Warping Cabinet Doors

[Richard McComas]

If you take this guy to court over warped doors you may be disappointed with the results. No cabinet door company I know of warrants Cabinet doors to stay perfectly flat. Most warrant within certain tolerances. No cabinet company I know of will ever warrant doors 42'' or taller. Below are a couple of links to cabinet door companies warranties . I believe most door companies will have similar warranties. If the contractor presents these warranties to a judge as the norm in the door business I doubt he's going to rule in your favor.

That being said, I believe you have some legitimate on some of the other deficiencies and workmanship.



http://www.advantagecabinetdoors.com/product-warranty/

http://cabinetdoorstore.com/ecom.asp?pg=warranty

[Jack Pinkham]

After a few days, some of the warp has resolved. It's still noticeable, but perhaps with more time the doors will flatten. The doors are plywood with cvg fir veneer front and back.

[Brett Bobo]

That is another sore point. He intends to put a trim piece there. In fact, he will bend it (or if I'm nice to him, he will scribe it) to follow the new drywall which covers the removed soffits, and which he had a contractor replace. The replaced drywall is 1/2" thick and the existing walls are 3/4" lath and plaster. Instead of telling his subcontractor to fur out the replacement drywall, he is satisfied with a transition from thick to thin sheetrock, ("the eye will never notice it"). Well, my eyes did notice it and it's on my punch list.

We assumed that, as the master craftsman he claimed to be, he would not have exposed particle board backs, yet he did this on all his cabinets.

Sorry for all of your frustrations thus far. Regarding the exposed backs, I'm trying to understand what exactly happened because it now appears that you have the original back of the cabinet, which is now a false back and seen on the interior of the cabinet, and an additional back that is acting as a filler due to the difference in drywall thickness of ~1/4". If that's correct, did he start the run of cabinets from the adjacent (to the window) walls on each side and work towards the window wall? Was the 1/2" drywall not installed when he started the cabinet runs? It seems like he worked backwards, instead of from the window wall out, or at least wait until he had finished walls before hanging cabinets.

[Jack Pinkham]

Sorry for all of your frustrations thus far. Regarding the exposed backs, I'm trying to understand what exactly happened because it now appears that you have the original back of the cabinet, which is now a false back and seen on the interior of the cabinet, and an additional back that is acting as a filler due to the difference in drywall thickness of ~1/4". If that's correct, did he start the run of cabinets from the adjacent (to the window) walls on each side and work towards the window wall? Was the 1/2" drywall not installed when he started the cabinet runs? It seems like he worked backwards, instead of from the window wall out, or at least wait until he had finished walls before hanging cabinets.

I didn't explain this clearly. Two of the wall cabinets are installed
where soffits were removed. The drywall subcontractor put 1/2" sheetrock where the soffits were removed. The rest of the wall is 3/4" thick lath and plaster. Instead of putting 1/4" furring under the new 1/2" sheetrock, the contractor "transitioned" from new 1/2" to existing 3/4". Some of this transition is behind the new wall cabinets.
In other words, there is a gap behind the wall cabinet that goes from zero near the bottom to 1/4" at the top.
To hide this gap, he will install a trim piece on the side of the wall cabinet that will hide the particle board edge and
hide the gap. The gap should never have been there, but he should at least scribe the trim piece so that it is plumb on one edge and touching the wall on the other edge. He previously tried to bend trim at the ceiling instead of scribing, so that is what my remark was about,

[Jeff Duncan]

After a few days, some of the warp has resolved. It's still noticeable, but perhaps with more time the doors will flatten. The doors are plywood with cvg fir veneer front and back.

I personally would not use modern plywood for that type of door unless it was some type of specialty situation. MDF is a much more stable material and when veneered properly and using the correct hardware, will generally be stable and stay flat. Unfortunately based on your threads about this project I believe this person is just not capable of quality work. There are almost always several ways to accomplish a given task in woodworking and cabinetmaking. However there are also ways which should be avoided, and knowledge and experience win out over the guy who seems like he learned from watching HGTV shows!

I wish you luck and hope you eventually get it all sorted out in the end, but unfortunately I think your likely to keep finding problems as time passes

good luck,
JeffD

[George Gyulatyan]

I personally would not use modern plywood for that type of door unless it was some type of specialty situation. MDF is a much more stable material and when veneered properly and using the correct hardware, will generally be stable and stay flat.

Yup. Even particle board would've been a better substrate. There is no excuse for that kind of warpage on properly constructed veneered slab doors.

And the backs? ay ay ay!