French Cleat Tool Cabinet

This seems to make hanging the cabinet a little easier and insures the faces of each cleat half engage cleanly.

French cleat tool cabinet.

Then simply set your table saw blade to a 45 angle and rip the piece in half lengthwise. On this cabinet i also screwed the top french cleat the one that s part of the cabinet to the wall also through the pegboard holes for even more strength. Rip the french cleat strips for the wall to 4 in. Then you put the wall cleat in place based on the location of the cabinet cleat.

Installing the french cleat. Accessories box filled with screws. It s simply a board that has been cut with an angle i used 45 on it s long side and attached to a surface with the angle sloping in. Just pick some holes in the pegboard and let er rip.

Flat area at the point of the bevels. For the tool cabinet it was easy to screw the spacer cleat to the osb wall. Then reset the saw to 45 degrees and adjust the fence to leave about a 1 8 in. How to build a frenchcleat wall in this video i show how i built a french cleat wall for tool st.

I used a hidden french cleat to hang a dovetailed wine rack that i created. The other half of the board that s been cut is then attached to something be it a bracket for tool storage or the back of a cabinet for mounting on the wall. If the mantel is already built and you are thinking of attaching a french cleat to it it will push the mantel away from the wall by the thickness of the cleat. If you are building a mantel you could certainly build it with a french cleat recessed.

So what is a french cleat. Using a hand plane or similar tool remove approximately 1 16 to 1 8 from the sharp point on both pieces. The joint held up well but for a shelf this size it s better suited to hold smaller individual. This is so simple i m surprised it doesn t get used more often.

The cleat is made by cutting a 5 wide piece of 3 4 plywood to fit between the two box sides. It may sound fancy but a french cleat is simply a sturdy beveled support board a secret that builders and craftsmen rely on to hang heavy items such as large mirrors artworks and cabinets. We tested this french cleat connection and shelf using a 10 lb.