Easy SOLIDWORKS Cabinet Making Part 2

In part 2 of the easy SOLIDWORKS cabinet making series I am going to separate the front face of the body for drawers and create bottom door pieces. You can catch up with part 1 here »

Reference planes with 6″ spacing from the top face.

Continuing with the SOLIDWORKS Split tool because it can be used in a different way other than selecting faces. I’m going to add some reference planes based from the top face as my first reference and spacing them (plural) 6 inches apart going down.  I want two of them for two drawer fronts.

Split command using the planes as the cutting tool.

I’m going to preselect the planes just created and start the Split command. We must specify the body(s) we want to Split with is the front piece. We want all pieces from this Split. Now we are left with 2 drawer fronts and a larger bottom door. Once the command is complete I typically hide the planes.

Using the Offset of the face for a quick fully defined sketch.

I wanted a bottom door with a circular mesh inlay. For this we need to do a standard cut extrude through the door only. When I start my sketch on the face the part become highlighted, this is a good thing as now I move right to the Offset command. With the offset I going choose my dimension and reverse direction to inside. Immediately we have a fully defined sketch we can cut. When I do the Cut-Extrude instead of adding a dimension I choose Up To Next. This will recognize the thickness of the door.

You must select the faces in the picture for the Split to work

I want this door separated into four pieces. To do this, you guessed it, Split command. The faces to select are not as intuitive as before.

This will make the tops longer and the sides shorter.

Cut bodies as per usual and select the four door pieces in the graphics area.

Easily make a sketch with 45° lines for Mitered Corners and Split.

In the next article

We will add feet, counter top, door hardware, and I’ll show you how to position them.