Challanges ‣ Kitchen Design and Cabinetry Installations for Northern Arizona

Kitchen Reface with Horizontal Grain Plastic Laminate

by Steve Shearer | Feb 22, 2024 | Cabinets, Challanges

Tracey was looking for a craftsman who could make her kitchen updated with a unique Euro design, and found me from a referral. She also wanted to incorporate these convenience options: sink tip-outs, trash tilt-outs, file drawers, tray storage, and two appliance lifts.

I discovered this easy-to-use, versitle plastic foil, Northern Contours 9013 Oyster Bay 3D laminate for verticle surfaces with this job. White with gray veining, it looks like bleached eucalyptus with the durability of Formica plastic laminate.

Tracey’s original knotty alder kitchen

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Kitchen layout drawing via SmartDraw diagramming software

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Convenient corner cabinets refaced.

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Appliance lifts for mixer and toaster oven

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Double trash tilt-outs in a 12″ base cabinet

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Custom metal extension for a kitchen breakfast peninsula

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Tracey’s Oyster Bay 3D foil kitchen reface, sink wall

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15-inch tray cabinet with Oyster Bay 3D laminate

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Refacing Kitchen Cabinets in Prescott AZ

by Steve Shearer | May 21, 2022 | Cabinets, Challanges

I’ll have to admit, Michele’s kitchen was a challange 🥺. She has custom made cabinets that have different sized face frame styles and she wanted quarter inch spacing between all doors & drawer fronts. We ended up buying four different back-set hinge styles 🤦!! I figured there was over one thousand calculations to get this job done, and I made a ton of mistakes. Michele took it all gracefully as I had to reorder 18% of the fronts 💰.

She frequently referred to this house as one of those “money pits 🤑,” where you just have to replace this BC you repaired that. They knew when buying this that there would be a lot of changes, and it was her husband’s full-time job doing most of the remodeling 🚧 hisself. One of the more notable changes was to remove most the wall-to-wall 96 inch tall storage cabinets that were piece-built in two garages. I would estimate that this amounted to a whole bunk of 3/4″ particle board scraps.

Her cabinets turned out smashing 👏 and she loved it!!

Cabinet Paint used: Benjamin Moore Advance Semi-Gloss Paint Interior, Super White
Shaker Cabinet Doors made and painted by: Horizon Cabinet Door Co.
Soft Close Euro Hinges furnished by: Woodworker Express

Now that the kitchen was finished, Michele had another project for me, a set of bypass doors.

White maple Shaker style bypass doors

MONDAY, May 2nd, 2022, happened today – like ALL DAY, 💩 nonstop!!

by Steve Shearer | May 5, 2022 | Cabinets, Challanges

To sum up my day, it all started when I arrived at my cabinet install job in Dewey. I mistakenly backed up my 2007 Ford van

onto loose gravel in Doug’s driveway and got stuck. It took me 90 minutes to get it back on the pavement & now I have some landscaping clean-up to do

.

The job at hand today, was to remove a DB18 & replace it with the original cabinet I had for it, a DB15 (don’t ask me why

). I also had to relocate the plumbing holes in the SB36 floor (plumbing comes from the floor for mobile homes) and make patches for the slotted holes (I’ll take a picture of it tomorrow). Starting at about 10:30 am, I got it done finally at 2:30 pm.

Next, I realized that the DW was hard-wired with an 18″ cord, which isn’t a problem, unless you want to replace it. I guess it was installed 2 years ago by Home Depot. Don’t know HTF they did that without removing the countertop

???

Then I discovered that the countertop had some 1/4″ hardboard glued to the bottom (we are re-using the Formica post-formed tops). This became an issue with his wife.

They were going back & forth about these issues, so I thold them that they can discuss it all & I’ll go get materials for it. That was at 3 pm. But I still made it home before 5:30, so it was a GOOD DAY!!!

I forgot to mention that the DW was a short (24″) live-wired connection that got shorted out when I tried pulling it away from the wall & had to fix that so it wouldn’t happen again.

Prasher-cabinet-install-mid-project_5-2-22

Bob’s Wall-to-Ceiling Crown Molding & Kitchen Remodel

by Steve Shearer | Sep 12, 2021 | Cabinets, Challanges, Custom Cabinets, Millwork & Trim

It’s not elaborate at all, we’re changing the stained wood into white shaker, but not touching the island. And we’re not done yet.

Bob’s project started on September ‎01, ‎2020. He’s been through 2 painter companies for his doors, and taking them to a shop in Phoenix for the third go-around. Today, September ‎10, ‎2021, I drilled the doors for hinges.

And I really feel good because when I went to layout the doors and drawer fronts, I only got 1 wrong, and Bob can probably use it as a frame for an artwork crafted by our local merchants.

I had finished the wall-to-ceiling crown molding on Thursday, September ‎02, ‎2021.

This is something I hadn’t done for over 20 years. And as sure as God made little green apples, I had zero experience at pricing this project. But I wanted to do it and gain this knowlege.

He wanted 6 inch crown molding, and that monkey is not available in our small town, so I had to order it. I ended up getting 14: 3/4 x 6-1/8 x 84 Primed MDF Crown Moulding pieces. More pieces equals more joints. Great start for underpricing this job. Next, we need to paint it and since it’s already primed, I get to skip that step – WRONG!! The primer was obviously laid on with a machine – very, very wavy. So now the trim has a texture that needs sanded (see pics) AND an extra coat of paint because 50 percent of the primer got sanded off! More time for underpricing!! Then I start the project with a return-to-wall trim piece – WRONG!! I should have started where the paint color changes (see pics). So this misstep burned a few more hours.

Woodworking Mistakes

The job took about 30% more time than I had bid. Naturally, the joining of the crown took the most time. And about 75% of the way through this project, I realized that using a biscuit cutter would save time and even the joints out better.

I had introduced to Bob that we could use rubber molding for the curved bay window area, but it was a lot more expensive. I’m glad we didn’t use it, because you’ve only got one shot with this. Miss by over 1/16th of an inch, and I buy a new one. There was also no guarantee on how it would match up to the straight trim. I ended up making it with 6 pieces, about 17 inches long each to span the almost eight foot compass window.

I had unknowingly under bid myself on his wall-to-ceiling crown molding, but it’s no big deal,as I wanted to add it to my portfolio. I was solving someone’s problem, while I was prospering on my main goal.

Cabinets painted, 5 doors hung to check sizing

Anybody want these? Nice doors, solid maple.

Original cabinets

Island cabinets stay the same with Bob in the background.

6 inch wall-to-ceiling crown molding

Curved bay window with 6 inch wall-to-ceiling crown molding

Bob’s reface in Stoneridge AZ afterwards, with existing island cabinets

Bob’s kitchen in Stoneridge AZ afterwards, with existing island cabinets

Bob’s kitchen with 1/8″ reveals. NOT recommended: should be 1/4″ minimum.

1978 VW Vanagon (Westfalia) Camper Cabinet Restoration

by Steve Shearer | Jan 14, 2021 | Cabinets, Challanges, Custom Cabinets

Z and Andy run a custom bike & vintage auto restoration & repair shop in Prescott Valley, AZ

Z found me on Craigslist on June 1st of last year. He introduced me to Andy, who has coordinated the build. They needed somebody to restore the cabinets & panels for a 78 VW Vanagon. This will be a project for me that will likely take about 4 weeks of off-and-on work set between other works (mainly cabinets).