Garage Storage cabinet build question.

[Jack Gaskins]

Hello, I need to make a tall storage cabinet for my garage. Cabinet will hold hand power tools; chemicals; small paint cans. I would like to keep the depth around 12-16" so I can see everything easily on the shelf and put it on wheels. First thought was to build deep doors so paints cans and chemical cans can go in the doors and boxy stuff on the shelves. I am going to make the cabinet from a plywood I guess and was wondering what the best way to fasten the carcass together would be? Butt joints screwed together; pocket hole joinery; biscuit joinery or some other way of fastening?

Thanks,
Jack

[Ted Reischl]

Sounds like a large cabinet with a lot of weight in it. I would make some side frames out of dressed up 2X stock. That would provide some excellent surface area to screw the plywood to. You can either put the frames on the inside, or the outside. Just my 2 cents.

[Steve Grimes]

Butt joints glued and screwed will be very strong if you use 3/4" plywood.

You'll also have to construct the shelves so that they don't sag. http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthre...g-under-a-load

Think carefully about the height vs depth and width of the cabinet. When I google "tall rolling cabinet", I see 66" and 72" cabinets that are more than 20" deep and very wide in order to provide stability for their height.

[Chris Damm]

Tall cabinets 12-16" deep on wheels is asking for trouble. They won't be very stable. I had some 20" deep by 60" tall cabinets that my wife wanted on wheels. They were very tippy when loaded with all her gardening junque!

[Tom Clark FL]

Skip the wheels. This cabinet is 24x48x96" high. 30 years old. No problem seeing everything on each of the six shelves. 3/4 ply sides, shelves, and doors. Run 3/4x2 on on four sides of shelves. From Practical Shop Cabinets.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Jack,
I would not put wheels on a tall cabinet only 12"-16" deep. It would be too easy to tip over IMO.

For my shop, I built two rolling tool carts for my shop with drawers on slides. They work well. They are 24" deep and about 48" tall. I have several hanging wall cabinets I have made and one tall wall cabinet. I use dados, rabbets, glue and screws. The carcasses I made out of 3/4" plywood and I used 1/2" plywood for the drawers with 3/4" plywood fronts.

[Mike Heidrick]

Just bought 6 pallets of 18" deep 30" wide steelcase binder bins super cheap. Could you find some of those local? Just make a stand for them.

[Jack Gaskins]

Thanks, so far I have butt joint the plywood and use 2x carcass and attach ply to the 2x or use rabbet and dado. Guess I need to sit down and draw up some plans to see what each option will look like. I only want the shelves to be deep enough to hold power tool cases and the doors deep enough to hold cans/bottles and such. If I put wheels on it I can keep the height around 80 inches I guess.

[Steve Meliza]

I recommend Tom Clark's book Practical Shop Cabinets, his methods are sturdy, inexpensive, easy to build, and very practical. I built the 18-drawer workbench from his book and absolutely love it. I've also built wall hung cabinets using 3/4" MDO per Norm's garage workshop plans. The shelves are set into 1/4" deep dados in the sides as well as glued and nailed to the 1/4" back. The MDO is great stuff to work with, a full 3/4" thickness and no face grain to splinter out or orientation to worry over. The dado method looks cleaner but takes more time and specialized tools.

If you insist in a mobile cart that is tall and shallow then also consider what happens when you open doors holding 50lbs of paint and stain ... crash!

[Jack Gaskins]

Thanks I will take a look for that book. As for the wheels and doors my intent was to up a wheel under each door so the wheel would support the door as it opens. The cabinet wouldn't actually be that shallow. Tool boxes and stuff like that would probably need about 16 to 18 inch shelves and the doors would be about 4 to 6 inch deep so total depth would be around 26 inches deep by 36 wide by 72 tall. I read some posts today on another site about connecting ply wood panels and think Im going to rabbet the sides for the back and use a 2x2 frame around the sides; back ; top and bottom to attach plywood. Then use the 2x2 to put some sort of adjustment for the shelves.