shop cabinet advice

[JimD]

Garage floors should be angled to drain water to the outside. That complicates the toekick. I like to make them as a separate structure so I can level them and then screw the cabinet to them. That would be especially useful with a slanted garage floor. You can cut your toekick pieces to compensate for the tilt of the floor. For contact with concrete, pressure treated is recommended. You could just use PT 2x4s to construct a toe kick area a little narrower than your base cabinets. It it gets wet, no big deal. PT also takes paint well if you set it dry out a bit first. I would probably just glue it to the slab with construction adhesive. I use tapcons and have a percussion nailer but if you use them, it is pretty permanent. If you just glue it, you could knock it off later if you ever have to and leave essentially no mark. Or not even fasten the toe kick, just screw the cabinet to it and screw the cabinet to the wall.

Jim

[Tom Clark]

Kyle,

Like most others here, I hate MDF and think of it as glued up sawdust. Check out a few of the ideas on this link.

Tom

[kbkreisler]

Thanks guys, I appreciate all the great advice, I am leaning toward plywood for the majority of the structure. The only exception is I will probably use hardwood edged, sealed, laminated mdf for the bench tops because it is so dense and flat. the shopnotes article I had referred to recommends laminating two 3/4" layers for the benchtop.
I am trying to get this done as inexpensively as i can, and I have half a dozen sheets of 3/4 cdx plywood taking up space in the garage right now, and several more available very low cost if I need them. They are clean, straight, and flat but not sanded smooth. I intend to paint these parts. With functionality superseding beauty, do you think this would be a suitable building material for a garage workspace?

[jonmulzer]

I think it will be more than adequate. It won't be pretty, but nothing in the workshop has to be, that is just luxury if it does. I built a bench for my winemaking area out of CDX for the carcass and SPF for the faceframe and drawer fronts and after running over the plywood sides with my belt sander it doesn't look half bad and works wonderfully for what it is. Best half day's work I spent in the cellar.

[knotley]

I am about to build this:

http://www.workbenchmagazine.com/mai...-garage01.html

for my basement storage. Infinitely adjustable , keeps it off the floor away from salt, slush, water, etc.

Simple plans are free to download.

[ironhat]

My solution for keeping my recently built miter saw station off of the floor was to use the round, nail-point feet that you usually use on the bottom of chairs. It keeps the plywood off of the floor sufficiently to keep the occasional water seeping under the garage door from wicking up into the wood. This cab has an open front for moveable equipment and such so there is no toe kick. My solution would present the problem of things rolling under your toe kick and being permanantly lost. I though of that while I was building and thought that I would use a piece of rubber from a truck innertube or some such belting and staple it to the back of the toe kick. Dropped hardware and tools would be stopped but the slop would still migrate. The other alternative is to put vinyl cove base down and caulk around the bottom of it. JAT

[dbhost]

You know, you could always sand the BCX plywood. On my first plywood bench top (I have been through several, all of them BCX, all of them suffered at my hands with a drill bit, the good drill press should put and end to that) I took the 3/4" BCX routed a 3/8" roundover into it, filled it with way too much Elmer's Wood Putty, and sanded the dickens out of it. Then I realized I was drilling through it, painting on it, repotting plants on it (Habaneros anyone?). The current one is rough as the lumber dept fellow at the Orange box would do with the panel saw...

One of my must do projects is a proper foldable panel saw jig for the circular saw... Oh yeah sorry cabinets...

As far as any concerns with moisture wicking up through blow through the door, sure that is a concern, BUT... Some foot blocks (probably the wrong term, just the one that comes to mind right now) to give you a good surface to mount them to behind the toe kicks, and some screw levelers and you are set! Just get the things 1/2" off the floor and you are a happy camper.

[jackellis]

I am concerned about putting all the weight of the base cabinets on the wall. I can't really quantify that concern in terms of worrying about placing a load of "X" pounds on the wall, but it just seems like a better approach to have base cabinets supported in part by the floor (I guess this is why most upper cabinets are always shallower than the base cabinets -- less weight on the wall?). Of course, in areas where the garage floor can become wet, this may not make much sense.

Weights being equal, the upper cabinets probably place a larger bending moment on the studs than a base cabinet. However, unless the studs are crooked by a fair amount, most of the force from the cabinets will compress the studs along their length. For that reason, I'm not sure I would worry about whether the wall can take the weight, unless you're storing a couple thousand pounds of lead weights.

Think about it this way. If you anchor the base of a stud that's vertical, which action is more likely to either break the stud or topple it - pulling from the top or pulling from 2 feet above the anchor point?