Dominos to hang cabinets

[leftistelf]

Would you use a domino for hanging cabinets?

 

[semenza]

Interesting.  How would you do this?  A strip on the wall to hang them similar to a french cleat set up?  Alignment could get tricky.

Seth

 

[ccarrolladams]

Would you use a domino for hanging cabinets?

My shop builds custom cabinets for wholesale clients 6 days a week. Many of those are uppers, which typically hang from walls over base cabinets.

Almost always we use French-style cleats to support the uppers.

We do use Dominoes constructing certain kinds of both upper and base cabinets. My experience is that with appropriate design for cabinets Dominoes are just as robust as more traditional methods.

 

[bwiele]

ccarroll, I've been thinking about this very topic for some wall mounted shop cabinets that I'm intending to build (to gain some experience before I start some other projects around the house).  Can you post a picture of where you put the French Cleat?  Do you set the rear of the cabinet in enough so that the mating pieces of the cleat are essentially behind the back of the cabinet but still allows the cabinet side to sit flush on the wall?  Hopefully my question is clear - I'm having a hard time articulating the question accurately.  I'm only 2/3 thru today's first cup of coffee...

Thank you, Brian

 

[kfitzsimons]

I made an upper cabinet out of 3/4" melamine to hold 6 systainers. I inset the back 3/4" to house a 1x4 that is attached to the wall. Like a cleat. I put three of the largest dominoes into the top of the 1x4 and made enlarged (wider) domino slots in the top of the cabinet to house the dominoes in the cleat. Not sure I'm explaining clearly. To make sure the weight is supported, I also put a 1x4 under the cabinet that is screwed into the wall. So far, so good.

 

[ccarrolladams]

ccarroll, I've been thinking about this very topic for some wall mounted shop cabinets that I'm intending to build (to gain some experience before I start some other projects around the house).  Can you post a picture of where you put the French Cleat?  Do you set the rear of the cabinet in enough so that the mating pieces of the cleat are essentially behind the back of the cabinet but still allows the cabinet side to sit flush on the wall?  Hopefully my question is clear - I'm having a hard time articulating the question accurately.  I'm only 2/3 thru today's first cup of coffee...

Thank you, Brian

Hi Brian and Everyone,

Where to place the solid batten or cleat on the back of upper cabinets takes a little thought. For example, how much space do you have between the top of the cabinet and the finished ceiling?

My preference is to put the solid cleat just under the top. The back of the upper cabinets is set in enough to hide the cleat and still leave enough side material to scribe for a neat fit along the wall. Except, when there is a run of uppers such that only the outside side pieces needs to be scribed.

Since I have always only made custom cabinets, the only constraint to the width of a cabinet is the path from off-loading the truck to the room where the cabinets will be installed. Given a clear shot, which happen more than you would think because I tend to work on very large homes, I routinely make cabinets over 8' in width. Once installed they usually appear to be an assembly of typical narrow units. My experience has been build my way the cabinets are more robust. Shaking of homes is a major issue in my parts of Southern California. These wider cabinets tend to rack and twist less. Year after year the reveal around doors stays the way the cabinets were designed.

Usually the backs of my uppers are 18mm plywood, since the back is the primary structural element. The downside is my cabinets require robust installers. Most of the installers have been working with me for a lot of years. Many of them are my actual clients, the folks who sell the jobs to the home owner.

By the way, I started advocating building the base sled which serves as the toe kick space as a separate structure in 1959. Once that sled is installed level, placing the base cabinets is a piece of cake. Frequently we ship the sleds for installation ahead of the finished cabinets. Flooring contractors can install right up to the back of the toe kick while seeing what they are doing from above.

 

[bwiele]

Thanks for that great information.  Hugely helpful.  Last 2 questions to finish the thoughts: (1) what thickness stock do you use for the cleats (1/2" or 3/4", or their metric equivalents, I assume) and (2) assuming you are doing a bank of individual units rather than one long unit, do you mount a cleat on the wall for each individual cabinet which is captured between the 2 sides?  Sorry I came up with a third question - do you then screw through the cabinet backs and into the wall or just depend on the weight of the cabinet holding it in place, and rely on the integrity of the cleat?

Sorry for the interrogation!

 

[tvgordon]

I made an upper cabinet out of 3/4" melamine to hold 6 systainers. I inset the back 3/4" to house a 1x4 that is attached to the wall. Like a cleat. I put three of the largest dominoes into the top of the 1x4 and made enlarged (wider) domino slots in the top of the cabinet to house the dominoes in the cleat. Not sure I'm explaining clearly. To make sure the weight is supported, I also put a 1x4 under the cabinet that is screwed into the wall. So far, so good.

That's the way I hung my mailbox on the house. I glued dominos into the cleat, hung the mailbox and then drove a couple of screws down from the top into the cleat just to make sure the box didn't go anywhere.

Tom

 

[ccarrolladams]

Thanks for that great information.  Hugely helpful.  Last 2 questions to finish the thoughts: (1) what thickness stock do you use for the cleats (1/2" or 3/4", or their metric equivalents, I assume) and (2) assuming you are doing a bank of individual units rather than one long unit, do you mount a cleat on the wall for each individual cabinet which is captured between the 2 sides?  Sorry I came up with a third question - do you then screw through the cabinet backs and into the wall or just depend on the weight of the cabinet holding it in place, and rely on the integrity of the cleat?

Sorry for the interrogation!

Hi Brian and Everyone,

Sorry for the delay responding.

To answer in reverse order, despite the French cleats, I also run screws through the cabinet back, the cleat and into a stud. I work in earthquake country, so the last thing I want is for cabinets to shake off their cleats and crash. That would be so embarrassing! BTW, at the very bottom of all my upper cabinets between the back and the wall there is another cleat which is glued to the back. I run screws through that one as well which reach into studs. Those screws are as close to the underside of the fixed bottom shelf as possible so they do not show.

When there are individual upper cabinets, each has separate cleats, so notching the sides, even when hidden, is not needed.

These cleats I mention are one of the few solid lumber parts I do not make from raw wood we mill ourselves. For as long as I can remember I have used poplar, but ages ago I started off making these kinds of cleats from clear white pine. In those days that was the preferred wood for making scenic flats, so short left-overs were available from the studios at affordable prices.

When using wooden cleats they are nominal 1" lumber, which is @3/4" or 18-19mm. I make sure the bottom cleat is exactly the same thickness as the cabinet French cleat and the corresponding French cleat screwed to the wall.

If space is so limited that I need every mm of depth, instead of wooden French cleats I will use metal hangers like those popular in the closet organizer trade. Sorry I am in Palm Springs without catalogs so I cannot provide a brand and part number. It has been a year since I needed to use that system. The more common situation I run into with my clients is that they want base cabinets an inch deeper than average, meaning there will be extra room behind the upper cabinets.

 

[Kevin D.]

The logistical use of the Dominos are not conducive for such a task imo.  Dominos are so amazing for so many tasks suplanting many others, but I can not see this being one of them.  Despite the wide morticing ability, there just does not seem a method in hanging cabinets to me that can benefit by this.  My opinion is only that of an enthusiastic intermediate Domino user, although some of my comprehension of the Domino's uses has been inspirationaly astute in the past.  Just love that device to the point where I believe I think like a Domino for everything I want to do.

I'm not a conttactor or pro, just an avid hobbiest. TIFWIW.

 

[bwiele]

Thanks very much for all the patient and thorough guidance and advice!

Brian

 

[ccarrolladams]

Thanks very much for all the patient and thorough guidance and advice!

Brian

Brian,

You are most welcome.

I hope you have much success and enjoy what you are doing building cabinets. There are a million approaches, and in most cases many would be equally appropriate.

My own designs were developed for the special considerations of Southern California back in the 1950s when we knew less about construction to withstand earthquakes and did not have the positive-closing and holding cabinet hardware available today. I felt then, and still feel the same way, the advantages of having a solid bottom shelf of base cabinets fastened to a structural sled using the space of the toe kick.

To me the only drawback to making wider runs of upper cabinets was the need for more than a single installer and those folks needed to be robust. Way back I was in that physical condition and every framer or drywall person was even more robust. I pitched the idea of using stronger but heavier upper cabinets to a couple of generations of installers taking classes in cabinet design and construction I taught. Those who embraced the idea of working in pairs flourished. Many of them are today the successful cabinet designers who are my wholesale clients. Some are now in their 60s and still do at least a portion of the installation of the cabinets they design, sell and have me build.

 

[Sam Murdoch]

Would you use a domino for hanging cabinets?

There are so many really good and solid ways to hang cabinets (see ccarrolladams' posts above for example) that using dominos in this application offers NO ADVANTAGE. Honestly, I can't imagine one  [unsure].