I ran out of space in my US General 56 & 26" craftsman top box a while back and started having to pile tools on top of each other. That led to me starting a search for a Lista cabinet roughly a year and a half ago. Many cabinets popped up in the search, often not in the best shape and for $150 a drawer. I had almost forgotten the search and stopped looking for them all the time. Then this weekend I wanted to hang a picture and couldn't find my picture frame wire & hangers and just thought damn it, I wished my hardware was all neatly organized in bins in drawers lilscorpion style. So I jumped on FB marketplace with a cocktail that evening.
Surprisingly there were 2 Lista cabinet with mediocre pictures, that had just been put up an hour before. I reached out and was able to be there at 8am to pick them up. So now I have two 40x22.5x34 7-drawer cabinets (36x18 internal drawer dimensions, Bummer that they are not deeper), paid $600 for the pair of them. They had been in the back of an HVAC van for a few years, with light weight parts rolling around in them, boxes are square, not dented or tweaked. They are the old style slides, but the bearings seem to be in good shape, tight & smooth rolling. I think I did well price wise even though they are not deep & wont win any beauty competitions.
The negative: The paint on the outside of the box is falling off and peeling pretty badly & there are lightly rusty spots in ~4 of the drawers. I want to strip rust & repaint the cabinets, but with winter up here in New England, and time constraints on getting the garage space freed back up for the spouses car I knew I couldn't restore the cabinets right away.

I hit the bottom of the cabinets & the other rusty spots with a wire wheel & slapped some rust reformer on for a short term solution, and cut up some 2x6 to make a pallet base for the cabinet. Pallet base >>>>>> casters. So much better, I have been converting as much of my shop as I can to them.



The plan is to use the lista next to the red toolbox for expanded tool storage & the other lista for hardware storage. Now I have to figure out a new tool organization scheme so I can figure out if I want to switch any drawers between the 2 cabinets. Are 2" or 3" drawers better for hardware storage in bins? I can probably use either for tools.
Surprisingly there were 2 Lista cabinet with mediocre pictures, that had just been put up an hour before. I reached out and was able to be there at 8am to pick them up. So now I have two 40x22.5x34 7-drawer cabinets (36x18 internal drawer dimensions, Bummer that they are not deeper), paid $600 for the pair of them. They had been in the back of an HVAC van for a few years, with light weight parts rolling around in them, boxes are square, not dented or tweaked. They are the old style slides, but the bearings seem to be in good shape, tight & smooth rolling. I think I did well price wise even though they are not deep & wont win any beauty competitions.
The negative: The paint on the outside of the box is falling off and peeling pretty badly & there are lightly rusty spots in ~4 of the drawers. I want to strip rust & repaint the cabinets, but with winter up here in New England, and time constraints on getting the garage space freed back up for the spouses car I knew I couldn't restore the cabinets right away.

I hit the bottom of the cabinets & the other rusty spots with a wire wheel & slapped some rust reformer on for a short term solution, and cut up some 2x6 to make a pallet base for the cabinet. Pallet base >>>>>> casters. So much better, I have been converting as much of my shop as I can to them.



The plan is to use the lista next to the red toolbox for expanded tool storage & the other lista for hardware storage. Now I have to figure out a new tool organization scheme so I can figure out if I want to switch any drawers between the 2 cabinets. Are 2" or 3" drawers better for hardware storage in bins? I can probably use either for tools.
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