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Door Hinges on the Bastard Wall Cabinet

The Bastard Cabinet: Now with Hinges!

It’s been far too long since I’ve worked (or blogged about) the Bastard Wall Cabinet. To be honest, nothings been done on the cabinet since my last post about it on March 22, 2011. That is, nothing until today. Keeping my head down and finishing my work homework on Saturday afternoon meant that I was actually able to steal a whole hour in the shop on Sunday.

I’m up to fabricating and installing the cabinet doors. As they will be relatively dimensioned, just like every other cabinet component, I decided to install the hinges first so that I can exactly mark the size of the doors.

I’m using Rockler Partial Wrap Slotted Piano Hinges. Though the brass platting breaks my usual chrome and brushed nickle aesthetic, these hinges are wonderful for doors made of sheet goods. The partial wrap means that on the door I’ll be screwing into both face and end grain so there’s no worry about screw holding power as there would be if I was only attaching to the end grain.

The hinges clamped in place, ready for marking.

I began by laying the hinges against the cabinet sides where they will be installed and marking them (I marked them on blue tape to make the pencil line easier to see). I used a try square to mark perpendicular to the hinge barrel. Then I took the hinges over to my bench, clamped them down and went to work with a fresh hack saw blade. That sized them right. A few quick passes with a file and the cut ends were nice and smooth.

Using relative dimensioning to position the hinges.

To install the hinges I began by fitting a scrap of ¾” baltic birch plywood (my door material) into the hing and setting it so that the scrap was flush with the end of the side panel as the final door should be. I then slid a temporary fence against the inside edge of the hinge and clamped the fence on. Once I removed the scrap door spacer, opened and clamped the hinge against the temporary fence, I was ready to install. I used a centering bit to pre-drill and then used an extra long bit in my screw gun to prevent the body of the screw gun from hitting the fence. I set the torque nice and low and each screw went in without a fuss.

In testing, the hinges seem to be working fine. Next I’ll re-mount the plane shelf (I forgot to account for door & hinge clearance when installing it) and then it’s on to doors. Hopefully this cabinet will be up on the wall soon.

Have you stolen and shop time lately?

Other Bastard Wall Cabinet Posts
Winter Wall Cabinet Wonderland
The Bastard Wall Cabinet (for tools!)
Trudging Towards Tool Storage
Cutting the Cabinet Carcass (in relative terms)
A Home For My Planes
Continued Wall Cabinet Assembly
Whats a Bastard Wall Cabinet without Shelves?

Boxing in the Bastard Tool Cabinet

Posted by nomino at 4:30 PM

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Labels: bastard, cabinet, door, hinges, on, the, wall