#8
With the lower curb-side case mostly resolved, the progress moves to the upper cabinet doors...
(above) I've thought a lot about the best way to access the cabinets...
Mike brought me an Ikea cabinet with a very nice Blum lift-up mechanism...Bulky but nice...It turns out that you can buy a cabinet with the hinges in it for $60 each...My wholesale hardware supplier's best price is $75 per pair...******...???...If I do the math, seven doors at $60 equals $420 just for hinges...Ouch...
I came up with simpler hinging alternative, but I got to thinking that a lift up door forces you to either step aside or lean back to get into the cabinets...I think we can do better than that...
Side swing doors create latching issues and it's not the most creative way to do things...
So on this project, I'm going with roll-up tambour doors...A tambour door in this application is an up-and-over opening door, made of narrow horizontal wood slats and "rolls" up and down, by sliding along vertical tracks...
(above) Commercially produced tambour doors aren't cheap...Figure $20 a sq. ft. for solid wood and that is for stock sizes...This project is odd sized, so the materials cost would be in the $500 range...No thanks, I'll make my own...
A while back I found over twenty, clear grain, straight and dry, 2x4 fir studs at Lowe's for 2.79 each...That's what I'll use...I'll use three of them...Cost, under $10...
(above) With an aggressive blade on the tablesaw, the 2x4's get ripped to a fat 1/4"...
(above) Next, run them through the planer, once on each side...
(above) The tablesaw has a router inset in the tabletop...A small round-over bit is used to ease the edges on two sides...
(above) Machine work 90% done...
(above) More than enough for both upper cabinets......
(above) The strips are cut to length plus an inch...The faces are up, then masking taped together...
(above) That's good enough to hold it together...
(above) Tambour doors can be held together several ways...For this project I'll keep it simple since the wood is thin and light...A fabric backing is glued onto the wood with contact cement...The fabric here is a heavy cotton canvas painters tarp I got at Harbor Freight for $4...
(above) A heavy layer of aerosol contact cement is sprayed on the canvas and wood...
(above) Flip the wood onto the canvas and hammer it down with a rubber mallet...
(above) Repeat the spray, flip and pound...
(above) Finally the panels are flipped over and the fabric is rolled hard with a rubber roller...
I love the fact that if you do it yourself, the cost to make all the tambour doors costs less than a single sq. ft. of commercially made tambour...Sure there is some labor involved, but to me, creating as much as I can myself, defines what custom is...And I live for custom...
That's the curb side doors...First thing tomorrow, the pre-cut driver side panels get taped and glued...Then the guide rails get made and the doors get fitted...
