How To Install Cabinet Drawer Slides

This video illustrates an easy way to accomplish kitchen cabinet, bathroom or furniture drawer slide installation. This demonstration of installing drawer glides shows an almost fool proof way of getting the cabinet parts to align correctly without the use of measuring and marking things with a pencil. By using this method costly mistakes can be eliminated because of mis-measuring. Just make sure that you check and double check your dimensions before proceeding with applying the parts to the cabinets.

With a little creativity, this easy way of getting the parts in the proper place can be applied to many different areas of cabinetry fabrication, installation and remodeling.

Tools and materials needed:

* Blocks of wood cut to the proper dimensions to use as spacers
* Electric drills with pilot hole bits and driver bits
* Tape measure
* Drawer glides
* Installation screws
* Table saw
* Electric chop or hand saw

Steps for installing drawer slides:

Measure the distance where you will be installing the drawer slides to determine how big the spacer blocks will be.

Cut the wood spacers to the proper length, width and height using your table saw, hand or chop saw.

Get your drills into a good position where they can be easily reached along with the installation screws for the slides.

Insert the spacer block into position and rest the drawer glide against it.

Align the slide into its perfect position.

Drill the pilot holes into the cabinet sides through the drawer slides where the oblong holes are located. This will allow room to make adjustments, by sliding the drawer slide into a different position, if you need to at a later date.

Screw the installation screws through the drawer glide and into the kitchen cabinet, wall-unit, garage cabinetry, office furniture or bathroom cupboard.

Use a hand screwdriver to loosen the screws if you need to make any adjustments to the position of the drawer slide.

Depending upon the style of cabinet slide you are using, you may be able to use spacer blocks for installing the slide’s members onto the drawer or it might be necessary to measure for proper placement using your tape measure.

Now, in his video tutorial he is only installing one cabinet drawer in the box. Keep in mind that if you have a stack of drawers you would just need to cut different sized blocks to use as spacers.

If you are changing drawer slides and you are not able to find the exact style you had previously, this method of using some sort of spacer may work in your situation too. The spacer block can be used either over where the drawer slide gets mounted or underneath.

This method of cabinet drawer slide installation can be used in many different areas of fabrication. If you are building something that has fixed shelves or partitions, you can cut spacer blocks to eliminate using a pencil and a square. We used to use this system for making mailbox inserts slots and desk organizers.

By figuring a few mathematical equations much of the measuring and marking process of installing drawer slides can be eliminated. Most cabinet manufacturing facilities call these spacer blocks templates or patterns and use them regularly in manufacturing all different types of cupboards, not just where drawers are needed.

After installing the glides, you may need to spray WD40 on the drawers if they are not operating smoothly. If you still have difficulty after that you may need to cut it down a little.