If you're like most of us, you are in and out of your cabinets a lot. They are some of the most useful furnishing in your home.
Besides that they lend an important aesthetic feeling.
Hi I'm Avian Rogers and I'm Les Cizek and on today's programme we're going to show you how to build a simple bathroom vanity.
This project will demonstrate construction methods which you can apply to much larger cabinets.
You know, building your own cabinets, like any other woodworking project is fun, if you break it down into easy to manage steps, work carefully and patiently...
...so along with your basic woodworking skills you're in business.
And in fact a lot of people are building their own cabinets because they find they end up with a much better quality cabinet than if they had bought one commercially...
...and not only that, they save a lot of money aswell!
So if you join us down in the workshop we're gonna get started!
Let's start by looking at a completed bathroom vanity and all the component parts...
...so that when we start our building you will have an understanding of all the different steps and parts.
Now down here, this is called the "kick plate" and it usually indents 2 to 2.5" and allows for toe space when the unit is installed.
Then we build a base and attach the bottom shelf and start the assembly of the "shell" or the "carcass" of the unit.
The carcass is made from 3/4" oak veneer plywood.
Now this piece back here is called the "strongback" and it helps tie the whole unit together.
Since our unit is small and we will be pushing it up to a wall with plumbing pipes...
...we decided not to use any backing.
But you may decide to do that with a larger unit.
On the front we attach a "face frame" and the face frame looks like this in its unattached state...
And it creates the openings for the doors and the false front.
Since we're going to be putting a sink in here we won't be using a drawer but the false front is designed to look like a drawer and fill that space.
The steps required to build our vanity cabinet are:
1. Cut the plywood and assemble the carcass.
2. Then assemble the face frame
3. Attach the face frame to the carcass.
4. Build the doors and drawers if required.
5. Sand and finish the cabinets
6. Install the cabinet and attach the top.
7. And finally install the doors and the false front
Now in addition to regular shop tools...
...you will need a table saw, a router, clamps and an orbital sander
Let's get to work!!!
To start making our vanity cabinet we start by ripping our oak veneer plywood to the proper width.
And I set the saw at 17.75" and we'll be adding a 3/4" face frame onto that...
... so the total depth from the wall to the front of the unit will be 18".
Ok, even though we have these extension tables on our table saw, we are ripping a large piece of plywood so you definitely need some help...
...and we've even got a roller stand out there to help support the weight.
We want to make sure that we keep our plywod running smoothly along that fence
We ripped our ply to the proper width and now we are ready to crosscut for the sides of our cabinet...
... and the important thing about this set up is to get this straight edge exactly square to the stock.
We will use a circular saw for this cut and it's a very simple set up.
We know that the height of the total cabinet is 31" and a 3/4" inch top...
So we've set the straight edge up so that the saw blade will run just through the 34.75" mark
So with the straight edge in the right place we are ready to make our cut.
During our show today you will see us both ripping and crosscutting using the table saw.
And we have a special blade we use for that and it's called a combination blade and it's ideally suited for the work we are doing.
We are going to be cutting both plywood and solid lumber.
Plywood with all the glue in between the plies is very rough on a plain steel blade.
We are using this blade which has carbide teeth which have been brazed on here to the plain steel and this carbide will stay sharp for up to 30 times longer than a plain steel blade.
It also has a combination pattern, so it's set up to both cross cut and rip very efficiently.
So, this is the single ideal blade to have in your shop.
But if you want to consider having a specialty blade then you may want to consider this blade which is designed to cut especially plywood panel...
... which is that thin 1/4" panelling.
These tiny, little teeth are not as tough as the carbide blade...
..but will do a very good at cutting that thin plywood panelling
If you do not plan to do much plywood panel cutting then I would recommend the combination blade.
Now that we have all our plywood cut...
... we are ready to assemble the carcass.
And to do that we literally...
...start from the bottom and work upwards.
Right here is the base and the front piece is called the kick plate and this is the bottom of the cabinet , obviously.
Now the base, is simply
a rectangle of plywood, glued and nailed together
and our base is 3.5" tall
Now we take our bottom, and place it on top like so and then glue it and nail it to the base...
...squaring it up to the back
... so we end up with a few inches of toe space.
And once we've got our base assembled
and all fixed then we are ready to put the sides on.
And that's a very simple job
There's a little problem though and it's how to cut this notch
Because the notch does not match the bottom, it matches the face frame itself
as you can see goes right on like that and leaves a slight reveal
under here
other than that there are no special tricks needed
now we are ready to glue it and nail the carcass together
we already nailed the bottom to the base
so now we are ready to erect our sides by gluing it to the base
Before you put the clamps on make sure the sides are very flush because this is where the face frame goes on
ok let's put the clamps on
Since these sides are going to show
you want to take extra care in nailing so that you don't "ding" or dent your sides!
then we'll come back and set the nails so that the nail head rests below the surface of the wood
ok we're all set to put the strong back on
squeeze in on the clamp a bit just enough to hold it
you just want to make sure that the strong back is flush with all surfaces of the sides and especially on the top
because we don't want this sticking up too high
When you are using the Mark V, it's a great idea to have the joiner set up with the table saw
that way you can do your joining and your ripping and then you can come back and clean up your saw cuts on your joiner
I've finished ripping the stock for the face frame
and we are using solid oak to match the oak veneer plywood we are using for the carcass
But you can use any hardwood you like
Now if you are planning on painting your unit you may decide to use a softwood like fir, but unfortunately it doesn't stand up to the test of time the same way as hardwood does...
... and you won't get the same quality finish
OK, I'm set up now to cut the rails
OK now I'm set to cut the rails to the correct length. These are 3 horizontal pieces.
So I've set up a stop block here and we'll use the mitre gauge to guide the piece through
and we're going to get a nice, clean 90 degree cut
Did you ever break a chair when you were young and just before your mother grabbed you, you saw a joint like this?
That's a dowel joint
And they are used because they are strong and efficient and of course easy to make.
ANd that's what we are going to put our face frame together with
We're gonna put one of those joints in each intersection of the parts (styles and rails) so that this will be a very strong assembly
Before we do any drilling we need to make sure the face frame we cut is gonna fit the carcass we assembled previously
Now I see that we have 27" across here and 27" right there
Now you see I have measured across the bottom of the carcass and the reason for that is because the top is not tight yet
and we would then get a false reading
And of course the reason we make the, eh, face frame after the carcass is assembled is to make sure it fits right
Like you wouldn't tie your shoelace before you put them on your feet
That's why this gets made second
The next thing we gotta do is make sure that I mark very carefully where all the dowel holes will go so that the face frame will look right
We know that we need a 4.5" spacing here for our false front that we will put on later
So I measure that down, now a lot of people would make a mistake here, so let me show you how to avoid it
A lot of people would measure down here and make a mark and then measure same distance down the other side and make a mark there
That would very likely result in one of the rails doing this
Now to avoid that, we are going to align the two styles up right next next to eachother and you can see I have already made that mark
Then we're gonna take the square and mark the two styles at the same time, that means our rails will stay nice and square
Then I put my rail back here then using the square again, extend that mark right into the rail
so that when I drill my holes I'll know they'll line up right and that's the next step - drilling the holes
In order to make our dowel joints easily, we are going to use a dowelling jig
To put these two dowels in here like that
Now the dowelling jig is a very simple device that allows us to drill both holes with the same setting
Now there's an index mark on the jig that I line up with the mark that we already made on the style
and I'm gonna use the same procedure for when I drill the rail
So that will guarantee that all 4 holes will line up exactly and I will have a good joint
Now the only other thing I want to draw to your attention to is the red tape I have on the drill bit
I've set it so that I know that the dowel hole will be a little more than half the dowel length
Having done that I put my safety glasses on, I am ready to drill the hole
With the Mark V you can set the tool up into the horizontal boring position to cut your holes for your dowels
Now when we've got it into position, so then we want to set the depth.
SO we line the point up of the bit with the line, lock our coil into position, then we come over here to the depth position and lock that in
so the depth will go in slightly more than half the length of the dowel
OK then we unlock the coil and we're ready to go!
come down to the next one and line the point of the bit up with the centre of the hole
Beautiful!
Les has all the holes drilled for the dowels and I've inserted the dowels being careful not to damage them, so that when we put it all together..it's going to fit together smoothly
and we've glued everything on both sides of the joint
...where the end grain is exposed I have ensured to apply extra glue as the fibres in the wood will soak up a lot of the glue.
Ok, Les is going to help me clamp this whole unit together, work carefully to line up your dowels
with your holes and we are working from the top to the bottom
so everything's gonna line up well
using the clamp we're just going to squeeze these pieces together
once we've finished up we are going to put our face frame aside and let it dry overnight