File Card Cabinet

[OccupantRJ]

Looking good dfiler!

 

[isb cornbinder]

I buy cabinets off Craigslist for resale after some freshening. I am not selling very many because I like the cabinets and they stay in my shop and basement.
My first cabinet is a card catalogue file similar to the first one posted in tis thread. It was originally used in the office of the British Columbia Electric Railroad.
The SIMPLISITY cabinets were used to hold sewing patterns. I have two in my sewing room along with the Waterloo tool box. My sewing machine is a JUKI 562 for upholstery.
I have another 6 Simplicity cabinets in the shop.

 

[OccupantRJ]

I also have one of the simplicity cabinets that I have had for 30 years from when a piece goods store went out of business. It has served me well.

 

[isb cornbinder]

At one time the Simplicity cabinets were plentiful and $40 each. That was 30 years ago. My friend has about 100 of these Simplicity cabinets in his house and maybe 2 in his garage. My friend has his some of his massive toy collection sorted and stored in the cabinets.
Yes, he is single.
He reminds me of the golfer who found a frog in his way. He picked the frog up to remove it to a safe place. the frog spoke to him and said, :If you kiss me I will turn into a beautiful woman and we can have a great life together. He put the frog in his golf bag. the frog protested, " What about the *** and other things?" The golfer said, "Look here, I am 72 later this year and I would rather have a talking frog."

 

[Mr_B]

^lol

card cabinets are great organizers, I got 4 over the years and all free besides first one .

 

[406Rich]

Glad you got it figured out Rich, I made a tool out of a sawzall blade by cutting a notch in it then putting a slight twist in the end. I could slide it along side the plate then pull the bottom out. The one I found had copper hardware (or some alloy that looks like copper).

My label holders are aluminum, they tangs protrude thru the sheetmetal and are twisted on the back side to lock them into place, not sure if I want to remove them for painting, not sure if they will take the removal without fracturing the tangs..

 

[OccupantRJ]

Warm the tangs with a heat gun or hair drier right before straightening one. I have had pretty good success doing it slowly to let the metal "catch up" to the twisting. If all else fails and one or more breaks, they can be held with a dollop of JB Weld or silicone sealer on the backside of the drawer front.

 

[406Rich]

Never thought of heating them up, good call, got a heat gun so all is good...! Thanks RJ..!

 

[isb cornbinder]

A soldering iron works much better.
How hot do you think a hair-dryer gets? Remember the hair dryer is for drying hair and steel melts at many times that temperature.

 

[OccupantRJ]

Since I manufacture soldering irons, I will get in the R&D lab next week and see if I can melt some steel with one.

 

[bullnerd]

Is there a particular brand to look for?

It would be cool if there was a list of brands, like a sticky.

 

[OccupantRJ]

I was off work today so I spent some time catching up a few things. I was at Lowes this morning when they opened at 7 to get some steel wheel casters, as I had noticed the casters on my previous cabinets were developing flat spots due to sitting still with the weight on them.

These casters are 300 lbs each load rated, so we will see how they hold up.
I am trying to consolidate hardware storage and eliminate several small drawer units in the process.

I used 1-1/2"x1-1/2"x3/16" angle to build a tray dolly to support the cabinet and allow moving it around if needed. This size so far has allowed the lower drawers to open after the cabinet is in the support dolly. I also tend to do this with most metal tool cabinets as it makes for a more stable mobile platform. The casters and metal was around $33. I have a total of $83 in the cabinet as I already had the paint.

Today was final assembly day, so I fired up the mobile cabinet relocator (forklift) to do the honors and make it easier to get the cabinet into the dolly frame. I build the frame with an excess 1/4" tolerance to allow easy placement of the cabinet into it.

 

[OccupantRJ]

This is the companion cabinet to the one I just refurbished, and is basically what I started out with. The guy had about 8 or so of these stored outside on concrete, and the rust is more cosmetic than erosive. I used a dual orbit DeWalt sander with 40 grit abrasive along with a lollipop style shaft mounted 3" flap wheel in a pistol grip drill to bring the cabinet down to bare metal.

 

[406Rich]

Someone needs this cabinet...! 80 drawers
https://sacramento.craigslist.org/tls/d/80-drawer-industrial-storage/6250560576.html

 

[poppinjohnnies]

Here's a freebie I picked up a few weeks ago. It was pretty ugly when I brought it home, but now it fits right in.

 

[Falcon67]

Recently found one myself - in a basement with the bottom rotting away.

 

[dkmc]

Just found this thread......had no idea the IBM cabinets were so popular with GJ folks.
I got one at the local scrap yard about 10 years ago. The bottom was bashed a little, but I straightened it out. I thought $25 was a good price even with the minor damage. Turns out they got in about 65 of them from a local IBM facility! The good ones all sold quick for $60 each, with one guy buying about 50 of them himself. When I called him, he said "sure I'll sell you some.......$180 each". Ah......no thanks...

I painted the one I got with Krylon Dark Gray, and made an angle iron frame with casters. I really like these, and wish I could find 2-3 more of them.
My CL searches usually turn up nothing.

 

[396foxRN]

I too had been looking for some old card file cabinets. Finally ran across these at an auction, for about $70 each, bought three.

also have a 10 drawer map cabinet I bought off craigslist last year for $125.

I enjoy repurposing. You dont see the card cabinets for sale by individuals often, seems to be more common from businesses as thy are weeding out storage cabinets and keeping everything digital/online, or from government auctions for the same purpose.

 

[dkmc]

By the way.....that fellow I mention in post #57, that had the 50 Card File cabinets.
I found out recently, when he passed away about 7 years ago, his sons cleaned out his place, and EVERYTHING went into scrap hoppers. Including the card file cabinets.

 

[jfleisher]

I'm still trying to figure out how to refinish my wood library card catalog, I want it to look like dark walnut...

 

[teamextreme]

I'm still trying to figure out how to refinish my wood library card catalog, I want it to look like dark walnut...

You're going to have a hell of a time figuring out how to cross reference bolt sizes to the dewey decimal system. Sweet cabinet, BTW.

 

[moparfreak]

I've got a pair of the IBM Card cabinets and they hold the majority of my hardware. Filling them with professional style bins would cost a fortune, so after thinking about it, I came across the fact that cheap blue electrical boxes fit perfectly. Just gotta saw / nip off all the extra mounting bits on the outside of the box itself. Then you can scale by getting some larger ones for bigger bolts or larger collections. When you buy as a pack of 100 those BU20 single gang bins are about $0.32 ea.

 

[teamextreme]

I've got a pair of the IBM Card cabinets and they hold the majority of my hardware. Filling them with professional style bins would cost a fortune, so after thinking about it, I came across the fact that cheap blue electrical boxes fit perfectly. Just gotta saw / nip off all the extra mounting bits on the outside of the box itself. Then you can scale by getting some larger ones for bigger bolts or larger collections. When you buy as a pack of 100 those BU20 single gang bins are about $0.32 ea.

That is a friggen genius idea! I am totally doing that with mine. That ends up being about half the price or less of actual bins.

 

[bullnerd]

Nice setup Moparfreak!

 

[moparfreak]

Nice setup Moparfreak!

Thanks, after 3 years of using this method, zero complaints. I'll pull these little bins out and take them with my to wherever I'm working. I've always got 3 or 4 of them floating around somewhere near projects.

Combine this method w/ a decent labelmaker, and you can't go wrong. When those edges are trimmed flush they fit like a glove w/ these IBM Card Cabinets.

 

[ryan20021982]

Here is one I got for $50 a few months ago and it is awesome, I love that there is no divider in the drawers for bigger bins or stuff, as you can see the slides are Waterloo.

View media item 74875View media item 74876View media item 74877

 

[OccupantRJ]

Bin cups are available from Zoro for a very reasonable price, around 33 cents for small ones and around 60 for the larger ones.