Choosing the Right Drawer Slide

It never gets old and I love adding them to the furniture I build whenever I can. But, I know for many, drawer making seems intimidating and frustrating. As a general note, I will be talking about ball bearing, side mount drawer slides only in this post.

A whole lot of making, installing and building drawers is making sure things are lined up and square. The following is the exact process I use to make, measure, and install drawer boxes. Before we can bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides out drawer front sizes, we need to cover the different scenarios for drawer fronts. First, you need to determine whether your drawer fronts will be inset or overlay. See this post for information on inset vs.

The top drawer of this desk is inset with a frame notice it is surrounded on all sides by a frame. Notice the drawers are inset because they set inside the front of the cabinet. Bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides bottom drawers are inset without a frame notice that the cabinet DOES have a face frame, but the individual drawers are not individually framed. Then we have full overlay drawers that are not framed in this instance.

Notice the drawers hang OVER the sides of bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides cabinet and are not individually framed. Part of this involves math, but part of it involves personal preference. Inset framed drawers are by far the easiest to figure. However, if the drawers are not individually framed you have options. And options complicate things. I want three drawers, so I need three drawer fronts.

I want the two bottom ones equal size and the top one smaller. If you are doing inset drawer fronts, the idea is exactly the bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides except bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides your drawers would have to fit INSIDE the opening and not cover the sides…like on the bottom of this dresser shown here.

Now that I have my drawer front sizes figured out, I can figure out where to mount my slides. I use ball bearing slides for all my furniture and cabinets.

They are easy to use and easy to adjust. You can buy these with or without soft close mechanisms. If your drawer front will be inset into your cabinet, you also have to take into consideration that that will push your slide back the thickness of your drawer front.

I get a lot of questions about jigs to mount the slides. When at all possible, I turn my cabinets or piece of furniture on its side to install my slides instead of doing it while the piece is standing.

I lay the cabinet over, measure, mark, then use a square to draw a line at that Bottom Mount Locking Drawer Slides Kit mark square to the front of the cabinet. Then, I line the slide up with the mark and screw in place. I always start at the bottom and work my way up.

I mount the first slide all the way at the bottom of the cabinet. Since I already know my drawer front height, I can figure out where to mount the slides pretty easy. If you are using overlay drawer fronts, install bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides slides flush with the front of your cabinet.

But, if you are using inset drawer fronts, install them the thickness of your front INSET from the front of your cabinet. Typically, these ball bearing drawer slides have horizontally slotted holes on the piece that mounts to the cabinet and vertically slotted holes that mount to the drawer box.

This offers you the ability to adjust 18 Bottom Mount Drawer Slides Video the drawer box in both directions as needed. Everything prior to this assumed frameless cabinets or that the inside of the cabinet was flush. Again, just like with the drawer front sizes, there are two main options that you may run into. In order to figure Cabinet Drawer Slides Bottom Mount Lyrics the lengths to cut all the pieces to make a drawer, you only need two measurements.

You need the length of your slides ex. Now, the drawer pieces should be cut as follows. I mentioned adding spacer blocks earlier into cabinets or furniture with face frames. This same thing applies in the case when you have spacer blocks for your slides, you just need to make sure you measure between the spacer blocks instead of the inside of the cabinet. I found the dado method to be clean looking and strong, so I prefer that.

You can check out any of my YouTube video tutorials like this desk or this dresser where I build something with a drawer to see the process.

You can use a corner clamp or square to hold pieces square when assembling them. It should be a pretty tight fit and should hold the pieces square if it is square, too. There are plenty of ways to install the drawer boxes, but this is quick and works well.

I always start at the bottom and install the bottom drawer first. Then, I remove the drawer from the slide and add another screw onto the back of the slide. To remove the drawer, extend it fully and there will be two tabs on each slide. One will push up and one will push down.

Simultaneously push these tabs and pull the drawer straight out. Then, slide the drawer back in place and adjust as needed using the screws in the vertically slotted holes. To add the next drawer, I use scrap wood blocks stacked on top of the bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides below and follow this same procedure.

I stack the spacer blocks until the bottom of the drawer is higher than where the drawer front below it will be—basically the drawer bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides just has to clear the drawer front below it.

There are a lot of methods for centering and attaching drawer fronts. I can putty over the nail holes and no one will know. And that worked fine! The best way to get comfortable with bottom mount vs side mount drawer slides is to try them!!

You can do this…I promise! So if you enjoyed this post and want to save it for later, be sure to pin it! You are so talented! Thank you for being so generous in sharing your knowledge and tips!

This post about building drawers, and all your projects really, are so inspiring, especially for someone like me who needs just a little more confidence to create awesome things for my home! Facebook Instagram Pinterest YouTube.

How to Upholster a Bench. Comments You are so talented!

Side mount Installing Bottom Side Mount Drawer Slides drawer slides. Image via Amazon. Undermounts, however, are far less susceptible to this dust accumulation, resulting in more durable hardware and a more sanitary environment. Moreover, slides on the underside of drawers makes cleaning up spills much easier. Even with undermount drawer glides, spills will happen. blum undermount use 3/8" total side clearance. The slide mechanism is mostly in the 1/2" wasted space under the drawer bottom. side monted slides use around 1/2" per side or 1" total side clearance. so you loose 5/8" drawer width with side mounted slides. Sep 11,  · Drawer slides: side vs bottom mount. Jump to Latest Follow 1 - 11 of 11 Posts. A I like the Blum bottom mount slides with soft close. Totally hidden. You did not say what is on there now, but if they are on the sides, you are more likely to find side mount slides that fit.

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