Snack Tray Cabinet

charlese · Post by **charlese** » Sat Nov 22, 2008 8:16 pm

Wow! Gotta chance to look at my new Woodsmith Magazine. Both my wife and I are turned on over their Snack Tray Cabinet. The name of this piece of furniture doesn't sound very enticing, but a look at a finished one was a Wow! from both or us. It'll fit in our house!

It looks like a small chest of drawers, but some of the drawers can be pulled out and they become snack trays.

You might be interested also! Take a gander - http://www.woodsmith.com/issues/180/

scroll down the page to see a photo of it.

This issue also has a handsome TV/ entertainment consul.

reible · Post by **reible** » Sat Nov 22, 2008 9:00 pm

Thanks Chuck!

I like what I see, don't know if I build one but can you explain how the leg bit works?

I've been wanting a cabinet to store projects in, an idea like shown would be a good addition. That way one could be a work surface (upside down drawer) and the other could be drawers to store unfinished small projects in. (Expand this to say 2' x 2' wide/deep and 5' or 6' tall).

My brother and I were just talking about that last week. He builds model airplanes, the old way with balsa wood and this tipped over drawer idea would make a lot of sence for that too. I was sharing my idea of drawers but we did not come up with a plan of how to work in his needs. This should solve that, I'll email the page to him to look at.

I may have to see about getting that edition anyway. One of my sons is having a house built and it has a wine cellar planned for downstairs. It will be ruffed in but he plans to do the rest himself. The wine rack looks like it could be useful to him. I like the bottom one pictured with the place for glasses.

The wine glass thing reminds me that somewhere out in my workshop I have a set of wood slats that are designed to fit under a cabnet and hold the glasses, something copied from some I saw in a store... they are done except for final sanding and finish and well then there is mounting. I think it has been about 6 years since I last saw them. Now I'll have to look for them.

Ed

charlese · Post by **charlese** » Sat Nov 22, 2008 10:16 pm

reible wrote:Thanks Chuck!

I like what I see, don't know if I build one but can you explain how the leg bit works?

I've been wanting a cabinet to store projects in, an idea like shown would be a good addition. That way one could be a work surface (upside down drawer) and the other could be drawers to store unfinished small projects in. (Expand this to say 2' x 2' wide/deep and 5' or 6' tall).Ed

Looking at the picture of the tray & tray table in that link - The back of the "sawbuck support" slides forward, then both legs fold toward the rear so that the legs are the same depth as the drawer. Then the whole thing slides into the drawer space. You can make every drawer into a folding table, or only one. It is the builders choice. I think an enlarged version of this type cabinet would be nifty for project storage.

This table has designed drawers that are only about 2 1/2" tall. (The false fronts are 3".) Of course you could design deeper drawers and a taller cabinet. The idea is of special interest to us because the trays are stored away and we don't have to hide them in a closet or somewhere.

The shelves you spoke of owe their uniqueness to special hardware. They refer us to HangMan Products: (part CBH-18) I just looked it up -http://www.hangmanstore.com/product-p/cbh.htm The coolness of these brackets are: a) each wall hanging part comes with a level bubble and b) The two parts interlock and will support 200 lbs or 300.

reible · Post by **reible** » Sat Nov 22, 2008 11:49 pm

Hi Chuck,

OK now I "see" the rest of the story on the sawbuck story. Now that is even more neet then I thought. Glad to see some cleverness still exists.

The brackets are interesting with the level built in. I have some of those san the level in fact the bat house I made lots of years ago is still hanging using this system.

I also use the same idea for hanging cabinets, of course I use wood and just cut some strips at 45 deg and put one on the cabinet and one on the wall. Slide the cabinet up and on and you can do it yourself. These two tool cabinets are using them:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12199425@N ... 718317946/
as is this wall hanging photo in this set:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12199425@N ... 718313140/

Not my idea but it sure works slick.

Ed

charlese · Post by **charlese** » Sun Nov 23, 2008 1:27 am

reible wrote:Hi Chuck,
...I also use the same idea for hanging cabinets, of course I use wood and just cut some strips at 45 deg and put one on the cabinet and one on the wall. Slide the cabinet up and on and you can do it yourself..... Not my idea but it sure works slick.

Ed

Wholeheartedly agree! That is the only way I have hung cabinets for the past 6 of 7 years. I learned this by watching Norm. Only drawback, if you can call it that, is the back of the cabinet has to be recessed 3/4". I made a Melonite cabinet to hang above our up right freezer. It came out so heavy, I had to recruit the neighbor to hep me lift it up to the wall cleat.

I Hadn't seen the metal locking hangers before. Just the thing for this earthquake country. But now that I think about them, the back of a cabinet would have to be more than 1/4" plywood to support several hundred lbs.

Thanks for the look at your tool cabinets!

reible · Post by **reible** » Sun Nov 23, 2008 4:36 am

Hi,

Got to thinking maybe some of you have no idea what we are talking about here so I did a couple quick sketches for you to look at.

Well Chuck you've got a better memory then me... so Norm it is, guess I should have expected that. Wonder if he is still using this method??

[ATTACH]2413[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]2414[/ATTACH]

Ed

a1gutterman · Post by **a1gutterman** » Sun Nov 23, 2008 2:24 pm

charlese wrote:...I Hadn't seen the metal locking hangers before. Just the thing for this earthquake country. But now that I think about them, the back of a cabinet would have to be more than 1/4" plywood to support several hundred lbs...

I have used metal hangers for years, bought them at Radio Shack (I was going to share a part number and /or a web page on them, but I could not find them online so I just checked with my local store and they no longer offer them), for hanging speakers on the wall. These metal ones (from Radio Shack) do knot take up much depth. I have knot seen the ones with built-in levels (I did knot see them on this page http://www.woodsmith.com/issues/180/ ).

Although I have been following this thread with interest, I will have to admit that I had not considered using this method for kitchen cabinets before. It looks like a good method for hanging them, but I hesitate to implement it as, like Chuck says, it reduces the depth of the cabinet interior. Of course, a person could compensate for that by making the cabinets deeper, but for the standard 12" upper, that wood use materials in a way that creates more waste.

In any case, I do knot see the need to use more then a 1/4" back on the cabinets, as long as your wood or metal hanger is adequately mounted to the cabinet, i.e., do knot JUST attach the hanger to the 1/4" ply: In the case of a wood hanger, make sure that it is attached to the cabinet in a similar way that a more traditional screw strip wood be mounted; in the case of a metal hanger, perhaps you could put a traditional screw strip inside the cabinet and mount the metal hanger to it from the backside. Like I said in a previous paragragh, I have knot seen these metal hangers that you are talking about, so maybe there is a problem with my conclusion.

reible · Post by **reible** » Sun Nov 23, 2008 4:26 pm

Hi Tim,

The URL is in the third post but it was not linked so here it is with the link:
http://www.hangmanstore.com/product-p/cbh.htm

Ed

john · Post by **john** » Sun Nov 23, 2008 4:31 pm

After seeing Chuck's first post, I ran to my copy of Woodsmith (haven't had time to look at it yet), and spotted the shelves. The snack tray cabinet looks interesting also but the shelves might be a good fit for a quick project.

The hang-up here, will be to find similar hanging brackets as the wood ones used for heavier cabinets would be too thick for this application. Ordering from the U.S. would be too costly.

Looks like a project worth looking into.

John

a1gutterman · Post by **a1gutterman** » Sun Nov 23, 2008 5:41 pm

reible wrote:Hi Tim,

The URL is in the third post but it was not linked so here it is with the link:
http://www.hangmanstore.com/product-p/cbh.htm

Ed

Thanks Ed,
I should have seen that! Anyway, those look a lot like the ones that I got from Radio Shack, only longer and with that handy level. I still do knot like the way they are attached to the cabinet. I can see what Chuck was talking about. If I were to use them on cabinets, I wood consider reinforcing the back panel at the mounting location, with a thicker board, mounted to the inside of the cabinet spanning the width of the cabinet and attached to the walls of the cabinet.

They look perfect for pictures, shadow boxes and the like.