Rebuilding the Base

Last Thursday was time to rebuild the black base of the cabinet. The only thing remaining on the bottom of the cabinet was a pair of rear wheels. My guess is that the black (originally plywood) base had seen some water damage and was removed. For some unknown reason the previous owners hadn't replaced anything on the bottom, causing the cabinet to tilt forward when resting on the floor. You can see some wear along the sides as a result.

I acquired some lumber to do the task and bought particle board to replace the sides while I was at it.

My awesome brother-in-law let me use some of his tools to saw the boards to the appropriate specifications and sand my two side pieces. I had a nasty run-in with the sander.

 

It's only a fleshwound! 

Let this be a lesson to you, kids. Always wear the appropriate safety equipment when operating dangerous machinery. When we were done, this is what the finished base looked like. It is made of pine 1x4s with corner pieces to give it more accurate 90° angles and added support. We sunk the screws and nails beneath the surface of the wood so I could putty everything in later and create clean sides. The boards are designed to be slightly taller than the wheels so the wheels sit above the floor when standing but touch the ground when you tilt the cabinet backwards.

After puttying in the holes and sanding, I painted the base black. Once finished, I had to pull 12 staples out of the base of the cabinet, which proved to be an arduous procedure. 

I stood the cab on my new base just to see how it looks. This profile also shows the wear that the side panels have seen, near the front.

The next step is sawing off the bottom of the side panels flush with the cab and using a router and biscuits to attach the new side pieces, then blending everything together.