Cabinet Refacing Guide and Tutorial

The lessons outlined in our online tutorial will help guide you to a better understanding about the concept of having your kitchen cabinets refaced as opposed to completely destroying a good cabinet skeleton and spending more money than necessary on remodeling your kitchen.

Cabinet refacing has vastly improved over the past 30 years and has now become accepted as a remodeling standard. 

You may consider refacing your kitchen cabinets to be a form of green as you're essentially re-cycling your existing kitchen cabinets.

• Lesson 1 - Refacing Your Kitchen Cabinets Project Planning
  
  With plenty of cabinet door styles to choose from, buying your kitchen cabinet doors online is an affordable alternative that can save you loads of time and energy. If new kitchen cabinet doors and drawer fronts alone won't complete the job to your satisfaction, the option of refacing your existing cabinets is a great way to coordinate your existing kitchen cabinets with new kitchen cabinet doors and drawer fronts.
• How to Measure Cabinet Doors and Drawer Fronts
  
  How to Measure Cabinet Doors and Drawer Fronts Here's a brief description on how to measure your doors and drawer fronts for your cabinet door order. This method will allow for a 1/2" overlay of cabinet openings.
• Lesson 2 - Kitchen Cabinet Preperation
  
  Getting the cabinet face frames ready to apply the PSA pressure sensitive wood veneer or the high pressure laminate covering.
• Lesson 3 - Refacing the Cabinet Ends
  
  Start by applying the cut-to-size plywood to the cabinet end panels. Apply wood glue use a water based contact cement to the back of the plywood. Then fit it to end panel, making sure it is flush with the cabinet front and bottom of the cabinet box as showen below.
• Lesson 4 - Refacing Your Cabinet Face Frames
  
  Cut the wood veneer or laminate to length to fit edge of stile. Width of veneer/laminate strip should allow for trimming flush with stile after installation. Peel back just enough backing from the top of the strip to anchor the strip to the inside edge of the face frame.
• Lesson 5 - Installing the Cabinet Doors
  
  When using 35mm cup hinges, (Figure 17), screw into face of cabinet frame and center the door over the opening, allowing an equal margin of overlap on all sides. On openings with two doors, leave a gap of about 1/8” between doors.