DIY ADA Style Cabinet

To start I'll give you a list of parts that I needed for the aquarium cabinet:

• Paint grade pine - Lowes $50.00
• 4 Concealed cabinet door hinges - Lowes $10.oo
• Nails for my nail gun - Lowes $5.00
• Paint - Lowes $10.00
• Wood glue - already had
• Wood putty - already had
• Table saw - already had
• Nail gun - already had
• Electric Sander - already had

If you have to buy the tools for this project, you'll end up spending a lot more money than I did. Wow, $75.00 is a lot less than paying $769.00 for a cabinet from ADA. Of course, it takes time to build a cabinet, and it may not turn out as perfect as one you would by at the store, so you have to weigh out the options. For me, building the cabinet was the obvious decision since I have a little experience cabinet building and am trying to cut costs where possible with my nano reef project.

Here is the wood after I spent a couple of hours cutting it out in the garage with the table saw.

Here is how it will look after I put it together. It isn't nailed together yet in this shot, just set together to give an idea of how it will look and to make sure that all the pieces fit together just right.

The gluing and nailing process is pretty straight forward. Put glue along the entire joint of one of the boards, put them together and nail them together with the nail gun. I highly recommend using a nail gun, it makes the job much easier and you are less likely to split any wood.


After nailing and gluing the cabinet together, putty the nail holes and any gaps you want to fill in with wood putty.  Let the putty dry and then sand it off with an electric sander.

Here is the cabinet after sanding the putty.  It still needs doors and paint, but it is starting to look nice.