Large storage drawer

[rgaines]

In our home addition my wife wants large storage drawers under the stairs.  Large meaning 2' wide by 30' deep by 4' high for the largest one.  (When open, only one side will be 4' high; the other side will be low and may have shelves depending on what goes in that 'drawer).  For the faces I was just going to use 1/2" birch plywood and score a 1/8"x1/8" groove 2 1/2" from the edge to 'frame' the face and make it not so plane.  They will be painted.  My question is, is birch plywood what I should be using or should I use mdf of something else?  Any other ideas are welcome.

[Stwood_]

If your painting,  mdf will be fine

[AHill]

I'm guessing you meant 30 inches deep and not 30 feet deep. 

If the face is also the drawer front, I'd go with BB ply.  Kind of depends on your joinery method.  I agree that MDF is OK for the faces, if attached to a drawer box, as long as any drawer handles are attached with pan head screws.  If a screw needs to bite into the face, I'd use BB ply or poplar.

[rgaines]

It will be painted but. None the less, I'm leaning toward bb plywood because I think it is weighs less than mdf. I meant 3' deep, not 30'. Aslo, typically with drawers there is a front board that the face attaches to. Where the face is 2' wide by 4' high, it seems like a lot of extra wood/weight do have 2 full pieces. I'm wondering if it would be better to make a wood frame to attach the face to (maybe 3" x 1/2" perimeter with one intermediate cross piece instead of a solid piece of plywood.

thanks for the info.

[Stwood_]

Just attach your sides and bottom to the front face. Route 1/4" deep grooves for them, glue and clamp.

[Cooler]

What drawer hardware are you planning on using?

I sketched out a large drawer like that and I planned on using in-line skate wheels for both the bottoms and the sides to keep it working.  It was to be much cheaper than the drawer hardware.  But then I moved to a ranch house and I never built it.

[Steve N]

Talk of really large drawers always makes the little hairs on my neck stand up. You plan just to put light loads in them, next you know you have a 250# accumulation of junk that doesn't fit anywhere else stuffed into them. If that doesn't sound like your house, first of all, congratulations. If it sounds vaguely familiar then I'd do what I'd start doing, by building them up. I'd put them on 250# hardware to start with, I'd build the boxes with 3/4" BB ply with corner reinforcements. I would make the front full height BB ply, and then face it full height with 3/4" MDF, Having the sides not be full height is ok, as long as the items aren't movable where they might constantly trying to roll out with any movement. You could still go partial height but may need to put the items into those plastic storage boxes. So make it plenty heavy enough you never utter I wish I had.......

[Cecil]

You mention scoring a grove, which will work, but you may also want to consider building up.  You can get any number of profiles of bead mouldings, which also will please the eye.  One such example below.