jonny round boy
Member
- Joined
- Jul 21, 2007
- Messages
- 3,227
I'm currently building an in-frame kitchen, and needed some magnetic catches to hold the doors closed. These are based on a design that a kitchen company I used to work for made, but I made then a bit smaller.
FYI I'm documenting the full build of the kitchen on another forum, but will re-post it on the FOG later once it's all installed & complete.
The carcases were made from birch ply, so I wanted to use solid birch for the catches. Unfortunately, I couldn't get hold of solid birch, but I managed to get some sycamore which matches OK. The magnets I used are 20mm diameter by 5mm thick, bought direct from China off eBay. The ones for the blocks are solid, the ones for the doors have a countersunk hole in.
The design was drawn up in sketchup to get the dimensions right. The company I used to work for would produce these on the CNC machine, but since I don't have one I had to find another way to make them. I needed a template, but didn't want to make the template by hand. In my recent job working for a glass company, one of my roles was programming & operating their CNC machine, for cutting sheet glass, so I made a 6mm glass template:
[attachimg=1]
Since a glass template isn't terribly practical (!) I then used that with a bearing guided bit to produce a copy of it in 6mm MDF:
[attachimg=2]
The sycamore I bought was already thicknessed to 18mm, so all I needed to do was give it a sand both sides to take out the planer marks:
[attachimg=3]
I then cut it into two pieces to make the next steps a bit easier. Then I set up a 1/2" bit in my router table with a planning fence & cleaned up one edge of each piece. I was using some clear door buffers from Hafele that fit into a 6mm hole, so I drilled a hole in a piece of scrap, inserted one of the buffers, and then measured the height of it. This gave me the measurement I needed to set up the router to cut a rebate:
[attachimg=4]
[attachimg=5]
I needed to remove the bulk of the material, so I drilled a 15mm hole in each gulley, and then rough cut the shape with my carvex:
[attachimg=6]
[attachimg=7]
Changing back to a bearing guided bit, I then cut each piece to the required profile:
[attachimg=8]
[attachimg=9]
There are a total of 5 holes to drill in each piece, and they needed to be repeatable, so I built a quick jig that could be screwed to the table of my drill press. This consisted of just a fence and a small stop block:
[attachimg=10]
First up was the 20mm hole for the magnet:
[attachimg=11]
By resetting the jig position for each hole, I could quickly & easily drill all the holes identically across all the pieces. Here are the blocks after drilling, sanding, and with a quick coat of varnish applied with a brush:
[attachimg=12]
Once this was dry, the blocks were separated from the waste just by trimming them off with my TS55R. The magnets were quite a tight fit in the holes, however a small dab of PVA in the bottom of the holes helps keep them in place just in case. Note that the orientation of the magnets is critical - if they are wrong, the door will not close! Finally the buffers were installed:
[attachimg=13]
The blocks screw into the back of the frame:
[attachimg=14]
The doors are drilled with a 20mm bit for the opposing magnet, which is then secured with a short screw:
[attachimg=15]
I think the finished result looks better than any of the shop-bought magnetic catches, and looks far more 'bespoke', even though they are a bit bigger - the finished blocks are 60mm wide by 50mm high, and the projection below the frame is 30mm.
All in all, it took around 3 hours to make the 15 catches I needed, which I don't think is bad (that also includes the time to make the template/jig).
FYI I'm documenting the full build of the kitchen on another forum, but will re-post it on the FOG later once it's all installed & complete.
The carcases were made from birch ply, so I wanted to use solid birch for the catches. Unfortunately, I couldn't get hold of solid birch, but I managed to get some sycamore which matches OK. The magnets I used are 20mm diameter by 5mm thick, bought direct from China off eBay. The ones for the blocks are solid, the ones for the doors have a countersunk hole in.
The design was drawn up in sketchup to get the dimensions right. The company I used to work for would produce these on the CNC machine, but since I don't have one I had to find another way to make them. I needed a template, but didn't want to make the template by hand. In my recent job working for a glass company, one of my roles was programming & operating their CNC machine, for cutting sheet glass, so I made a 6mm glass template:
[attachimg=1]
Since a glass template isn't terribly practical (!) I then used that with a bearing guided bit to produce a copy of it in 6mm MDF:
[attachimg=2]
The sycamore I bought was already thicknessed to 18mm, so all I needed to do was give it a sand both sides to take out the planer marks:
[attachimg=3]
I then cut it into two pieces to make the next steps a bit easier. Then I set up a 1/2" bit in my router table with a planning fence & cleaned up one edge of each piece. I was using some clear door buffers from Hafele that fit into a 6mm hole, so I drilled a hole in a piece of scrap, inserted one of the buffers, and then measured the height of it. This gave me the measurement I needed to set up the router to cut a rebate:
[attachimg=4]
[attachimg=5]
I needed to remove the bulk of the material, so I drilled a 15mm hole in each gulley, and then rough cut the shape with my carvex:
[attachimg=6]
[attachimg=7]
Changing back to a bearing guided bit, I then cut each piece to the required profile:
[attachimg=8]
[attachimg=9]
There are a total of 5 holes to drill in each piece, and they needed to be repeatable, so I built a quick jig that could be screwed to the table of my drill press. This consisted of just a fence and a small stop block:
[attachimg=10]
First up was the 20mm hole for the magnet:
[attachimg=11]
By resetting the jig position for each hole, I could quickly & easily drill all the holes identically across all the pieces. Here are the blocks after drilling, sanding, and with a quick coat of varnish applied with a brush:
[attachimg=12]
Once this was dry, the blocks were separated from the waste just by trimming them off with my TS55R. The magnets were quite a tight fit in the holes, however a small dab of PVA in the bottom of the holes helps keep them in place just in case. Note that the orientation of the magnets is critical - if they are wrong, the door will not close! Finally the buffers were installed:
[attachimg=13]
The blocks screw into the back of the frame:
[attachimg=14]
The doors are drilled with a 20mm bit for the opposing magnet, which is then secured with a short screw:
[attachimg=15]
I think the finished result looks better than any of the shop-bought magnetic catches, and looks far more 'bespoke', even though they are a bit bigger - the finished blocks are 60mm wide by 50mm high, and the projection below the frame is 30mm.
All in all, it took around 3 hours to make the 15 catches I needed, which I don't think is bad (that also includes the time to make the template/jig).
