Thread: Some heresy - using prefab kitchen cabinets for your shop?

I think it’s a great idea. I go through phases where I enjoy making fixtures and projects for my workshop. At other times it just feels like a waste of my limited time workshop time. Oddly enough, as time has progressed and I’ve developed more skills, I spend less and less time on workshop fixtures as I have the skills to make more pieces for the house or as gifts.

I say go for it!

Cgcc,

Buy the cabinets and get on with the fun stuff!

Hope this helps,

Jeff

Keep your eye on FB marketplace for 2nd hand kitchens too. I have a whole row of cupboards that I use for boat building where long narrow benches are useful, good storage as well. . Bit of a hint, leave space between your cabinets where you have bench over so you can clamp stuff.

7 metre wall in my garage is Ikea kitchen cabinets wit double layer yellow tongue bench top. I have far too many jobs on my list I think it cost approx $1300 about the same cost as the melamine and hardware ( although I would have purchased a kreg cabinet jig if I went DIY, )
I had so much stuff hanging on the floor stacked, in the way usually, and could barely put my finger on where some screws were.

one weekend’s work and I am very happy. Wife says there is even a chance to get “both” cars in the garage at the same time, I said let’s not rush I need more tools

setup was two doors, then one drawer two doors, rinse repeat and last gap was left as gap for my air compressor to tuck into.

it looks good and it would have taken me a month, I had also tried to get a price for 7 x double door cabinets and hardware only, from kitchen/cabinet maker folk. One guy quoted me $7,000 another told me it should cost around $1400 but he was booked solid for 18 months and looked at me as if had two heads when I suggested he could do it as a end of shift job any day he wanted with “leftover” time and material. Apparently the “computer” does the cut list and his computer says the next available slot for anything is 18 months. I drove to ikea the next day,
cheers

Nothing wrong with that at all and, IMO, IKEA stuff is actually very well engineered.

Go for it - I'm a big fan of "what works . . . . ."

In 2011 I needed storage in a hurry to get me started in the new shed extension.
On the day after I started thinking about this I found these two wooden cabinets in a skip at work.
Some sort of a lab refurb was going on and these apparently did not make the cut.
The Regum slab tops were from a tree that was going right outside the old part of the shed that I had cut down about a decade earlier.
10 years on and they are still there -
B12.jpg

When we bought our house, we ripped out the old kitchen and put in a new one. Most of those old cabinets have been repurposed into my workshop for storage. I put 1 inch thick plywood on instead of a kitchen counter top and they have been going strong for over a decade.

Originally Posted by Morbius

When we bought our house, we ripped out the old kitchen and put in a new one. Most of those old cabinets have been repurposed into my workshop for storage. I put 1 inch thick plywood on instead of a kitchen counter top and they have been going strong for over a decade.

Perfect.

Reminds me a bit of the following.

A few years back one of the neighbours did a major house reno including replacing the circa 1970's orange and brown laminex kitchen with tasteful white melamine cabinets and off white marble tops. A year later they sold up and moved on.

The new owners (he was about 40 and had sort of retired after a stint as the CFO for a major music record label) came in and replaced the 1 year old kitchen with what did not look that different to me. They put the old/new kitchen cabinets on the back veranda and was talking to the lady of the house about how new it still looked and how they should be able to get something for it. "Oh we're not selling it, it's going into a studio (a shed) as the marble tops will be perfect for hubby's French clock restoration workbenches". The owners completely did the house up and I believe the spent over 100 grand just on the pocket handkerchief back yard, limestone everything, pool with marble statues, outdoor kitchen with all the mod cons etc. They wanted to spend 25 grand on a brick and stone fence between us - I said I would pay for half a Colorbond fence which did not go down well. In the end they put up a second elaborate 3.5m high lattice work fence just inside their boundary.

They had "House and Garden" Photographers over taking photos for a couple of days and then they flogged it off. Apparently this was her thing, find an old house with potential, move in, spend loads of hubby's money doing up the place and move on. It was something like their 7th house in about 10 years. That would drive me just nuts.

BTW the lattice work fence started falling down and was giving the current owners no end of trouble and last year they ended up pulling a section of it down.

Yep - it's your workshop, your time and ...... well ..... who cares.
Just do it and enjoy your woodworking.
Life's too short to worry about what anybody else thinks
Tom

I wish i had of seen this when I started doing up my shed. Ton's of covered in storage... just don't install the sink and for $800. people spend that on 1 tool box
Practa Straight Line Modular Kitchen - Bunnings Australia

I used IKEA kitchen cabinets for one wall of my shed. Have never regretted it.

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I saw this originally and my thoughts were

1 - Prefab!
2 - Bunnings!
3 - MDF!

Barely qualifies as woodwork, burn this heretic at the stake! Buttttt, its a good idea.

I looked into doing this in my last studio - using a kitchen company. One sends all the measurements in and their flat-pack machine cuts everything and sends it to you for assembly.

It fits the spaces you have.

BTW, I think having an oven and sink in a workshop would be wonderful. Good for sharpening, resin casting and pies

Oh, and a decent coffee machine

I have used IKEA and Bunnings cabinets.
What I don’t like about the IKEA ones is their fiddly DIY style metal installation brackets etc. and their 5mm backs
I don’t use their brackets but instead buy a length of white primed 90x19 pine from Bunnings and install a hanging batten across the back top of the carcass and fix off through that like you do with traditional kitchen cabinetry

Other than that they are fine.

Originally Posted by havabeer69

I wish i had of seen this when I started doing up my shed. Ton's of covered in storage... just don't install the sink . . . .

I reckon leave the sink in. After 10 years of use I haven't regretted installing a sink in my shed. I did my own plumbing using PVC connections to a garden tap and the waste has a diverter so it can be discharged direct into the garden.