Oh, you're paying him. That's different. I build a lot of cabinets, mostly
for fun (like Habitat projects) and 3/4 lauan costs me $24/sheet and makes
nice stuff. My material cost for a complete set of kitchen cabinets runs in
the neighborhood of $250. I know all about boredom. But yeah, if I wanted
to make money per hour, I would buy the doors and make the boxes.

In any case, I don't know who makes cabinet carcasses. I have never heard
of it. Lots of places make doors and drawer fronts. The real savings in
mass production is in the manufacture of these fancy millwork pieces,
especially if you are buying the hardwood at retail (i.e., not having your
own tree sawed or something equivalent). Lots of people make the boxes and
buy the doors, or use the doors on existing cabinets.

Incidentally, are these cabinets to be faced? Putting your own hardwood
facing on some kind of particle board cabinet sounds like a trick.


"Matt Mason" wrote in message
...


donald girod wrote:

Question: why doesn't your dad build the boxes as well? It isn't hard
(hell of a lot easier than making raised panel doors), and it has the
capacity to reduce his boredome even farther. Besides, you will get
nice
sturdy plywood cabinets.




He did the cost / benefit anaylsis on his own. The boxes can be built
via mass production much cheaper than he can do on his own. The doors,
which use the expensive materials (solid maple) are where the savings
are to be made.