Anyone turn shelves into "cabinets"?

[NOMAD]

Or would they be called "Faux-cabinets?"

I have 7 foot long shelves on both sides of the garage where I store boxes and whatnot. I'd like to cover them up so that I don't have to look at all the clutter. Painted white, it will look really tidy in there. I think I saw some pics of this done before. I'm wondering how best to go about it.

The shelves are on the regular metal track with 12" brackets supporting the 12" deep shelves. I was thinking I could attach 2x2 tot he wall as cleats and then just attach a 12.5" deep plywood box to the wall around the existing shelves. Then I could attach 1x4 to the plywood to make a face frame and then attach doors to the face frames with regular cabinet hinges. If I secure the outer frame to the wall, and then screw into the existing shelves when it's done then it should be pretty strong, no?

Do I even need the metal brackets? Other than still having some adjustability in placing the shelves higher or lower.

Hope that made sense.

 

[1320stang]

I'm planning on attaching some 1x2s to the bottom of my melamine shelves then attaching more to these as face frames, then putting on doors. My shelves are put up with brackets, not the tracks.

Now I just need time.

 

[MustangRick]

Shop Notes magazine had something like this a few months back. It doesn't look like they have it online but I know they will send it to you if you contact them.

 

[snorvet]

I had shelves that looked like this:

I framed out some walls around the shelves to look like this:

 

[NOMAD]

Wow, that's really slick. Looks great. I wish I had as much space as that.

I think I'll be doing this soon so I'll post pics of the process just for kicks. I'm using as much scrap material as possible so it'll be interesting to see how little I can spend. The shelves themselves are from the hollow core closet sliding doors that were in the house.

 

[shocksystems]

I had shelves that looked like this:

I framed out some walls around the shelves to look like this:

Incredible transformation. Hard to believe it is the same garage. Nice job.

Cheers!

Jim

 

[66RICH]

Here's some I added doors to. The first time I used
1/4" plywood which over the years warped. The
last time I used 3/4" particle board, and routed the
edges.
Rich

 

[66RICH]

Here's another one to show you can add doors to
an odd shaped shelf unit.
Rich

 

[Fuller]

66RICH,

Your set up already has a structure to mount doors and hinges to. If you only have the brackets and open shelves the job is a bit harder. Nomad may spend more time messing around making a "silk purse out of a sow's ear" than finding a reasonable cabinet set to hang in its place. I always try to justify and value my time appropriately unless its a project that I really want to do myself regardless of how much its going to cost me.

 

[66RICH]

These cab.'s actually started out as 2 sets of shelves
on each side of the window. I added a top to enclose
the cabinet, and cut pieces to go in between the shelfs.
1" x 2"'s were used to mount doors on. Later I made
the TV cabinet to join them.

I do like wood working though, and I was able to fit
them as needed for the space. I know what you mean about 'time', I'm retired! LOL

I think some of the most cost effective cabinets are
the cheap wood kitchen cabinets at Lowes, Manards, Etc.
Easy to hang, paint the color you want, and are designed
for heavy dishes.

Rich

 

[rickairmedic]

I think the most cost effective cabinets are free myself . I placed a couple adds on my local craigs list looking for old metal kitchen cabinetts got a reply about 3 weeks later guy had about 14 feet of them if I wanted come get them He didnt bother to mention they were stacked 3 high it took 2 loads in my van and it was FULL both times did I they were free I have time sanding them down and painting them and hanging them only money invested was a gallon of Ford blue paint from TSC and some reducer and thinner.

Rick