hinges


Tim Kohl

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To answer your question, I haven't found them. Every hardware store sells hinges. Rockler and WC sell hinges. Amazon sells hinges.  Here's my issue after using all of the above listed. 

Quality is pretty universally observed. 

Value is in the eye of the beholder. 

Price is only an issue in the absence of value.

For me it comes down to this simple fact.  I may spend 6 or 10 hours building a small box.  At least 2 hours prepping for finish.  2 hours over 3 or 4 days  finishing it. 

I have $500 worth of my Time invested in it.

Will I ever regret paying $20 for a set of hinges.  Nope.

Will I ever regret slapping on $9 plated hinges from rockler,  maybe not,  but maybe.  Is $11 to buy the insurance for myself that it won't happen worth it,  absolutely. 

Soap box rant.  I've also heard about the "better quality for less $" pitches around.  I may even try them out, but I trust  brusso. They invest their marketing dollars supporting some of my favorite media and content producers. I don't see my purchasing trend changing.

Edited by Brendon_t
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Brendon I agree with every thing you said, there is always a Brusso (fill in name brand)  wanna be out there with similar quality and little bit cheaper.  That seems not to be the case with hinges it either cheap or Brusso, so Brusso it is.  Thanks for the input

 

 

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Yeah I can't say I've ever found anything in the middle.  It's either brass plated junk that you find everywhere, or solid brass USA-machined Brusso awesomeness.  It would be great if Brusso had some competition to drive the price down a bit, but at this point they don't have any, at least that I'm aware of.

I look at hinges the same way I look at lumber...I'm putting a bunch of hours into building this whatever, which is really the most costly part of the build...my time...so the extra few bucks it takes to use high quality materials is not only negligible, but frankly not even optional.  I simply cannot get excited about spending hours, days, weeks of my life working on a project made with junk wood and hardware.

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I purchase all my hinges from Horton Brasses: http://www.horton-brasses.com/Hinges.asp

I've used 50+ sets of hinges in a variety of styles and sizes... I can vouch for their brass, specialty (clock, butler tray, etc) and forged iron hinges. I've also used 20+ lock sets in a variety of sizes -- I can vouch for those as well...

They offer a wide variety of other hardware, but I have not used it... YMMV.

I do not know how their prices compare to others... I suspect that you get what you pay for with hardware, so I bet they are similar in price to Brusso... I've used some of Brusso's specialty hinged not provided by Horton. From my use, Horton/Brusso fit/finish are equivalent.

Their customer service is very good.

Edited by hhh
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I use Brusso and decided to try another manufacturer recently. The hinges were nowhere near the quality of Brusso and they were not particularly cheap either. I decided not to put them onto the furniture project I was doing at the time and used some Brusso ones I had in stock.

I think the alternatives would be ok for shop projects and they have now gone into my stock box for that usage in the future.

I do like the Rockler toy box hinges though - they are very good.

 

Bottom line - for me only Brusso will do for furniture projects that I make.

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I ran into a situation on my current build where Brusso didn't offer a hinge that went with the design. I shopped around quite a bit, ordered from a couple of sources, including Lee Valley and still wasn't satisfied with the quality. 

I found some made by Deltana that matched the design, ordered them and have been very happy with them. Quality is very good and 1/2 the price of Brusso.

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