Well, the COVID bug bit me, was like a nasty cold, no fever but didn't do much other than sit around for a week.
Now back to regular programming.
Fun with dados! Got all the dado's cut in carcass parts as well as the toe-kick cutout.
Also edge banding. Yes, I "cheated" and used the iron on prefinished maple veneer strips.. I think they look great. These are all behind drawer fronts, so shouldn't see much abuse like they would if fully exposed in an upper cabinet where dishes and such are constantly being moved in and out of. I used an entire 250' roll of the stuff with only about 20" to spare.
You might notice that little ~3/4"x1/4" notch in the toe-kick area of each of those base cabinet side parts. That will meet with a similar dado in the bottom shelf of each, and will receive an aluminum channel with diffuser to hold LED strips for toe-kick lighting (tunable and dimmable) along the various counters and island. Yah such channels could be surface mounted later, but might as well cut them in now and allow for the recessed/low profile LED channel.
The width is just shy of 3/4", I really dialed in the width of the dados so the aluminum channel fits very well with just a friction fit.
I don't really have room to start assembling all the boxes at this point so I'm getting close to the point where there's not much more I can do in the shop until I start actually installing the kitchen. But unfortunately I'm still waiting for the contractors to do the wall removal and beam.. When I booked them in November they told me to plan for "March/April timeframe" so hopefully by end of this month.. At that point, I figure this plan of attack:
1. Wall removal/beam installed
2. Run any new electrical that may require cutting holes in existing drywall
3. Have my drywall guy come close everything up and make it paint ready
4. Have my hardwood floor guy come in and weave new flooring into the now expanded space (basically cutting out a corner creating 60 more square feet)
5. Install all the base cabinets and island carcasses in their final home.
6. Have the countertop fabricator come measure.
7. Finish making drawers and doors. (Parts are all cut slightly oversized but otherwise ready)
I'm assuming it makes most sense to let the drywall guy make his mess before touching the floors, and then let the flooring guy make his mess with a wide-open floor space rather than having to work around the cabinets and island.
Hopefully before this thread is 1yr old, this project will be done, but I suspect it's going to drag.