DIY
STORAGE
CABINETS
cabinet panel are flush when
drilling, the holes will line up. Be
sure to label the jig and the side
panels, so when the cabinet is
put together all of the holes will
be spaced from the same starting point.
In addition to the layout jig for
the hole spacing, Chad also
made a depth gauge to fit on his
drill bit. The depth gauge pre-
vents you from drilling the holes
all the way through the cabinet
side panels. We sometimes use
tape around the bit or mark it
with a Sharpie. The important
thing is that you drill deep
enough for the shelf pegs, but
not so deep as to exit the side of
the cabinet panel.
Consider the effects of the saw kerf when planning your cabinet sizes. If your plan calls for a cabinet that’s 12 inches deep, that would mean four rips out of a 4-by- 8 sheet of plywood, right? Well, not necessarily. Keep in mind that
each time you make a 12-inch rip on the table saw, you’re actually using up 12-3/16 inches because of the thickness
of the teeth on the saw blade. By the time you get to that fourth piece, you may be 9/16 of an inch too narrow. So,
make the depth of your cabinet pieces reflect the number of cuts that will be made out of a sheet of plywood. What
you think of as being a 12-inch cabinet ends up being 11-3/4 inches net to accommodate for the saw kerf.
Sometimes, however, the sheet goods are actually designed to allow for this type of cut. In our particular case, the plywood we had was actually 49 inches by 97 inches, which allowed us to go net 12, 16 and 24 inches for our cabinets.
