Help how to Cut down a cabinet?

20 years ago

I hope that someone can give some suggestions on my issue. I have a small 3 drawer unit that goes between the counter top and the bottom of the wall cabinets. My problem is that the manufacturer made the cabinet 1/8" too tall, 18 1/8 instead of 18" as it should have been and I set my cabinets to have 18 1/64" between the counter top and the bottom of the wall cabinets. The drawer unit is a framless unit with 5/8 plywood top, bottomand sides, it measures 24" wide, 12" deep and 18 1/8" tall. I need to take 1/8" off the height, are there any suggestions on how to do this? I was thinking about trying to find a millworks and asking them to cut it down.

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Comments (5)

User
20 years ago
If I were trying to do that I would look first at the bottom to see if the 1/8" could be removed there. There are several ways in which 1/8" can be removed, depending on the material. Marking the line around the whole frame, scoring that line with a utility knife and using a belt sander to sand off the 1/8" is probably the best way, since teying to use a circular saw is a bit of a problem unless the blade is a special finish cut blade. Using a jig saw is worse---very difficult to saw a straight line---and there in little support for either type of saw.
tonbiak
Original Author
20 years ago
handymac, thanks for the suggestions. As I said above the bottom and top are both 5/8 plywood. I have thought about taking a circular saw and running it around the edge and remove he 1/8" off the top and bottom,1/16" each. However that will leave me the middle to figure out how to cut as my circular saw is only a 5 1/2" saw. I have also thought about putting it on the 10" table saw and removing 1/16", just the thickness of the blade,from each end and sanding the middle down.
What I really would like to find is a shop that has a large band saw that could make the cut all at once or a large flatbead sander that could take off the 1/8".
Marking and sanding with a belt sander is my least favorite choice as there is a greater chance of the bottom being less than smooth and flat, although it may be my best bet as I can control the amount of wood that is being removed.
Further suggestions will be helpful.
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mfederwi
20 years ago
How are the top and/or bottom attached? I would try to disassemble it and then cut the sides down and put the top back on. If that is not possible, maybe you could make an adjustment to the upper cabinets. Maybe you could post a pic.
Jon1270
20 years ago
Got a router? If you do, use a straight bit to hog out the middle area first, then do the perimiter with the table saw.
tonbiak
Original Author
20 years ago
Thanks for all of the suggestions. I set up my table saw with an 1/8" keef blade to take off just the blade width from the bottom of the cabinet with the blade raised all the way up. I then made 4 passes one on each side and ended up with an island of untouched material in the middle. To get rid of the island I took a sharp wood chisel and chiseled it off and then sanded the bottom. The bottom isn't a pretty as it was with the finished natural maple, but it will never be seen again and it fit like a glove.
Thank all of you again for the help. Each of you helped me come up with the solution because you started me thinking about different aspects of the problem that had different solutions and then I could use the tools that I am most comfortable with to get the job done.
Thanks again.