A guy at the lumber yard told me my drawer boxes were too tight and it bugged me for a week

Robin Garcia · 2026-09-18T01:30:03.464795+00:00

I was picking up some maple ply at a yard over in Fresno and the owner wandered over while I was loading, looked at a drawer box I had in the truck bed and said "you're building those too tight, they'll fight you in summer." I nodded and drove off thinking he was just being nosy. But it nagged at me, so I measured my last 6 drawer boxes and found I was leaving around 1/16 inch total play on a 22 inch wide box. I rebuilt two of them with 1/8 inch play and ran them through a humid stretch in July with no binding at all. Now I build every drawer with a little more slack and my callback rate on stuck drawers has basically dried up. Curious if you guys size your clearance by climate or just run one number year round.

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A guy at the lumber yard told me my drawer boxes were too tight and it bugged me for a week | Cabinetmakers - Babble Community