The day I realized my drawer boxes were always 1/4 inch too short

I was fitting a set of kitchen drawers last week and noticed the fronts kept hitting the cabinet face before closing all the way. Turned out I was measuring from the bottom of the sides instead of subtracting for the bottom panel thickness, so every box was built short for 10 years. How did you catch your own long running mistake?

2 comments

2 Comments

pat_coleman17d ago

Man, 10 years. That's brutal but I get it. I built decks for seven years before I realized I was spacing joists wrong. I always measured from the outside edge of one to the outside edge of the next instead of center to center. So every deck had slightly off spacing and nobody ever called me on it. One day I was helping a buddy frame a floor and he looked at me like I was crazy. Felt like a complete idiot but at least I finally knew. Once you see it you can't unsee it.

emery_lopez17d ago

@pat_coleman that joist thing is wild because nobody called you on it for SEVEN years. Makes you wonder how many other little mistakes we all just live with. I bet half the houses out there have some hidden quirk the builder never even knew about.