Cabinet doors

[Dan M]

The piece: A face frame cabinet, 2 doors and a single large drawer, partial overlay

The question: How would you make a double door base without a center stile?

The follow up ?: Won't there be a slight gap between the doors?

Thanks

[PaulMarcel]

I'm sure you've see the solution where one door has a strip of wood sticking out past the inside edge of the door to act as a gap-filling stile. Uhg.

Another way to accomplish hiding the gap is to route opposing bevels in the inside edges of the doors and have those edges overlap. That is, before cutting the bevel, the doors would overlap by about 1/16". On one, cut a back bevel, on the other a chamfer of the same angle. The chamfered door still needs to be closed first before the back-beveled door closes on top of it, but the gap is gone.

You could do the above with opposing rabbets, too, although I think bevels are prettier.

[markhochstein]

The piece: A face frame cabinet, 2 doors and a single large drawer, partial overlay

The question: How would you make a double door base without a center stile?

The follow up ?: Won't there be a slight gap between the doors?

Thanks

I don't think the gap will be unsightly at all-and a much better option than the alternatives. If you take your time fitting the doors, you should be able to make the mate up perfectly and you will only have a seam or a very small line, not a gap. Make sure that the two edges that will touch each other are beveled away from each other on the back side to give clearance to open one door while the other remains closed. Do that work with the doors on your bench. Then you are ready to hang them. You don't want them to be too narrow. I would make sure they are about 1/16" oversized. If you are using traditional partial overlay hinges (non-euro style) then you can trim the hinge side of the door to get it to fit just right. If you're using euro style cabinet hinges the the hinge may have enough adjustment capability built-in for you to refine the fit.

I made a cabinet years ago and I shiplapped the doors for the same reason. I hated it. You always had to open one door before the other and if you closed them in the wrong order it made long bang and beat the hell out of the "short" door. Of source, I was the only person who knew which door to open first, so you can imagine the comments I got from others. I won't be doing that again.

[Bob Rozaieski]

The piece: A face frame cabinet, 2 doors and a single large drawer, partial overlay

The question: How would you make a double door base without a center stile?

The follow up ?: Won't there be a slight gap between the doors?

Thanks

If you look at period pieces like tall secretaries, they shiplapped the doors. In essence, the left door(usually) was slightly wider than the right door. The two doors then had opposing rabbets cut on their edges, which would overlap when the doors were closed. This required that the left door be closed first, then the right would lap over it. THe doors would be opened in the opposite sequence. Many modern kitchen cabinets use a similar feature where they screw a thin (usually around 1/4" thick) strip to the inside stile of the left door to simulate a center stile when the doors are closed. When the doors are open, the "center stile" moves with the left door. Again, this requires that the doors be closed in order to close correctly.

I did a similar cabinet to what you are describing, with inset doors though, and I didn't use any kind of center stile or shiplap. There is a gap, but it is very small; just enough to allow the doors to swing past each other without binding. The trick is to make the doors just a hair wider than they need to be, so that they do get stuck when you open both simultaneously. Then, with the doors hung in place, plane the edges where the two doors meet in the middle to give you a very small gap. You can even back bevel the inside edges of the door frame slightly to allow the gap to be slightly tighter at the front than the back so the doors will clear each other but close very tightly together.

[Bobby Slack]

Great solution if you want to see no gap. I use this method for exterior french doors. On a cabinet, this fantastic approach would force you to open one door before the other.

This issue is all about reveal. Reveal is the clearance between two doors. If you use Salice hinges 110 degrees of opening your reveal will be 1.1mm per door 2.2 per opening, this is about 1/8" overall.

If you are using European concealed hinges, when installing the doors make sure you have plenty of adjustment to the outside of the case, then install the doors where they slightly bind. Once you do this adjust each to the outside just a little bit and you will get it perfect.

Here is the huge advantage of Salice Vs. Blum. I am sure there is a lot of Blum fans in this forum.

When you adjust the overlay on a Salice hinge the relationship of the door and the case does not change at all, with Blum you need to make two adjustments: First the desired overlay and reveal, second the distance between your door and your case.

I'm sure you've see the solution where one door has a strip of wood sticking out past the inside edge of the door to act as a gap-filling stile. Uhg.

Another way to accomplish hiding the gap is to route opposing bevels in the inside edges of the doors and have those edges overlap. That is, before cutting the bevel, the doors would overlap by about 1/16". On one, cut a back bevel, on the other a chamfer of the same angle. The chamfered door still needs to be closed first before the back-beveled door closes on top of it, but the gap is gone.

You could do the above with opposing rabbets, too, although I think bevels are prettier.

[PMR]

Dan I just made some upper cabs for the shop without the center stile, I adjusted the doors so the gap is from 1/16" to 1/8" and they look fine, you can really only see a slight opening when looking dead center at the cabs. Pat

Just read Bobby's post above me, I used the Salice hinges with 110 degrees opening...

[Dan M]

Thanks for all the info. I made my doors wider than the opening, then at installation I planed each until they closed perfectly. Now I'm going to bevel the inside edge slightly and they're good. here's a pic.....