Adjustable drawer stop
A traditional method for creating drawer stops for inset drawers is to glue two small blocks of wood—one on each side—to the front rail of the drawer’s supporting web frame. The tricky part is aligning the stops perfectly so that the drawer front face sits precisely flush with the cabinet face. A typical approach is to first measure back from the front edge of the rail on the web frame, and scribe a line at the location of the rear face of the drawer front. Wipe glue on the stops, set them a bit forward of your line, and then carefully install the drawer, aligning it perfectly with the case front. Make sure to remove the drawer before the glue sets to prevent any squeeze-out from locking it in place.
Unfortunately, the blocks can slip out of alignment during installation. My failsafe trick? I cut a small rabbet in my stop material, and install each stopblock with the rabbeted face forward, as shown. Then, if the drawer front sits a bit proud of the case after the glue sets, a swipe or two with a shoulder plane across the stop is all it takes to cleanly line things up. Alternatively, I can glue on a sliver of veneer to pack out a recessed stop, planing it perfect afterward if necessary.
—Mario Rodriguez, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
