Build a stronger drawer box Part 1 

Came to watch your latest video and saw this. And boy was it informative. You NEVER let us down. Felt like I was in a master class. Going to watch part 2 now before checking out the latest.

I just found your channel yesterday thanks to a comment from Sawyer Design. I subscribed immediately. I agree with the comment that you are the "most under-rated woodworking channel. Like finding a diamond." I actually unsubscribed from a couple of woodworking channels I don't watch any more because yours has more to offer. God bless you and your willingness to share your experience and time.

The handwriting is as meticulous as the work! Keep on crafting!! Great content as usual. Most under-rated woodworking channel, like finding a diamond!

Thanks for “Rocking My World” with this alternative system for stronger rack resistant drawers on many applications which are appropriate. I love when someone “ hurts my head” with a new idea. It’s the only way we can mentally grow as individuals…..

I love seeing your way of doing things and always learn so much! Thank you!

So much knowledge… I’m convinced!

Ramon, I understand agree with your drawer design, it adds strength and durability that should last forever ! I will begin making all my drawers this way also. Fabulous work once again. Thanks for sharing your techniques.

I started working in a very small custom shop 3 yrs ago. We use 1/2 imported raw plywood for everything including bottoms, glue and side staple using spacers to get the 1/2 clearance for undermount slides only. Backs only, are flush to bottom. Top edges, and staple holes are bondo'd then sanded (90% of our work including inside of boxes are painted), do not edge band even stained but use putty. The full gluing makes for fairly strong boxes especially with 1/2 bottoms. As the lead installer, hardware finisher, maintenance, electrician, jig and fixture builder in a shop of 6 who build from ff-doors-finishing I have lots of tools and maintenance parts. I am building a 8ft h X 8ft L X 3ft deep tool crib-maintenance-enclosed workbench and wanted stronger drawers and also try out new techniques. Bought the whiteside plywood dados set, as well as the v-groove edgebanding set for my 13 drawers. 1/2, in a dado is extremely strong for racking and twisting with just a dry fit. I have waisted countless hrs on the v-groove edgebanding, and it's one of the few tools I've ever regretted purchasing. In a county of 42k population, with 40-50 custom cabinet related businesses change happens very slowly. My biggest conundrum was choosing undermount loosing 1/2 of drawer depth, vs sidemount. Since toolbox is 8ft long I used a maple ff. So many factors go into my decisions lol. Thanks for teaching all these concepts, it's nice when I can reach into the memory bank and use one!

Atomagicly love the vocabulary, thanks, teacher.

I have a new way of making drawers now! Thanks for the great tip, definitely takes advantage of the strong point of plywood!

As always, fantastic ❤

That’s intriguing. I count the number of boxes or drawers that I’ve made over the last 40 plus years in hundreds - certainly not the thousands that you talk about. When I started, material like plywood obviously existed but it was rarely used for boxes. We used to take a piece of 3/4” solid secondary timber, joint if we needed to for width, and then plane down the edges to, say, 1/4” to fit into grooves/dados that we had made, with a grooving plane, in all four sides. Expansion and contraction is not the big issue here in the UK, generally, than the extremes of climate you have in America. We would make the dados front and back to a depth so that bottom fitted snugly. For the sides, we would leave a cumulative 1/4” expansion gap between the width of the bottom and the depth of the dados. Now, we have engineered timber and much better glues plus loose tenons. For a jewellery box, for instance, I use solid wood for the 4 sides and plywood for the bottom which I cover with leather or suede internally. For a drawer box which is going to have a false front, I would make all the sides and the bottom out of good quality ply but not necessarily Baltic birch as opposed to a good quality A/B plywood. Because I’m using ply and because I E want to avoid a sagging bottom , I do groove/dado all 4 sides and I glue the bottom in. Racking is an issue whilst the glue is curing but I have a lot of shop made 90 degree triangles which I clamp until I’m happy with the glue set. I’ve not seen your method before and I’m not doubting that it’s the best way for you. I also see examples where the bottom is set into grooves/dados but has the back only reduced in height so the bottom overlaps the back and is screwed into the back. Again, I’ve seen much better craftsmen than me do it this way but haven’t had the opportunity to ask them why is that method better than glueing the ply bottom to the 4 ply sides. We recently had to make very large drawers for a permanent display van. That is, the van is taken around to potential clients by our customer, who then opens up the sides, pulls out the drawers and there all the merchandise is on display. Well, the biggest drawers had to be 900mm wide x 1830 long but only 150mm deep. Our solution was half rebates on all four sides as normal which had plenty of glue area already but we also used pocket screws after we glued the bottom in, rather like cramps. Add a false front and those 2 pocket screws were hidden and the rear 2 pocket screws were facing to the inside of the van and will never be seen.

Great content Ramon! Thank you for all your efforts.

Always learn something from you...thank you!

Can't wait to try your drawer box method!

Great Ramon. Hopefully in the second part of this series you'll show the dominoed corners also.

I’ve got 7 drawers to make tomorrow and now you’ve got me rethinking my entire drawer making work flow. I do 5/8 solid wood (beech/soft maple, 1/2” bottom, captive on three sides so I can slide the bottom in after assembling. Then staple the rear. The drawers do rack, even with dominos. I use 1/2” for the bottoms because in my workflow I can use scrap 90% of the time on my drawers. Since 1/4” was only used for drawers bottoms the excess waste made it more expensive for me to use 1/4 vs 1/2

Really enjoy your videos and 'always innovating' mindset 👍

How have I never seen the shim trick before? I will be doing this tonight on some jewelry box drawers. Thank you!

Awesome information as always.

How could I not make it to the end of the video :-) Thanks for the explanation of this drawer making approach. I've been gluing in my bottom panels in the small number of drawers I have made, but your approach looks way faster and probably stronger. Before I change my approach, I'm going to wait for part 2. Thanks for another great video which I'm sure took you a long time to edit and put together. Great work!!!

Really good video and process, i appreciate your approach and quality levels!

all my drawers will be made your way, outstanding

Thank you Ramon, Super Genius!

Why waste all that potential strength that the bottom can provide. It ties it all together. nice one brotha!

Very slick way of building drawer boxes!! Definitely heading iver to watch the next video!! I have a new shop currently being built and will need to build all new cabinetry and I will most certainly be building my drawers like this! Also, It would be nice if you posted more often 😉 As always very informative and greatly appreciated!! Sincerely, Mike Phillips

100% agree Ramon. Here in Australia we mostly use melamine and everything is glued! It squares it up and 'ties' everything together for a stronger construction. Everything for us is commonly 16mm including drawer bases and cabinet backs when it comes to household kitchens ect

Thank you for sharing

I love your through Dominos draw box construction.

Great channel.Subscribed!

even with under-mount style drawer boxes I staple from the bottom at an angle to secure the 1/4" bottom. Really nice way to square them up!

Made it to the end, I watched most 2X, genius as usual. Simple. I have questions but I will wait til part 2 to see if they are answered….please speed up production on that 😂

Brilliant.

Hi Ramon! You are trully the jewell box of ideas/jigs/tricks - thank you for showing us that. Would be really nice to have at the begining introduction of features which your drawer boxes have ( overview etc. ) it would be much easier later in video to relate particular parts of it and have it all visualized :) ( I'm speaking from non pro point of view of course ) !

Ramon, there is another angle to look at when building in a floating drawer bottom, and leaving a drawer with a very small amount of “rack”. If a cabinet box or carcass is built slightly out square by chance, or the cabinets where installed and anchored in place, and maybe pulled out of square slightly, then a drawer box can conform a bit to the front face of a cabinet box for a better, more parallel fit. But nice builds you have there! Thank you for the videos! 👍🏻

This is excellent. The only thing I don't see the point in is the fine adjustment for the rabet to 1/8": unless the sides are EXACTLY 5/8 or 1/2 you still have to put them back to back and measure the finished length. Love the idea with the shim for the drawer bottom and then using the same setting for the front and back and then the offcut for the filler. and just with the filler back in it is 100% the required width.

Ramon, love your work! Please tell us what you did to the sides of the drawers connecting to the front panel. Thanks!

Ramon, I just discovered you on RU-vid and look forward to your other instructional videos. I watched part 1 and part 2 and I will try your methods in my next project. Presently building an 8" vanity for a master bath and I really like the look of the dresser you showed in the videos. Could you possibly tell me what the wood species on the case is and wether it is natural or stained. The tone would go great on my project. Thanks for all the time it takes to provide these videos. I am an old hobby guy and learned a lot. Your presentation and methods are really enjoyable.

I have restored fixed dozens of antiek drawers and it's just as you said. I make my drawers for onder mount and side mount with a rabet and than I screw the bottem on. Al my drawers are mad of MDF and a groove in MDF with so little material behind it it Wil just brake out.

Don't know if you remember but I talked about that I didn't liked the grass tipon glides (I don't like tipon in general) but when I installed those I madey drawers in a different way I do now now I screw the bottem on on three sides and the front has a groove to except the bottom and the sides and back has a rabbet. But I used to put it in a groove al around making the drawer not rigid witch might be the problem of the tipon not working correctly. Wich is a good example why the drawer needs to be rigid

Excellent video love your work. What brand of drawer slides do you use?

I enjoyed the video! Would it be possible to link the drawer hardware used? Thank you!

Watching this video was certainly time well spent. You're obviously highly skilled at putting videos together. You must invest many hours in shooting and editing a video like this. How long did this one take?

Very cool... Did you say "automagically"? If you did; brilliant!! lol

I guess I knew that once and then I got in a hurry and messed it up😊. Happens without fail when I wanna do shortcuts, sigh.

Do you think the drawer box groove would still be the Achilles heel if it were glued all the way around?

What router bit are you using to create the rabbets for the drawer slides - the one with the replaceable cutters? All mine have a top bearing, and doesn't look like that would work.

How do you go about cutting the dominos on the sides without getting chip out on the plywood? Ive used rabbets and dominos for a bunch of drawers and I always get chipout on the domino holes.

You have mentioned you brother and his shop multiple times but is he a furniture maker as wel

I’m convinced. Drop mic

Love that sliding table saw! Joints are pretty but nobody looks. I've only made a few dozen drawers over the years. Maybe a hundred. I'll hide a couple screws behind the drawer front and through the back. Full board sides. Ply bottoms. Finger joints. To much time spent. All non-pro.

I really like this method but was wondering how weak would they be if I did them without the rabbits in the sides and just use dominos?

Lol- that saying never made sense to me, my balls sure as hell aren't dead on accurate🤣🤣

Ramon you didn’t fill the pin nails and 1/4” bottom has exposed MDf. Que pasa carnal??? The box is strong I agree but I am just here to quality control.

Drawers built 37 years, massive Ash,dovetailed with the drawer-bottom grooved, still fine, no warpling and no racking....