Inexpensive (cheap) Shop Cabinets

[Ted Reischl]

I have had to move my shop 5 times in 12 years. Along about the 2nd move it became clear that I needed cabinets that could be easily disassembled. Kitchen style cabinets are modular and waste a lot of material because of it (each cabinet is a complete cabinet unto itself).

After fiddling around a while I came up with this design which has worked very well. Right now my entire 18 feet of cabinets is sitting stacked neatly in piles along a garage wall while the shop is being built.

Here are some drawings and below that I will pontificate about why they are good.

Cabinet Assy.jpg

Frame Assembly.JPG
Frame Vertical Detail.JPG

As you can see the cabinets are made up of a series of "web frames". To connect them standard lumber can be used to create whatever length and spacing of cabinets are desired. This turned out to be important as I moved from shop to shop. In one shop they were a single run of 18'. In other shops they were assembled in groups of three or four and put in various places around the shop.

What is also great is if you need to change the length, just buy a few pieces of longer lumber or cut down the ones on hand. It is only 2 X 4 material.

I put plywood doors on mine with el cheapo spring loaded hinges. I have mounted drawer slides in a few of them too.

The cabinets are built by screwing the long pieces to the frames so they can be taken apart later on if need be.

These are real easy to make. Just lap joints I cut on the RAS. The notches were cut on the TS using a tall fence.

Mine look pretty good cause I dressed the 2 X 4 lumber before building the frames. Nice crisp corners.

Since this is my last shop FINALLY, I will be putting a bit more work into them as I assemble the pieces. Probably even paint them!

Hope this helps someone out who needs good but cheap cabinets!

Edit: I did not include overall dimensions because these can be built to any height desired. It is also possible to use 2 X 6 lumber if you want something a lot beefier. In my last shop the gunsmith vise I use for all sorts of things was mounted to one of these cabinet groups. Solid as a rock when filing, rasping, pounding, etc.

[Bill Adamsen]

Ted: This is great and too often overlooked. I moved my shop within the past 2 years and the reorganization of fasteners and other stuff was perhaps one of the biggest obstacles to getting functioning, and ultimately contributed significantly to costs. Ryan Grubs just had that post "If You Were Starting from Scratch" and this idea belongs in there for sure!

[Ted Reischl]

This is the new shop where the cabinets will go. It is 28 X 28, divided down the middle into two shops.

The left hand shop will be mine and the right one belongs to SWMBO. There is an attic above with the access stairs on her side.

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The left side has a double door with windows and three windows down the side not visible. There is also another window in the front that has not been cut out in this pic. Three more down the right hand side.

Here is how my half will be set up, not showing cabinets yet.

Capture.JPG

The double door in this pic is a bit wider than what is going in. There are three windows on the left hand wall that are towards the front of the shop.

This shop is a little smaller than I have had in the past but the layout is very similar and it is what has worked for me in the past. I don't do a lot of sheet goods so TS positioning is different than most shops. I also like to be able to walk all around the workbench when building furniture stuff. Right now I am thinking of putting can lights in rather than florescent. Rarely do I work in a shop after dark. Here in NC the sun is quite bright and I can open the double doors near the bench.

The machine in the back left corner is a cnc router I built a few years back and use a lot.