I'm resurrecting this thread in order to add additional content (and hopefully context) both of which are surprisingly absent from this forum and at least the English-speaking portion of the internet at large (at least according to my preliminary survey of same).
I'm getting ready to build a frameless wall-oven tower (using domestic 3/4" (~19mm) birch-ply solid maple edge-banded w/Eagle America
190-2045) that will consist, from the base up, of:
- an appliance garage w/roll out (that will be covered by two Shaker-style cabinet doors) and, at the top of that, an edge-banded vertically positioned stretcher that will act as the stop for the tops of the doors while also providing the minimum spacing from the bottom of the oven cutout as required by the oven manufacturer);
- the hole for the 30" oven (the top of this opening will be fitted with another vertically positioned stretcher to provide the minimum required spacing from the top of the oven cutout);
- a horizontal partition that forms the floor of another hole (this one for a microwave - in addition to featuring a recessed 120V receptacle, the back of this 3rd level will also house the flush-mounted metal junction box where the electrical connections for the wall oven will be made - yes, using Ilsco tap connectors); and
- a horizontal partition doubling as the ceiling of the microwave hole and floor of the single enclosed shelf above (the latter of which will be covered by two Shaker-style cabinet doors).
So, IOW this tower will have four distinct levels, some requiring line boring for hinge mounting plates (as well as other hardware) and others not.
The good news is that, at first blush, the only hole boring for hinge mounting plates I will need to accomplish (assuming I don't decide to cover a portion of the microwave hole with a door - more on this below) will occur within the first level and the fourth level.
So, in order to utilize the LR32 in this scenario I will simply register off the bottom of the tower...
...for plunging the holes for the hinge mounting plates for the two cabinet doors that will enclose the appliance garage pull-out - the Blum Tandem slides for the pull-out will be bottom mounted since I can still get away with this even though there will also be a hatch in the base of the tower to provide access to the hydronic kickspace heater that I've already installed within the sub-kick beneath...
...and the top of the tower...
...for plunging the holes for the hinge mounting plates for the two cabinet doors that will enclose the upper-most level,...
...respectively.
I will then make a note to remind myself which edge of the associated doors to register off of when I plunge the holes in those doors for the hinges.
The tricky bit - and this gets to the point of my post - is how to positively register the LR32 if I add a vertical partition and a door enclosing the partitioned area (within the wider expanse of the microwave hole).
Since the overall cabinet width is much larger than is needed for a small microwave, my thought is to add a vertical partition within the third level to create a smaller enclosed cabinet, in my case to the left of the space for the microwave. This would take up the excess horizontal space that would otherwise exist if I did nothing to reduce the width of that space. Of course, I could leave the partition as is and
not enclose that partitioned space with a door (which would negate the need to pre-drill holes for hinge mounting plates) but I kind of like the idea of enclosing it so it matches the surrounding cabinets (thus leaving the microwave hole the only "open" hole within that wall of cabinets).
In this scenario, I need to plunge holes
vertically mid-field for the requisite hinge mounting plates.
The problem that arises is with how to register the LR32 for hinge mounting plates in the case of vertical mid-field placement within a taller tower. In the case of an intermediate level, since there's no physical "hard" bottom edge or top edge (like there is with the top or bottom of a "regular" cabinet) there's no hard edge to register the LR32's end stop against.
I suppose I could transfer the location of the reference face of the end stop onto both edges of the guide rail (using a precision square and a fine point permanent marker) and then, after removing the end stop, align those marks to a line drawn from the front to the back of each tower wall (representing the future location of the floor of that level), in effect using that drawn line in lieu of what would otherwise normally be the bottom edge of a panel. This would involve some eyeballing (versus relying on hard stops) but I suppose it could be done. This approach would require that the base of the shelf that comprises the floor of the microwave portion of the cabinet, once installed (in my case with a mixture of dominos and screws - the latter in locations that will be hidden by other shallower wall cabinets and the latter in locations not hidden by anything), be
precision installed since any variation in the vertical location of the floor of the microwave portion of the cabinet compared to the reference line would introduce inaccuracy that would complicate the process of mating doors to that opening, given that the installation of hinges on the doors also relies on using the LR32, though in "door mode".
In other words, there's using the LR32 to plunge holes in panels - "panel mode" - and there's using the LR32 to plunge holes in doors - "door mode". "Door mode" alludes to the future existence of a separate but corresponding door (or set of doors). And, since the whole point of the LR32 system is hole drilling accuracy on panels and doors via the reliance, in most cases, on hard stops of various forms (the end stops, the edge stops, the holey rail(s) and the corresponding router sled with its spring-loaded centering pin plus the router's plunge depth-stop), having to rely on my eyeball to plunge holes vertically mid-field for hinge mounting plates elevates my concern level.
That said, I'm regularly able to successfully eyeball the
lateral placement of the guide rail for plunging mid-panel and back-panel holes for drawer slides (I know I can use the edge stops referencing off the front edge of the panel with the guide rail flipped around for plunging the mid-field column of holes but I usually just rely on my eyeball since that precludes my having to reset the edge stops - the latter being a needlessly tedious task that I'd rather avoid). So, maybe I could also successfully eyeball the
vertical placement of the guide rail by using the aforementioned reference line for plunging the holes for hinge plates.
So, has anyone encountered this situation before and come up with a better solution?
As an aside - I am aware that by linking a couple of 1400mm holey rails together and referencing off the top or bottom (or both top and bottom, in the case of a balanced panel(s)) of the walls of a tower cabinet, shelf-pin holes and holes for drawer slides can be accurately pre-drilled anywhere along the entirety of the tower wall(s) with no problem. What I'm alluding to here thus only applies to pre-drilling holes for hinge mounting plates in an intermediate location. Accuracy in this respect is needed given that there will mating components (in my case, cabinet doors) which will need to be similarly referenced by using the LR32 system. And since in "door mode", the bottom or top of the door (or both bottom and top in the case of a balanced door) is used to, in effect, reference off the same plane as the top or bottom (or both top and bottom in the case of a balanced panel(s)) of the corresponding panel (following whatever protocol was used while plunging the holes in the panel(s)), the absence of a top and bottom of the corresponding cabinet panels (as in the case of an intermediate level within a taller tower) complicates things.
So, maybe in cases like this folks simply dispense with the LR32 and rely instead on other store-bought or shop-built jigs and/or careful measurements, etc., for pre-drilling for hinge mounting plates. Or maybe folks simply forgo pre-drilling entirely and instead, after the cabinet has been assembled, install hinge mounting plates "by hand" (the old fashioned way) using a vix bit and jig/careful measurements, etc.
However, given the surprising dearth of discussion about this, I'm really not sure what folks tend to do.
Thoughts?
