Most Helpful Customer Reviews
106 of 107 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent instruction using modern materials and methods, August 15, 2000
This review is from: Build Your Own Kitchen Cabinets (Paperback)
Modern materials and methods means particle board and particle board screws with solid wood face frames and solid frame and panel doors that overlap the cabinet opening, and modern hidden hinges and modern european plastic feet and modern drawer slide hardware. If you want to optimize the look of your kitchen with minimum cost, this is the book for you. Step by step, very good writing, solid construction teaching. If you're into more traditional frame and panel construction using solid wood and/or high grade veneered plywood, rabbet joinery, mortise and tenon joinery or dovetail joinery, butt or knife hinges with flush fit doors, then this book is NOT for you. This book will teach you how to build cost effective cabinets using modern techniques and modern materials and it will teach you very effectively.
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45 of 46 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Yes, the example cabinets are UGLY..., July 5, 2006
but don't throw out the baby with the bathwater!
The late Danny Proulx was an EXTENSIVE contributor to cabinetry schools and magazines for many years before succumbing to a heart attack at a woodworking convention, but his passion lives on in this wonderfully simple and comprehensive book.
If you want to learn how to build high end custom cabinetry with all the nice details then look at udo schmidt's or jim tolpin's books. If you want to learn the basics to building a solid face frame cabinet with raised panel doors or frameless cabinets, this is an amazing introduction into the world of cabinetry as the author not only describes the steps but also gives you ACTUAL DIMENSIONS for both 5/8" and 3/4" materials for cabinets that are in the standard 3" widths. Not many people realize the merits of proulx's hybrid face frame/frameless cabinet which enable you to save yourself a lot of grief and pain in attaching european hinges and drawer slides to the cabinet sides directly without having to shim out to accomodate the inner lip of the face frame. This is the first book that I've encountered that describes this process. Finally, his section on frameless (or FULL ACCESS) cabinetry is invaluable for folks who don't want to buy a jointer and a planer (both are required) for machining solid wood for face frames. This is also one of the first books to explore this area of cabinetry. Lest you think that european frameless is junk, I recommend poggenpohl or omega cabinets as references.
Yes, the pictures of the cabinets are rather hideous because they utilize low grade plywood slab doors, but you can easily build cabinets that rival those that you see at home depot with SUPERIOR case construction methods but using raised panel doors. I would recommend using pocket screws to attach the face frame to the carcase instead of nails as well as using either confirmat screws, biscuits or assembly screws (NOT drywall screws) for assembling the carcases.
Realize that if you are serious about building your own kitchen cabinets and you want them to turn out good, you are going to need to INVEST some money in good tools including a table saw. You can forgo the slider by building a cheap miter sled but if you're going to be doing this in the future, I would strongly recommend the sliding table attachment by delta or jessem or dewalt or purchasing a guided circular saw rail like eurekazone or festool. Lastly, I would strongly recommend using prefinished material either plywood or melamine as the finishing process for my eleven kitchen cabinets easily consumed just as much time as building them.
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35 of 36 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Buy this book!, September 10, 2003
If I could give more stars, I would. I've never built anything out of wood before, and I just finished building all my kitchen and bathroom cabinets. I did not use melamine (the author is a fan of this material), as it would not be good for resale value in my particular area. I used polyurethaned birch plywood for the kitchen cabinets, and painted MDF for the bathroom cabinets. Using the author's instructions, they turned out very well, with very little hassle. The author has a no-nonsense approach to building cabinets (e.g., using screws in a butt joint, rather than time-consuming dados/rabbets). This saved me a lot of time and hassle. Since I was a beginner when I started this project, it was especially appealing. Certain other books were overwhelming to me because of the amount of space dedicated just to joinery. I've nothing against these other methods, but it was refreshing to see that they weren't actually necessary. Given the limited amount of time I had to build quality cabinets, it was the obvious choice for me. I'd recommend this book to anyone who wants to build his/her own cabinets, regardless of experience level. Also, I emailed the author to make sure the cabinets/cabinet legs would support my concrete countertops, and received a reply within 24 hours. A lot of authors will forget about the little people once they are published, but not this guy! (BTW, there was no support problems.)
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