# Question on closet remodel



## nightdiver5 (Jan 10, 2011)

I have a question about joinery.
I've decided to jump in and remodel the master bedroom closet. I want to do a whole built in look using vertical panels with a 32mm hole system to allow moving the shelves and clothing rods (the location of which will undoubtedly be decided by my gf). I've looked at the kind of products that California Closets and others offer but the quality of the material (particle board with veneer) leaves a lot to be desired.

So I've come up with my own design for the vertical panels. I'll be using 3/4 red oak and the thing I'm struggling with is the best way to join the 3/4 thick by 14" wide vertical panel to the bottom shelf. I wont be able to access the underside of the shelf so that does away with the idea of drilling through the shelf and into the vertical panels.

I thought about pocket screws but I don't really want to have exposed screw heads along the bottom of the verticals. I suppose I could put a piece of molding on each side of the vertical panel to cover the screws but I was hoping for a better solution

I also thought of using my nail gun with some small finishing nails and that may be the way to go, but I'm also concerned that the sharp angle I will have to use to avoid pushing the nail out the other side of the panel might cause some splitting.

Any better ideas?

Jeff T
"If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?" 
- Albert Einstein


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## Flocktothewall (Jan 16, 2011)

Have you considered biscuits, or dowels? You could even screw from the panel into the bottom of the shelf, and cover the screw with a plug.

If you wanted to take the time, you could also do like a tongue and dado joint on the bottom shelf, but IMO I think that for things like closets and utility shelves its overkill. Like you said, look at the closet maid stuff, its Particle board with Conformat screws, if that will hold up, a glue and screw, or glue and nail, or glue and biscuit will hold up.

I recently built a 'built in desk' and I just used biscuits for the carcases, it made alignment easy, glue up easy and didn't take any time at all.


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## nightdiver5 (Jan 10, 2011)

Thanks Luke,
Actually I'm planning on putting the vertical panels together with a combination of dowels and biscuits. I have a brand new biscuit cutter that I'm anxious to put to work. I'm also going to join all the shelves with biscuits since they all have to be 14" wide.
I'm reasonably comfortable with edge joining using the biscuit cutter but I have some concerns about joining a 85" tall vertical panel to a bottom horizontal shelf when the bottom shelf will be 12 ft long and I have 2 panels at the ends and then three spaced along the middle. I'm not sure how you would accurately transfer the location of the biscuit slots on the bottom of the panel to the middle of the horizontal shelf. Dowels might be an answer and I may go that way. I actually thought of just doing a 3/4 wide 1/8 deep dado and gluing the panel into the dado but it doesn't seem like the esthetic way to go because the front where the panel shelf joins will be exposed.
I don't know if this will come through but this is the drawing I did of the panel and then how it will join to the bottom shelf. Oh and it will need to join the top shelf but I can screw from the top down into the vertical panel for the top shelf.








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## nightdiver5 (Jan 10, 2011)

That's the join of the vertical panel to the bottom shelf. Let me try that panel drawing again.


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## Flocktothewall (Jan 16, 2011)

If you're essentially going to set the panel on the bottom board, dowels or screws with plugs would be easy! Biscuits will help with alignment. You could start by making the box, the two end panels and top and bottom and using scrap piece of wood cut to the length you want the middle panels to be, and use that as a 'stop block' for the biscuit joiner so you can have exact alignment.


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## shawnmasterson (Jan 24, 2013)

dados are the best way to go. I do mine with a router for long panels and a TS for smaller panels.


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## nightdiver5 (Jan 10, 2011)

Thanks again Luke,
You are exactly right that I'm essentially going to set the panel on the bottom board. That's the join that I'm concerned about. I'm not sure what you mean about making the box. Do you mean the very bottom where there will be sort of a box 3.5" high to form the toe kick and support the bottom shelf? I'll probably put that together just using finishing nails. 
The vertical panel will have 3.5" x 85" long pieces joined to 3.5" x 7" top, middle and bottom pieces with biscuits, and six 1" x 37" long pieces doweled into the top and bottom sections of the panel. I'm going to dowel the long strips and the top, middle and bottom 7" pieces together, then add the two long sides with biscuits.
After thinking about it, I'll probably use screws and plugs to join the vertical panel to the bottom shelf.

Thanks for the input Shawn,
The problem with dados for this project is the dado will show on the front edge and it wont have the clean look I'm going for.


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## Flocktothewall (Jan 16, 2011)

When I said box, what I meant by that was the two sides, and top and bottom, the carcass of the unit. In essence just a box, then inside of that you had a few more vertical panels, I believe, those are what I was saying to use a jig or scrap piece of wood for alignment, kinda like what alot of people do to install drawer slides evenly on each side.

Screws with dowels will be solid, the glue will do most of the work anyways. I remember along time ago, I was working with a cabinet maker, and he showed me that for years he had just edge glued his face frames, no pocket screws, or mortise/tennon, or anything. He said for their application, because they were glued to a box, screwed to a wall, they had never failed. Each application is different, so obviously in this case, just a simple end grain glue would probably not be a good idea, but combine that with screws into the end grain, solid construction that has been used for the past century, likely your closet will out last you, or at least your taste…

I've done a few projects, that now I want to re-do because my taste has changed


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## SharitaJBevilacqua (Aug 8, 2013)

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