Thread: Door knobs and drawer pulls Help wanted

Hi Scally

This is my "quick and dirty" cupboard / draw handle

It's just a length of 2x1 that I profile with a router then trim to length, but it's strong and effective. It works well for the type of furniture I build anyway. The 3rd picture is on my boy's bedside cabinet.

Cheers

Ian

Originally Posted by Scally

The cabinet is for a little boy so they need to be easy to grab hold of and strong enough so he doesn't break them in his rush to get at the toys inside.

Do any of you have any ideas or pics of different types of knobs or drawer pulls that you have made or liked the look of?

Oh I wish I had shares ...
Look at Lee Valley's spread. Some of the pulls can be got locally, but my favourites for kids are:
http://www.leevalley.com/hardware/pa...521,46772&ap=1 hands
http://www.leevalley.com/hardware/pa...742,46667&ap=1
http://www.leevalley.com/hardware/pa...742,46667&ap=1 love these ones !
http://www.leevalley.com/hardware/pa...742,46667&ap=1
http://www.leevalley.com/hardware/pa...742,46667&ap=1 though these ones may be a bit delicate for a child

just go "hang the expense", get some real kid's knobs and when he outgrows them replace them with more adult ones

ian

Thanks fellas
Ian
I have tried to keep away from the Lee Valley catalogue for a while.

They certainly have some spectacular stuff.

I will have a look at it again tonight.

The hands and the tools are cute.


Ianab
Your knobs are the typeof thing I was looking for.

They look strong and I like the clean style.

My imagination is flagging so I was after some different styles to help me out.

go here http://www.motherofpearl.com/index.htm they have mail order to i think...

As much as I liked the "hand" drawer pulls from Lee Valley, I was too impatient.

I cut out large hand holds for the drawers. Mum and bub can get a good grip on them.

The skinny drawer has an "ebony like" timber pull set into the deep cove in the front of the drawer. You can only get a finger and thumb on the pull but it does pull out easily.

I found the bright and shiny black nickle knobs for the four doors. It looks a bit shiny but once the doors are oiled I think it will go with the dark mahogany colour.

I'll probably try rare earth magnets for catches on the top doors and James Krenov style catches for the bottom doors.

Time to finish sanding and get the cupboard to my grandson.

If it was important for looks and not cut through the drawers I would be tempted to buy a drawer pull cutter for my router.
They are a bit too expensive for something I am not likely to use much.
For door and drawer knobs I do similar to ianab but use 3x3 timber and use a roundover bit on the outsides.
I also use the cove and roundover bits on all 4 sides which gives a good handhold no matter how you grab them.
I started making them this way after inheriting a couple of nice pieces of furniture from my parents and wanting the things I make myself to match.

Scally, for "concealed" drawers I've always preferred just what you've done, except when the drawer front is too shallow. (I recently posted a pic of a wardrobe I'd handled the same way; I really gotta work out how to add links to already uploaded attachments. )

I've been experimenting with something similar to ianab's quicky handles but with a shallower profile, which screws over rebates routed into the drawer front. The method looks promising, being both quick and (dare I say it?) stylish. A bit hard to change if you decide to change the decor though...

Hi Ian,

Don't you just love Lee Valley and their kit? I have to take a bex before I look at their catalogue of items, else I'd go into CC meltdown. And (I know, bad grammer), don't mention Lie Nielsens goodies list....Owwww!

Cheers!

I liked the idea or concealing the pull by routing a cove at the back of the bottom of the drawer front.
Then routing a cove in the top front of the drawer below it.

It would have been pretty well concealed.

To do this, I would have needed to have the drawer bottom at least 40mm above the bottom of the drawer front.

It seemed a bit of a waste of drawer space.

I have looked at the drawer pull cutters too, but I don't make enough drawers and doors to make it worthwhile. The standard wooden knobs are available from Mother of Pearl, harware shops and LV and you can buy a fair few for the cost of a cutter.
When I want to make something a bit different, I usually search through my cutters or use a rasp and jig saw to make them up.

Skew
where do I find your attachments?

I finished the cabinet on the weekend but forgot to take photos. I'll remember to do that next weekend.

thanks for all your suggestions.

Fellas
I just put up some pics of the cabinet finished so thought I would finish this thread off.

Thanks again for you suggestions.

Scally - those Bubinga panels look spiffy - and that's the BACK side you'r showing, too!
You should be able to live with that for a month or three.

Cheers,

Ian
Bubinga has a lot of figure and takes a polish really well.

It is a bit like blackwood in that you can get chip out when running it through a thicknesser.
The grain is running all over the place so you can't orientate it to stop the chip out.
It is best to have sharp blades and take light cuts. If in doubt you can just settle for a bit of extra sanding.

I split a thick board so I could bookmatch the front panels. You have to look closely to notice the book matching because of all the figure in the timber.
It is pretty spectacular timber.

A spectacular piece, alright.
Now I think I know what the plank I picked up years ago might be. I was getting the raw material for a kitchen project, and saw this board in a stack of odds and ends, I had no idea what it was, and neither did the yard hand, but it looked too interesting to pass up. It's been sitting around for years - I come across it every now and then and wonder what I could do with it - I suppose I've always been hopeful that some more would turn up. Now you've shown me the bleeding obvious - mix it with something close in texture, and stain to match. The Maple seems to have toned up and fitted with the Bubunga very convincingly on your cabinet. I'm usually relucatant to get into staining because of very erratic results in the past, but your effort has inspired me to have another go. I've got a nicely figured bit of Maple that would go well with my 'bubinga' board.
Now, which of the 427 projects 'under consideration' would it best suit.........???

IW
The maple was good to work but I struggled with the staining.

The maple had a fair bit of sap wood that was very pale althought I had a couple of boards that had good fiddleback.

I am not an expert with staining so played with several stains and mixes and ended up sanding most of the stain off some of the boards to even out the finish.
I bought interior grade ply for the back back. It had a good grain that matched the rest of the cabinet. Unfortunately the stain grabbed like the ply was blotting paper and almost completely obscured the grain.
It was pretty disappointing after going to the effort of finding good quality ply.

I made a cabinet using Jarrah for the frame and bubinga panels.
The red colours in the jarrah complemented the bubinga - and no staining.

I expect a dark blackwood would work OK, too. It can have some red colour in the grain.

Good luck picking your project.