I had to build my toekick platform but I chose not to use cut down 4x6 after buying them.

Upon research, I realized that the lumber is for framing and you will have the wood swelling along with other movements. This is not acceptable after installation as it will affect countertops negatively. I do not want my expensive quartzite counter to crack due to shifting.

I chose to use 3/4" plywood cut to size and glued together to give me 1.5" of depth for the platform. These were then attached to the floor and screwed to the cabinets.

Most people build a box flipped upside down. I'm only doing a frame due to toekick drawers.

That's something I never considered - about the wood swelling. Part of our kitchen will be a peninsula and I thought you normally build a base for that out of wood so it could be attached to the floor. What would be used to build the box that gets flipped upside down? Doesn't plywood swell too if it gets damp/wet?

Oh! Oh! Oh! I know! (Waving hand) I recently learned how to change the drawer configurations. You can do it!

Click on your cabinet. Select "Customize" - "change" - "drawers" and scroll right until you see the 5-5-10-10

Good choice by the way. We have a galley kitchen with 5-10-15s on one side and 10-10-10s on the other. I seriously don't like the 10" top drawers and wish I would have just done 5-10-15s everywhere. I might swap the top 10s for pairs of 5s, but I hate wasting the money :-(

benjesbride - are you using a MAC version? mine doesn't seem to have that option. Using Firefox. It give s me tripe drawers but no 4 drawer option. And no pics like you show!

Never mind- I figured it out! It does show a lot of options wihtout pics but I clicked on the one that just says drawers and it gave me the menu with the pics and the 4 drawer option. Thanks!

Plywood swell when it gets wet. It doesn't swell and shrink with temp or humidity changes. The 2x4 are ok for framing cause it's in the walls and can flex. Countertop doesn't flex.

You just build a rectangular frame then screw a sheet on top of it to make the upside down box.

If you are using 2 x 4 kiln dried the chance of warping is minimal. Pay a little extra for the good stuff if you are using the box method. Skip big box for this, find a lumber yard. Take the time to "true up" the wood. Pick it out and check down the length on all sides for straightness. We did 2 x 4 with a 1 x 4 flat on top for extra height. We did not put plywood across the whole thing. Ours have been down a year with the deep MS humidity and no ac. No issues whatsoever with the bases.

are you using a MAC version? mine doesn't seem to have that option. Using Firefox. It give s me tripe drawers but no 4 drawer option. And no pics like you show!

Benjesbride,I see it on a mac in Firefox, FWIW, after I click the customize button.

BTW, numbersjunkie, don't forget that doors/drawer fronts are the most expensive part of the cabinet, so be sure your order is still expensive enough to qualify for the gift card without those.

The planner is giving me a warning about having a minimum of 17" height between counters and the upper cabinets. I have 8 ft ceilings and am planning 40" uppers with the cornice and light rail. The Bodbyn deco strip is 1-1/8" thick, so that makes the uppers 42-1/4" from the ceiling. (I realize this won't be exact because the ceiling won't be perfectly flat/level all the way around). The base is 4.5" + 30" + 1.5" for the counter, so total height of 36. So 8 ft = 96 inches - 36 inches - 42.25 inches = 17.75 inches. Am I missing something? Is the planner assuming the deco strip will be mounted differently to require the full 2-3/8 height?

Do you have cover panels in your design? They could be causing the difference in the measurements since they are taller than the cabinets.

It could be it is using the height of the trim when used as a light rail. I think the light rails we bought (custom made by Scherr's, but based off of this design says the height is 2 3/8" also, and I am pretty sure they were meant to be installed vertically. We did not do that. We installed them flat, so they only take up 3/4" of height. That was plenty to hide the thin under cabinet lights.

We have the same height ceilings, except in some places they are a little less. It is making installing the trim at the top of the cabinets very difficult. I know why Ikea made the taller wall cabinets 40" (to keep things to increments of 5") but I really wish they were a little shorter.

We are planning to do our own framed bases instead of the IKEA legs. Most likely also our own toe kicks out of real wood and painted to match. For those who did this, did you use 2 x 4's? That would give a 3.5" toe kick instead of the standard 4.5", so maybe you shimmed them up? Or did rip 2x6's down instead of using 2 x 4's to get the standard 4.5" height? If there any reason not to go slightly less than 4.5" to allow a bit more height above the counter?

We used the rails and legs for cabinets against the walls, but built a base for the peninsula. (It was a little bit hard to level the corner cabinet which was on rails and also the base, but we got it to work.)

We built the base with 2x4's and put 3/4" plywood on top. I think. (When I say "we", I really mean my SO, so I would have to ask him the thickness.) That doesn't equal 4.5" but it ended up being pretty close somehow. That plywood base was good to have because the cabinets were screwed into the base.

Our plan was to make our own toe kicks also and we did not order them from Scherr's with everything else. I thought we would paint our base and we would use unpainted toe kicks from a big box store and paint them to match. However, I decided to just buy one plastic toe kick from Ikea to just see how it would work. I assumed the color would be off. It is a tiny bit, but it is pretty much impossible to notice. I ended up finding the Ikea toe kicks so much easier to use, that we just decided to use them. We were tired of trying to make things from scratch, and they really do look good.

Back to your situation... The toe kicks secure to the legs on the other cabinets with hooks, but there are no legs on our peninsula base. However, I actually ended up using the Ikea toe kick there also. Luckily it fit under the cabinet perfectly (height-wise) and is very secure. If it was not secure we might have ended up using some glue actually or some other way to secure.

I would suggest maybe buying one Ikea toe-kick and just seeing if it could work for you. I really was against the idea of those plastic toe kicks but I don't mind them at all.

If you go with making them yourselves I would consider buying unfinished toe-kicks and attaching them to the base and then painting. They are thin, so won't take away too much depth from the toe-kick.

Thanks for your comments Lisa! Yes, I do have end panels there, but I think you are correct about how they expect the deco strips to be mounted. Can I ask why you ended up using fronts from Scherr's? It sounds like you pretty much matched the IKEA color. I would love to see some sneak peeks of your kitchen - especially how you did the toekick and trim on the peninsula ends! I may do as you suggested and order one of the IKEA toekicks to see how it works. This is a big project - moving walls and appliances plus DH has to hack an angled cabinet so I think he will appreciate less work on his part at the end.

I am also looking for input on the under cabinet lights. When I did my main kitchen about 5 years ago I used Environmental lights, and we love them! But they do not seem to have the selection of sizes for the warm white or the high CRI I remember them having before. I know many people here swear by Inspired and I got a quote from them that is very reasonable, but the light strips have no covers and that worried me. Maybe it shouldn't, but I worry about steam from the coffee maker mostly, especially with the deeper wall cabinets. DH has indicated a preference for lights with a built in transformer but most of those are thicker and pretty expensive. Still looking at options...

Can I ask why you ended up using fronts from Scherr's? It sounds like you pretty much matched the IKEA color. I would love to see some sneak peeks of your kitchen - especially how you did the toekick and trim on the peninsula ends!

We did custom fronts because I wanted Shaker style doors and I did not like Ikea's options. The color is not exactly the same, but since the toe kicks are pretty much always in shadow, you can't tell the difference. Our cabinets are Sherwin-Williams Extra White, which is a pretty pure white, and similar to the white of the ikea cabinets, but not the actual finishes of the doors.

The toe-kicks are not perfect, but we decided they were acceptable, even though we usually try for perfection! We would have probably had more problems trying to create them on our own. The main problem is how unlevel our floor is in spots. We discovered we had a cracked floor joist causing part of the problem. We fixed this but didn't really bring the floor completely back to level because it was after the cabinets were installed. You can see the shadows on the floor because of this. The Ikea toe-kicks have a thick plastic/rubbery bottom that has some give to it, so it still is touching the floor in most or all places.

This is the toe kick on the peninsula. We need to create that cover panel still because the one we ordered was too small. The toe kick is not as deep as a normal toe-kick because the floor is unfinished under the base and we needed to make sure we covered it completely. There is nothing that the toe-kick is attached to, it just fits in there securely.

I am also looking for input on the under cabinet lights.

We used Ikea lights for under the cabinet. I'm not sure I would recommend them. I saw a thread a month or so ago with someone who had trouble with them after a year, so I'm not sure if they will last or not.

Also, they do have separate transformers so that won't meet your criteria. Worse, the 30W transformers have a low humming buzz when you turn them off with the remote. (They don't buzz when on.) We returned all the 30W transformers and replaced them with 20W instead, which was fine. However, they have discontinued that item now and are selling 10W transformers instead. 10W can only connect 3 lights. 30W can connect 9 lights. I would only use Ikea lights if you can do it with 3 lights per 10W transformer. I am not the only person who has had the buzzing problem on the 30W transformers. I found others who solved the problem by getting the 20W transformers. Unfortunately no one at Ikea seems to know this. I've told several people this, and they are always surprised.

I'm currently doing a Bodbyn kitchen and will be pulling it together and building the peninsula base later this week. I'm on vacation right now so I can't peek at my panels. I'm pretty sure they are slightly rounded but wanted to check for you. I have several sizes of end panels and can let you know on Tuesday if you don't order by then.

Are you doing Bodbyn Grey or White? The planner defaulted to a square deco strip for my white Bodbyn. I'm doing the 1 1/8" also and I'm pretty sure that's the warning you are getting. Trust your math!

DH isn't done with this farm sink cab yet, but I asked him to make legs for additional support.

I'm using the ikea base for ease and may have him scoot his legs back so I can also use the IKEA legs to attach the base.

Lisa, The cabinets look great. We are also going shaker and also going extra white on the color. What door style from Sherrs did you use?

@bundy123, We did the #400 door and #540 drawer front.

Our fronts are Paint Grade Soft Maple instead of the Poplar (which is the default wood they use.) The cover panels are mdf. We're very happy with everything that Scherr's did.

Thanks Lisa, that is what we are looking at as well.

benjesbride I had no idea Ikea had 6 drawer options. You learn something new everyday.

Lisa We placed our order and told the rep about the 30W transformer issue. She didn't know and did mention that the 20W is no longer an option. Not sure if this will result in a recall since it's an annoyance but maybe not dangerous? I am considering taking undercabinet lights out of the design entirely. She said we can return anything that we don't use/need even if there is no box so long as it's not cut or damaged.

Home Reborn, I know this is an old thread, but hopefully you will see this. I am also planning to make base supports for my Ikea base cabinets by ripping down 2x6s. How do you secure them to concrete slab?

@U P: I've never done that. But if I needed to, I'd just use construction adhesive to attach them to the floor.

@drmagda, I can't find our order right now, but I believe we have MDF inserts because that what was recommended. I personally like the consistency of having all the pulls at the top of the drawer. I think the toe kicks from ikea should still match the simply white fine. They are really in the shadows and the color match to Simply white might even be closer than the extra white.