Does Anyone Rabbet and Dado Cabinets Anymore?

Re: Does Anyone Rabbet and Dado Cabinets Anymore?

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

If one is experienced I don't see that dadoes and rabbets are any more effort than these flimsy ways to assembly. However, inside the boxes that are the cabinets I like adjustable shelving.

Not me...

John in New Mexico

First set I built about that way, though with M-T face frames glued onto boxes that were rabbetted and dadoed.

Next set I built with pocket hole joinery throughout (both had adjustable shelves btw) and it was vastly easier and quicker to do.

Last kitchen I did a couple years ago I didn't have the time to spare building cabinets so I let my wife buy what she wanted and I installed them. I would have done pocket holes again if I had built them, but I would have changed the box design to a system that sits on a curb instead of cutting toe kicks into a box. The 4" tall curb box provides the toe kick, you level it carefully and then the rest of the install goes easier since you have thus minimized the fussing with each individual box.

Speaking for me

Ellis Walentine

Sometimes.

We always used to use rabbet construction for sheet-goods cabinets because all we needed was a router and a couple bits. Figuring things was easy enough: just make the pieces longer by the length of the tongue(s). As you mentioned, they were solid as a rock.

Then along came biscuit joinery and Lamello, and all the production shops embraced the new method right away. Pieces could be cut to exact length and the methodology was simple and foolproof. Soon, hobby woodworkers could own an affordable biscuit joiner, and the old construction methods fell by the wayside. Pocket screws and Kreg-style jigs and their knockoffs entered the picture, too, and offered yet another quick and dirty solution to cabinet construction, particularly useful for face frames.

As for the comparative integrity of these methods, you have to measure them against their proposed function. If these joints are never going to be loaded to the breaking point, and if they aren't somehow leaky or otherwise deficient, for practical purposes -- and, they save you time and money -- why not use them?

Ellis

If my front door ...

H Bruce McCrory

.... is solid wood, it better be full M&T. But in this world steel seems to be more practical.

Re: Does Anyone Rabbet and Dado Cabinets Anymore?

William Duffield

It depends on what I'm building.

If it's an 18th Century reproduction box to stuff my sox, I use hand sawn dovetails in solid wood, hidden behind mouldings. I won't bore or confuse you with the complications of quarter columns.

For kitchen cabinets, I've used and still prefer rabbets, drywall screws and glue, but I figure the cabinets will be supported by the walls and floor, which add substantial additional strength. I used to use biscuits for face frames, but Dominos are quicker and stronger, and take less planning, since you never have to cut the corners off of them and they never show.

For shop cabinets, jigs, racks, etc., I usually use Dominos without glue and with minimal metal fasteners.

In general, I don't use dados, except for one pair to hold one fixed shelf in the middle of a case of tall bookshelves. Instead I use shelf pins or ball bearing slides, depending on the application.

I made my kitchen that way...

David Weaver

But recognize that it's unusual now. The cabinets in the kitchen were good hardwood ply ,but I didn't know how cheaply they were constructed (about 40 years old) until I took them off the wall - little between the show faces was as strong.

I worked in a cabinet factory for years and the cabinets were held together with hot melt and staples - they probably held together OK.

Mine were rabbet and dado because I could understand how it would hold up, and that's about it. I could see if biscuits or whatever is the norm now is good enough and there is price pressure, making the dadoes and rabbets would suffer unless they somehow allowed the use of cheaper material.

I'm not sad about it other than the fact that glue ups with one person and no "clamp" like we had at the cabinet factory to mash everything together nice and square and tight and very quickly - that made for some interesting one man work, and I could easily see why crisply cut stuff held together by biscuits would be much easier to get assembled.

Re: Does Anyone Rabbet and Dado Cabinets Anymore?

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

John, in my view, the modern joinery options are just fine for furniture or fittings that have a limited life expectancy. If you purchase from Ikea, are you really expecting heirloom pieces? What is the average life of a kitchen before it is considered out-of-date? I built a beautiful, solid Hard Maple kitchen doors and drawer fronts using Dominos and Melamine cabinets. The previous kitchen was built 25 years ago.

However, when it comes to the furniture I build, my choice is to do it the “traditional” way … proper joinery and no shortcuts. This reflects the different expectation that design, longevity and quality are part of the construction.

I am about to build another outdoor table. My consideration here is how to make it last as long as possible. Wood movement and preventing any rotting of joints become a prime concern. I am exploring the best methods for this and prepared not to take shortcuts.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Yes, on the kind of "cabinets" I'll make

John K Jordan

I use rabbet and dado joints for most of my limited cabinet construction, mostly for utility things in the shop and garage, glue and screws, very strong and totally functional. Appearance is not important. Most was done quickly on a radial arm saw - after I gave that away I use the slider on the table saw.

I simply don't enjoy much of the "fancier" woodturning; I'd rather be woodturning. I gave away my biscuit jointer in a benefit auction after using it a few times and deciding someone else would enjoy it more.

Right

Ellis Walentine

There's no equivalent to mortise-and-tenon joinery for heavy construction like doors and furniture, where strength and rigidity must be optimized.

Ellis

Yup

Mark Mandell - Gone Round in New Jersey

Back of the case is always rabbeted to inset a backing board (usually 1/2" ply).

SWEMBO insists on movable shelves, so the line of shelf pin holes get drilled with a jig on a case up to 48" tall. Higher than that and I make one shelf stationary in a stopped dado.

I've also made bookcases with stationary shelves but instead of dadoes I use 1/4" ply as spacers between the shelves and then face off the front. The spacers get glued in (sides are then a full 1"), the shelf sits on and glued, and then the shelf's toe nailed into the case side. The next spacer hides the nails and you build up like that.

Very strong method even without a backing board.

Re: Speaking for me

TomD

I agree, you don't need to use anything more than biscuits. I make that kind of cabinet with biscuits in the corners, and adjustable shelves, and usually flush mount hinges, the kinds that open widely. Very fast, clean, and easy for anyone. It is pretty straight forward, but if you want instruction Franz Klaus has a good tape on biscuit joints. Yup, Mr 3 minute dovetails. You can also assemble some pretty complicated and interesting pieces with biscuits. And have no idea what is holding them together.

Speaking of screws, years ago I had some chip board. I don't know where it came from, since I have never bought any. But I sawed it up , and made some shelves out of it, where the shelves were held in place with some particle board screws. Maybe 6 inches by 24 inches each shelf. I had two screws in each end of each shelf. You could not come up with a less appetizing method of assembly. It ended up storing turning supplies including a lot of heavy chucks. Never has given any trouble. Even less inspiring, it is held on the wall with french cleats, and the shelf side of that is particle board cleats. You would think that the cleat at least would have failed, but no such luck.

When I was a kid my parents had a nice face frame set of cabinets in their kitchen. It was all held together with nails, and mounted to the inside corner on one side of he kitchen with only 2 nails. Amazing what a few nails will handle. They were massively heavy units, and they supported a lot of heavy dishes. This was pre-plywood, all 1 inch pine boards.

Re: I made my kitchen that way...

TomD

Biscuits are better than most dadoes, as you get automatic fit. In a factory you can get your dadoes set up perfect and just run a lot of stuff, but in the home shop, every sheet of plywood seems different these days and even before that, there could be some blade shimming involved getting one dado set up. Dadoes take a huge chunk out of the adjacent piece, which is a lot of dust with today's crap panels, and they don't have much structural integrity, when you have cut into something like MDF. And you have to pay for all those "tenons" No doubt works great, but never occurred to me that it was the quality option. Plus they are ugly from the front, though presumably someone likes the "exposed Joinery" look.

Biscuits are very strong. I made some Krenov horses using them at least 30 years ago, and used them in massively abusive situations. Eventually they needed regluing, but they were standing in place of tenons in very exposed joinery, and huge loads were put on them. They probably would not have needed regluing if they had had a dowel between the two biscuits. That is the one vulnerability, they have the possibility of breaking out if there is minor axis overloading. But that takes some real work to achieve. A dowel solves that. There is a biscuit joint like machine for doing dowels which would be cool.

I'm sure they'd have been fine...

David Weaver

.I don't have a biscuit joiner, though.

When I made my cabinets, I was very wary of plywood quality, and went to a commercial supplier and bought columbia forest products cherry ply with two A faces. The core looks to me like it's poplar (which some may not like for screw holding, but there's not much in mine that screws are holding).

What I did would have no commercial appeal, though - the glue ups with all dadoes and reasonably tight tolerance are more trouble than they'd really need to be.

I made the last 10 feet or so of cabinet lengths (one corner cabinet, one long multi-space base cabinet) with hand tools only and the ply was easy and clean to rabbet and dado with old planes. To make it easier on myself for the boxes, I made the dado plane a smidge wider than the ply thickness, but not a 32nd or anything. The glue-ups went a lot better than precise size.

With one person, if the ply had warped at all, it would've been extremely difficult to assemble the cabinets. It's something I wanted to do, though (face frames, solid center panels, higher value ply sides rabbet and dado) - there's really no value in that to anyone else.

My wife doesn't like the color, and she doesn't like the "dirt" in the wood (the grain variation). If I'd have found some kind of uniform laminate doors with a decent wood grain pattern, but completely without the look of any natural variation, she'd have loved them, and I don't usually have much to do with the furnishing in the main house, but I made the cabinets what I wanted and I guess wasn't a real good boy asking the mrs. too many questions about "what would you like?).

As a designer.....

H Bruce McCrory

.... this has been one of my greatest pleasure's. In my case it has been chairs. I am on my second set, after dealing with complications and construction details to resolve earlier methods. The first build followed the demise of a purchased set. A dining set is in the works now, hopefully to be completed before the metal of the existing rusts away.

Enjoy your adventure, Derek.

"I am about to build another outdoor table. My consideration here is how to make it last as long as possible."

Re: Does Anyone Rabbet and Dado Cabinets Anymore?

Clint Searl

36" x 84" Ipe decking joined to a batten with countersunk bronze machine screws, floating on a patinated copper base. No joints to fail and totally weatherproof. Should last a few years.

Re: Does Anyone Rabbet and Dado Cabinets Anymore?

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

Thanks Clint! That is a great looking table top.

It is a little similar to the one I built about 15 years ago, which I now plan to replace. This was shortly after it was built ...

It was not a great design, with a mitred frame. The corners were secured with a pinned splines.

Interestingly, these actually proved to be quite strong - stronger than the boarded top, which exploded one day after it was rained on. The boards were too close together to cope with expansion. They were re-installed with wider gaps, and are still going strong. I just want to build a nicer looking table.

The top will go, and the trestle base will be re-used ...

Regards from Perth

Derek

Re: Board and Batten Table Top Construction

William Duffield

Why did you drive the screws in through the top boards and into the battens, instead of turning it over and driving them through the battens and into the top boards? If you had done it the other way, the screw heads would not be visible.

Re: Board and Batten Table Top Construction

Clint Searl

I wanted a fit that would allow the individual boards to pivot relative to the batten and could be tightened if necessary. Machine screws with nuts seemed more accommodating and reliable than regular wood screws. Plus, I liked the appearance of a row of exposed clocked heads declaring their use.