Drawer pull postioning

larry merlau

Member
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18,741
Location
Delton, Michigan
Some of us do things one at a time and others need to do it more productive or need to maintain uniform position.. i have ten drawers that need pulls and to measure each one and drill it then do it over again is way to time consuming and a mistake waiting to happen.. so here is how i deal with things like that usually,, yup i threw in a escape clause:)
group.jpgH-ctnr.jpg
First i take and lay then all out in the order they will go and then decide as to where the first one needs to be, in this case i have a divider built in to look like two dressers so i need to have the pulls centered on the top one between the edge and the divider..
the rest could be positioned with a offset but in my mind that doesnt look good, so we need to use the top measurement and carry it threw the whole group..i took and found the center between the divider and edge of the drawer front. this where a centering ruler is a blessing.. can be done with normal rulers but this works better for me..
V-ctnr.jpgSide offset.jpg
do the same thing on the vertical face of the drawer and make a mark for reference on both ends of the front, mark the center on the top and then take and make a offset mark can be what ever you want but i try to get it close to where the first hole will be and also try to have it fall on a easy dimension, like in this case i used the end of the ruler and came in at 5"
Ref. marks.jpgLayout rule.jpg
then with the ruler i took painters tape and marked the ruler with pointers to show me the right position of the drill marks and the edge offset.. then it was just a matter of taking the scratch awl and using a mallet to drop punch the position for the drill holes.. use a mallet its easier on your hands and makes it easier to see your exact position better.. once they are all marked then you can go to the drill press and have a good point for drill positioning and make your holes for all of them at once and be assured they are uniform.. one last thing i would like to emphasize on is the use of steel rulers not tape measures,, you can get into trouble fast with tape rulers, they are good in there place but the steel rulers excel in a lot of areas in woodworking.
 
Great tutorial Larry. When we moved into this house none of the cabinets had draws on them but LOML wanted then soI was faced with doing 20 of them and they had already been installed. I picked up one of these at the borg for <$5.It has a piece that fits over the top of the drawer.

template.jpg
 
yup don, that would give you some spacing positions but its setup for there spacing not the out of the ordinary like this is.. but is by far better with set sized frnts..
 
Thanks Larry. We need more of this. I learned a bunch. It may seem obvious after but i pick up on little tips like the use a mallet to pop the mark. Prior i would have tried to push by hand, now i get why the mallet.
You so right about the steel rule thing.



sent from s4
 
Good tip Larry! :thumb: Turning the ruler into a story stick is a great idea. I typically lay some masking tape over where the holes are going. Lay all of them out, check every one of the spacings with one of the handles, mark them with a awl, then drill them. Your idea should speed up that process. :wave:
 
in my case darren, the pulls are separate pieces, so i cant just lay one down for spacing. another thing that is nice is if all the fronts are the same size, but in my case the case work has different dimensions in some points and to get the same revel i had a slight difference in widths or heights, most would never see it and i probably could have just went with set position but the persistent part in me had to adjust..
 
Love the tape being used a tick marks. Great idea that will really relieve some of our aging eyes when doing those repetitive tasks :thumb:
 
Great suggestion Larry. I've noted it down on my ww hints notebook.

Another way of doing it is using a squared piece of cardboard, measuring from left side and from the top and make a hole in the mark.Then use the hole to mark where the pull hole is going to be using it in the same way as the plastic template that Don mentions, to mark the other side of the drawer just flip it over.
 
I had saw a video on how to layout drawer pulls with out using a tape measure. All you needed was the pull, a sharp pencil and a straight edge. It had to do with marking from the sides the width of the pulls and then drawing diagonal lines from each mark to the opposite corner. It puts them dead center every time.
 
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