How to Upgrade to Soft-Close Cabinets | Ask This Old House

[Music] kitchen looks awesome thanks um we did just a few small minor upgrades we replaced the faucet added water filtration all new appliances and then replaced the cabinet poles nice but one thing that we really wanted to do but haven't done yet didn't even know if it was possible is upgrade the cabinets to soft clothes let me take a look back in the day the soft clothes would have been a little bit more expensive of an option but these look like pretty typical hinges and draw slides i think it could be a really easy swap let me run out to my truck we'll grab some tools and get started great all right amanda what i want to get started with is our cabinet doors i went to the home center and i picked up a hinge that is really close to the one you have it has the inch and a quarter overlay and see that white piece right there yeah that's actually the piston that controls the slow close this little lever right here controls the speed oh wow it's the same mortise that we already have so let's swap them out we'll tuck this right into the existing mortise but as you can see the holes don't quite line up so we're gonna have to drill some new pilot holes it's really important that we keep it nice and square so we're gonna take our combination square and i'm going to use this nice little tool here it's a self-centering drill bit the way it works is it centers itself right in the hole and then it punches right through right where the screw is going to go oh wow that's cool so let's square it up and get drilling [Music] uh that's it that's it now we just have to do all the hinges in the kitchen all right [Music] [Music] all right it's a little tough to take out but just wiggle it back and forth and should pop out all right let's see if i got it all right here's your new one okay [Music] all right that's a little bit more [Music] okay i think that's on next we're going to work on the draw slides now there are a lot of options when it comes to slides so there's some things you want to look for you have side mounted slides but they also make under-mounted slides but freeze will stay with these okay next is extension right now you have a standard extension and you don't really get to use the back of your draw you can only use about three quarters of it but since we're swapping up for soft close we might as well swap them out for a full extension and you'll be able to use the full draw oh that'd be great so what we're going to do is empty all the drawers out strip the slides and get started perfect [Music] it's tricky to keep the slides level in the cabinet so i'm going to use this jig to hold everything in place this plastic socket screws to the rear of the cabinet to hold the slides in place then i can screw into the face frame to hold the front of the slide [Music] now i can reconnect the slides [Music] all right amanda you're all set give them a try okay that's wonderful nice and smooth all right let me test this drawer out full extension you can reach all the way to the back great let me try it nice oh that's wonderful thank you so much you're welcome nice job nathan thank you so i imagine with a job like this it really helps to find the right hardware the best replacement for what you're taking out speeds things up it really does you want to get the right hardware you want to make sure that your hardware fits right into that mortise but the hardest part about this job was how many there was 24 24 doors 12 draws so we're talking 48 individual hinges and 24 individual slides and it adds up quick so in terms of cost what do you think this could be a thousand to fifteen hundred dollars just in materials so that's probably news to a lot of people that they could spend almost 1500 bucks on something like that cheaper options out there there are there are there are a couple type like this is just a single piston you can mount it at the top of your frame so instead of um being embedded in the hinge just put it on the frame and let the door close against that but there's no adjustment with that right so you're you know if you you got to find out where to put it across the top to match with your hinges gotcha but they do sell another alternative that you can mount onto your hinge and it has a dampener built into it that you can actually add some adjustment but that's very specific to the brand and make of your hinges yeah okay well good to know it's out there i know you install a lot of kitchens um and every kitchen guy loves their jigs there's a bunch of them i saw you something like this would you recommend a homeowner who's probably only going to do this once in their life go for a jig absolutely it's only about 25 or 30 dollars this one yep you can buy it almost anywhere nice comes in a set of two and when you're doing the insides of your cabinets when you're putting those slides all the way to the rear those come in real handy because you can't get inside the cabinet work right in front of you i mean often times you're working by yourself so the extra set of hands makes a ton of sense but also the repeatability yeah i mean one here one there one here went all the way through so the jig makes a lot of sense it'll pay for itself beautiful all right and uh i noticed that you like this what did you call this again a socket a socket because you know earlier you would have maybe have padded it out built it out here in the back you like the socket i like it if you have a cleat across the back that you can get good screwing then you just attach this to the back of your slide put it on top of your jig and just screw it to the rear the only problem is that is the depth of it it's about an inch and a half and you need to make sure that in the back of your cabinet you have that depth to put those in make sure the drawer doesn't come back too far and hit this you wouldn't get a full close on it absolutely got it all right well good tip and nice project thank you well done thanks for watching this whole house has got a video for just about every home improvement project so be sure to check out the others and if you like what you see click on the subscribe button make sure that you get our newest videos right in your feed

Channel: This Old House

Views: 672,458

Keywords: This Old House, Ask This Old House, DIY, Home Improvement, DIY Ideas, Renovation, Renovation Ideas, How To Fix, How To Install, How To Build, Episode, TV Show, cabinets, soft pull, kitchen, carpentry, nathan gilbert, kitchen cabinets, house appliances, replacing house appliances, soft close cabinets, renovating kitchen cabinets, kitchen repair, kitchen repair ideas, kitchen reno on a budget

Id: ASiFTW3LTbQ

Length: 7min 36sec (456 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 04 2019