When I first "discovered" the french cleat method for hanging
cabinets, when redoing my kitchen ages ago, I thought it was the
greatest idea since insert witty invention here.

BUT, beware of unsquare/unplumb corners in (old) houses.

Built a lovely corner unit that musta weighed 40# (maybe more, not
less) Now, I know 40# to you brutes is barely equivalent to a feather
for me. But for l'il ole me it gets kinda heavy, especially when one
has to repeatedly lift the ^#@%#*^%# cabinet a hundert times because
the &$*^%#* walls aren't *&%&$*& straight!

But, I get ahead of myself...

So, I fasten a cleat to each wall. Lift the cabinet...resort to
sliding it up the wall, and hang it on the cleats. The walls are soo
bad that it won't grab both cleats. Long story short - mess around
with various adjustments, including a cleat on one wall, but in the
end, mount the cabinet the old fashioned way, directly into the walls
using lags (I don't have studs, didn't trust the furring strips, so I
lagged into the concrete block (brick and block walls) - The lagging
was yet more excitement, entailing rather long screws (have to
accomodate the furring strips and drywall), but I don't recall nor
will I bore you with the details.

Those corner cabinets aren't moving. If I found myself a 350#
football linebacker for a boyfriend, I can rest assured he could do
his chin ups off those cabinets ;-)

Renata

On Sun, 16 Nov 2003 09:40:31 GMT, (Dave Mundt) wrote:

Greetings and Salutations.

Nope...Deck Screws are NOT hardened to the extent that drywall
screws are...so they are a lot "tougher" - resistant to breaking when
drilling in.
As for hanging the cabinet...I would recommend (as others
have) the French cleat method. Although it does space the cabinet
out half an inch or so, it is going to be THE strongest and most
flexible way to hang them. I have been using the technique some
years now, and was interested to note that one of the woodworking
magazines has JUST published a lengthy and very positive article
about the technique.
Shoot one or two screws though the wall cleat into the studs
(making sure to get an inch into the stud itself) and you just about
will be able to hang an elephant on the cleat before it fails.
Regards
Dave Mundt