Carpentry standards and methods for new cabinets?
July 21, 2020 7:57 AM   Subscribe

We will be discussing with a GC new kitchen base and wall cabinetry. We want strong, well-built work. What kind of issues should we expect? There will no panelling, no moulding, but clean, flat-front. Probably maple. Edge-banding with a radius, or squared? What is Pro-Cor? Drawers to be dovetailed? puttied, chamfered edges, thickness? how is the drawer-front attached? Best drawer slides? Recycled countertop, Quartz? Other issues that will come up?
posted by ebesan to Home & Garden (13 answers total) 7 users marked this as a favorite
 
A lot of these are questions for a kitchen designer or cabinet maker, not a GC, who will be responsible (at most) for installing what the kitchen designer specifies and the cabinet maker supplies.
posted by MattD at 8:48 AM on July 21, 2020 [3 favorites]


It's really all up to you and your budget. I got a custom cabinet made with regular drawer slides (not soft-close) and it was super cheap. The main deciders are wood grade (paint vs stain) and add-ons like soft-close cabinets. Are you going full-custom?

A lot of mass-market cabinet places charge insane amounts for all the things you listed, but if you search around you can also find a local guy to do them for a fair price. Mass-marketers also have insane sales during certain times a year (like 25% off).

'Dovetail' is a buzzword now, almost all cabinets will have visible evidence of dove-tailing, even the big box store cheap-os, and it is not evidence of quality.

There are tons of cabinet stores around you (if you live in a city-ish type place) and they will show you their stuff and give you a graphic design layout. They are surprisingly low on the hard sales tactics (in my experience), and will usually give you the printouts for free.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:52 AM on July 21, 2020 [1 favorite]


Some thoughts based on our experiences:

We got a quartz countertop from a company called Caesarstone. There are different grades of quartz, with more expense depending on how much "vein" one wants. We didn't particularly want that, but they offered a thinner option (1.3 cm) than the other companies, which IMO gave a much lighter, elegant look.

Whichever product you go with, it really helps to look at samples. You might visit a kitchen remodeling shop, as they can show or get you samples, as well as have contacts your GC can use to work with distributors.

It was not a great experience working with Caesarstone. The slab we ordered was lost in shipment. What we got later on ended up having epoxy resin issues when it was manufactured, so that the surface looked damaged. They were able to buff out the damage, so that it is barely visible.

Make sure your GC knows about the layout of plumbing underneath any existing cabinetry, so that it can be planned for when ordering new cabinets. It became a "surprise", when a new cabinet did not fit against the weird plumbing layout we have.

If you are getting new appliances, make the installation sheets available to your GC to provide adequate space for gas and electric hookups. Perhaps ask for more clearance than the install sheets require. In our case, doing things to spec lead to a very tight fit that made installation difficult. For a while, the range stuck out a few more inches than it should.

Another issue that came up for us was electrical and gas work that required a permit and inspections, which lead to a code violation and expensive redo. Outlets needed to be spaced no more than four feet apart, but we had a kitchen with a large window that was in the way.

The initial suggestion was to drill a hole in the kitchen countertop and install a surface-mounted outlet in the middle (example), which would have looked terrible and been dangerous in case of a spill. But we were lucky enough to get the outlets moved close enough to the edges of the window to avoid this on the subsequent re-inspection.

The drawers we have are dovetailed. Cabinet door hinges and runners were from a company called Blum. The hinges and runners open and close smoothly. The hinges included stops, so that one door wouldn't slam into the door next to it, when opened. These are little details, but they matter a lot when using the kitchen.

We put LeMans in the corner cabinets and a Euro Cargo drawer to hold garbage and recycling.

Plan on the remodel taking a month or two longer than the GC says. Stuff invariably comes up and it can be difficult to order and get new bits and pieces in a timely fashion, especially now, given the current state of things.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 8:57 AM on July 21, 2020 [1 favorite]


I think you need to do some research on your own first about what you like, what fits your budget(cabinets were the second highest line item in my kitchen renovation after labor, and I have a small kitchen!) and what is available under your timeline. Cabinets take a while to construct, and if there's something wrong with them it can take a while to get them fixed/adjusted properly.

Budgets will vary tremendously based on your location, the quality and availability of local craftspeople and how complex your space is. Many people find Ikea to have good enough frames, and really great hardware, and then go for semi-handmade or another alternative for the cabinet fronts. Again- this is a budget constraint, I would price out Ikea so that you know what the lowerbound for cabinet pricing is, and adjust your budget from there. (see this blog for a recent renovation that used Ikea guts, with semihandmade fronts)

I have quartz countertops and I love them, I went with a cheaper option to Cearsarstone MSI Stone and I love that I can literally take stuff out of the broiler put it down on the counter and not worry about it. a bit of barkeepers friend takes up any stains. They counters look like real, but they do not feel like stone, if that is a concern for you.
posted by larthegreat at 9:09 AM on July 21, 2020 [2 favorites]


You'll want to decide whether you want face-frame or frameless / "Euro-style" cabinetry. Frameless cabinets make better use of space. They impose some appearance constraints, but those won't be an issue with the style of doors you mentioned.

As has been noted, much of this depends on preferences and budget. I had to look up Pro-Cor, and now that I know what it is, I can say it's a good idea if affordable. (It's plywood faced with layers of MDF). I wouldn't break the bank to get it, though. Sharp-edged doors with thin, machine-applied edgebanding will not stand the test of time, but alternate construction methods have a range of aesthetic, durability and cost implications.
posted by jon1270 at 9:27 AM on July 21, 2020


Response by poster: Thanks. We know our budget. We have the layout and dimensions. It is detailing, materials, and quality that concern us before we go any further.
posted by ebesan at 9:33 AM on July 21, 2020


+1 for quartz composite; my prior condo in Chicago had black granite counters and in my current place I installed white quartz (no veining pattern, just the "natural" speckle effect from manufacturing). It's been fantastic (much nicer than granite which needs sealing etc) -- I cook South Asian (lots of turmeric being fried in oil with spices), and this stuff is amazingly stain-resistant.

Mine is a Caesarstone competitor whose name I forget, but in the upper end of the cost range. Get a sample of whatever you're considering, take it home, and try to stain it overnight with foods you would use (for me, turmeric, wine, oils, etc.). Once you're done with the stain test, take the piece, set it on some wood, and hit it with a pot you would be cooking with, striking it in the center and on an edge (this is how I decided I didn't want Dekton). Incidentally, my countertop guy used a portable construction scanner to 3D map the kitchen, and I recommend this as well -- it means the countertop was fabricated to match the inconsistencies of my existing walls, so that there's no need to hide gaps where the wall pulls away etc. etc. Nice tidy edge all the way around (consistent sealer bead size etc.).

My backsplash is back-painted glass tile running full-height from the countertop to the underside of the cabinets, which I also recommend as it's a clean look and easy to take care of (see turmeric remarks above).

My cabinets are by Omega, and I'm pleased with the quality -- also, there was one anomalous panel, which they replaced without question, so that's nice. I went with all lower cabinets being drawers, and strongly recommend that approach as everything is now accessible to me regardless of storage depth (traditional door-front plus shelves means things vanish into the back depths).

All of my operating hardware (slides, hinges, etc.) are by Blum, and they're also quite nice -- the big pot storage shelf slides out all the way easily and confidently despite the weight. I went with 100% extension slides, and am glad of it.
posted by aramaic at 9:57 AM on July 21, 2020 [1 favorite]


I was confident that I was going to use Blum hinges and glides until I bumped up against the price. I went with Accu-ride drawer glides and they're great.
posted by kate4914 at 10:12 AM on July 21, 2020


+1 for frameless cabinetry. For quality hardware, that isn’t as expensive as Bloom, consider Richelieu.
posted by walkinginsunshine at 11:17 AM on July 21, 2020


We have soft close hinges on our cabinets and in some places they stick out into the cabinet and limit the width of things you can put in there. It not a huge deal, but it is something I would do differently on a redesign. The soft close feature is worth it, but try get an idea of how much room they take up.
posted by soelo at 11:23 AM on July 21, 2020


We used Costco for our cabinets, and got very high quality for a great price. They are solid wood, and very well-constructed. We went with a local shop for quartz - we’d have gone with Richlite, but it was way outside our budget. We got a granite composite sink from the countertop people and love it too.
We used a friend (master carpenter) to do the the install, and a janky electrician for that stuff (shoulda just paid the folks who did our new panel to do it all). We’re happy with the outcome, but you gotta project-manage the shit out of something like that. Be sure you have lots of buffer in your schedule- you’ll need it!
posted by dbmcd at 4:13 PM on July 21, 2020


Get a subscription to consumer reports then get the most recent back issues re: countertops, appliances, etc. The money you'll be spending? It's worth it to read independent reviews!
posted by lalochezia at 5:38 PM on July 21, 2020


I’d spend some time on Houzz and ask a bunch of questions there. We it did a big kitchen build/moved our kitchen as part of a remodel. We used a local cabinet shop-high quality work and significantly cheaper than larger brands. Soft close drawers, and almost all drawers in lower cabinets except for the corner, the garbage and under sink. The very best thing we did? Soapstone countertops. They are so lovely, easy care, and unlike quartz and granite, won’t crack with high heat or stain. They can scratch or chip, but we got a relatively hard variety and have had no issues a year later (and we have kids and are hard on our kitchen).
posted by purenitrous at 7:01 PM on July 21, 2020


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