AFRO AND RENO infront of finished custom recycling drawer built out of pine
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Building a custom drawer: Recycling Bin

ByTamarah

One Room Challenge Week 2

Welcome to Week 2 of the One Room Challenge (ORC)! If you missed week one you can go back to read it here!

In my quest to customize my kitchen on a budget, this week I tackled making a custom drawer insert for my recycling bin. Not a very sexy project but a necessary one to make it easier for my to separate recyclables. This project obviously also works for a garbage bin also or if you want to have small bins you can opt to use smaller bins that can work for both trash and recycling. The beauty of making your own drawer is that it can be 🎶 whatever you like 🎶! The above image was my inspiration. The best way to see whats available for custom kitchen cabinets is to go to a kitchen showroom! up

AFRO AND RENO infront of finished custom recycling drawer built out of pine
Finished Custom Recycling drawer
Afro and reno logo image featuring a black woman with an afro. In the afro you can see a hammer and a paint brush. The tip of the paint brush is purple. There is a sideways halo around the woman in mustard yellow and the words Afro and Reno

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Take all the pictures you need, open every drawer every door. Figure out what you like, what you don’t like and why. This way when it’s time to recreate it you have a better understanding of what you want. For this bin drawer I wanted it to be simple and would fit a bin on my choosing. That’s it! I’ve seen the fancy ones you can buy by rev-a-shelf, honestly their 13.5 in insert would have 100% worked in this space….the price ($100+) was not what I wanted to pay. I made my build with scrap wood, all I had to buy was the screws ($5.98), drawer slides (22.99), and the corner brackets ($2.18).

Inspiration
What I built!

Materials Needed

  • 2×4 Plywood
  • Corner Bracket pack of 4
  • 1 1/4in screws
  • Recycling Bin
  • Wood Glue
  • Drawer slides (22in)

Tools Needed

  • Circular saw or table saw
  • Jigsaw
  • Drill
  • Wood Drill Bits
  • Sander/sand paper

If unlike me, you don’t have a lot of wood lying around…browsing through Lowe’s the total materials for this project were under $75)

The Inspo

Search: rev a shelf pull out trash can

You can Shop all the supplies in my Lowes Storefront!!

Plywood ($17.51), Corner bracket ($2.18), 1 1/14in screws (50pack) (5.98), Drawer Slides ($22.99) Recycling Bin ($19.99)

Bracket
Plywood
Drawer Slide
1 1/4in Screws

Step 1: Measure Measure Measure!

First and foremost we want to measure our cabinet space. Make sure to measure both the front and the back as well ad different points vertically in the cabinet. For example, my cabinet at the top and middle measured 13 1/2in while the bottom measured 13 3/8in. If you are going to make a drawer that fills the entire space this difference matters!

Once you have your measurements…you will write them down…then measure again to make sure they’re correct. When you cut your wood you cant undo it and this is why we “measure twice, and cut once”. Next you we transfer your measurements to your plywood. It at this point that you want to go back and verify the measurements that you transferred and make sure you did it correctly. Side note: I have on several occasions incorrectly transferred my measurements and wasted a whole piece of wood because it was too short. Learn from my mistakes!

Measure Multiple places
Transfer measurement to wood

Step 2: Cut your pieces

Cut List:

  • Main drawer with cut out
    • Width = width of cabinet – width of drawer slides
    • Depth = length of cabinet – thickness of brace (3/4in)
  • Brace to attach to drawer
    • I used the middle cutout which was the perfect size
    • Width = Width of drawer cutout
    • Height 6in
  • 2 1.5in Side pieces to attach drawer slides
    • These are the size of a 1×2 (3/4 x 1.5 nominal)

Using your saw (circular or table) make your cuts for the main drawer and the side pieces

I wanted the recycling bin to fall in the middle of the drawer so I traced the top of the bin and made marks about 1in inside of the trace. Using my drill and drill bit I drilled a hole in each corner large enough to fit the jigsaw blade. Then I used the jigsaw to make my cutouts. The cutout in my case was the exact width of the drawer so I used that as the brace attaching the drawer to the cabinet door. If you’re not as lucky as I am then you will need to cut a piece that is the width of your drawer and about 6in height.

Tracing the bin
Tracing 1in inside bin tracing
Drill holes for jigsaw blade
Make cutout using jigsaw

Step 3: Put Everything together

Easier said than done as there are multiple steps to this part of the process. Before we attach everything, we want to dry fit the pieces in the base cabinet to make sure we cut everything correctly. That means putting in the main drawer, and the base, making sure it fits with the drawer slides on each side, etc.

Here we are going to attach the 1×2 side pieces to the main drawer. This is so the drawer slides can be attached.

1: Attach side rails to the main drawer

First you want to use a small drill bit to pre-drill pilot holes, this is very important because plywood tends to split. You don’t want to mess up your piece and have a huge chunk come out! Then you want to put wood glue on each piece then drill your screws to attach each piece.

2: Attach brace to main drawer

Next, we are going to attach the main drawer to the middle of the brace. I predrilled three holes in the center through both the brace and the main drawer, then screwed in some screws. This seemed secure but I wan to make sure the weight of the cabinet door and the bin don’t pull it down.

Add Brackets

Nevertheless, this is where the corner brackets come in, attach the corner brackets to the brace, then to the main drawer piece.

3: Attach drawer slide

Next, we want to attach the drawer slides to the side. Make sure you read the instructions for your drawer slides first, as different brands have varying instructions. I totally messed up in this part and had the inner piece backwards!

The part that goes in the drawer is the inner portion. You have to slide it our and push on the black piece to release it.

Step 4: Install main drawer rail to cabinet base

These will be installed based on the instructions for your drawer. Nevertheless, the most important part is to make sure the rails are level and are perfectly parallel and level to each other. Consequently, I used my level across on each rail to make sure both the front and back were level, in such a tight space it was not easy.

4: Attach Cabinet Door

In this step you will want to measure the distance from the top of the cabinet to your cabinet door, and where your drawer will go. However, this is a pretty finicky part of this process. I ended up having to wait until the last step to do this do the drawer could be in place and I could figure out the correct placement. Nevertheless, using my measuring tape and my pencil I was able to figure out the correct placement.

In addition, this is the perfect time to also install your drawer pull

Step 5: Slide it all in

Now that everything has been assembled, let put it all in the base cabinet. You will want to make sure of the following:

  • Drawer slides in properly
  • Drawer is level
  • Everything is secure
It fits

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