difficult to access the back of shelves. I like the idea of making slide out units like drawers. It provides full access.

Dick

[Chris Melanson]

Use a 3/4" scribe down the right edge to give clearance for your doors on the right hand side and look for the euro 170 degree hinges for the left hand side as they open 170 degrees as opposed to the 110 degree as the regular ones do so it should fix your access prob. I would never make a cabinet door over 22 inches for anything they become to large and bulky past that piont.

Chris Melanson BLH Millwork Ltd.

[gw]

I have plenty of room for swing - about 7' from the face of the cabinet to the opposite counter.

[gw]

Thanks for the suggestions - I'm going to re-think it.

[gw]

I was planning something more along the lines of this:

it is preferred by SWMBO over the pull-outs or the carousels. Maybe I'll dump the door shelves and go with a double or a bi-fold door.

Thanks for the ideas.

[Leon]

With that in mind, do you want to treat that cabinet as if you were opening your front door to go out side each time you open it.

[gw]

All good points - I'm back to the drawing board.