How to Install Crown Molding on Cabinets
George VondriskaAs you learn how to build cabinets, you’ll look for ways to dress up the basic wooden box. One surefire upgrade is installing crown molding. This video teaches you how to install crown molding on cabinets with clever tricks and tips it would take you years to learn on your own.
Watch this video, and even your first crown molding installation will look neat and professional.
Gussets
Crown molding that sits atop kitchen cabinets gives them a solid, finished look. For strength and stability, gussets are added to the top. You don’t want this molding to pull off the cabinet if someone pulls or pushes on it when moving the cabinet, for example. Learn how to angle-cut the gussets and where to locate them on the top of the cabinet.
Helping Hand
It can be difficult to install trim pieces like crown molding when you’re working alone. Our trick comes in very handy as you learn how to install crown molding on cabinets, and you’ll find lots of other uses for it when you’re assembling furniture projects.
Transfer Measurements
Discover the best way to ensure perfect-fitting miters. Hint: It was nothing to do with your ruler or tape measure.
Glue
It’s important to choose the right glue as you learn how to install crown molding on cabinets. You don’t want drips, runs, and squeeze-out, so a thick glue is recommended. Watch to learn the best method for applying the glue to kitchen cabinet crown molding.
Finishing Touches
Fasten the crown molding to the top of the cabinet (we used a brad nailer). Then stand back and look at your crowning achievement.
Titebond No Run, No Drip Wood Glue provided by Titebond. For more information, visit www.titebond.com.
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Nothing tops off a cabinet project like crown molding on the top of the cabinet. So what I wanna do here is give you some tricks to make sure that when you put crown molding on your piece of furniture, comes out real nice. So let me catch you up with what I've done already. First on the cabinet itself, I've added these gussets at the top. And the gussets are cut at an angle that matches what's called the spring angle of the crown molding itself.
So the deal with that is that if all I do is glue and brad the crown molding here onto the cabinet. If something ever grabs onto the top there, it's gonna be pretty fragile and maybe come loose. So the gusset is gonna give us a surface that we can fasten to and glue to, make sure everything is nice and rigid. I've got the piece on this side already in place. The way I did that was I took another piece.
A piece of scrap that had the matching angle on it held that in place, that let me position this one, got it. Glued and bradded up there. Now what I'm ready to do is get the front of this baby going. So the problem is there's one of me and there are two ends of this board. So what I'm gonna do is use some masking tape and that's gonna be my helping hand.
And I'm gonna need a nice sharp pencil. So on this end, I've already got my angle cut on my miter. And I'm gonna get everything positioned. And use the masking tape to keep it there. That looks good.
That lets me come to the other end of the cabinet Eyeball that end again and here. What I wanna do is mark this right at the outside corner of the case. I'm a big advocate of transferring measurement, rather than taking measurement. If I try to do this with a tape measure or a stick rule really, really hard to execute. So now I can take this off take it to my miter saw and make that miter cut.
Before I glue and fasten this baby in place, let's use this trick again. Make sure it's just right. And the way I'll check its length is by grabbing the piece that returns down this other side and hold that up here to make sure that coroner lines up just right. All right, that's good to go. So next thing I can do is take it back down and apply glue.
One of the things you wanna pay attention to when you put a crown molding or really any molding on a cabinet is the notion that I've got a nice cabinet there right now. It's all sanded, everything is clean and good to go. I don't want glue pouring down the face of that cabinet. So there are glues in the marketplace that are specifically designed to help prevent the glue from running. And that's the best kinda glue to use for these applications because you can just tell by how I'm, as I'm wiping this on, it's got some viscosity to it.
It's nice and thick. And the beauty of that is that when I hold this piece up against the cabinet, I'm not gonna end up with big gobs of glue running down the face. No runs, no drips, no errors, kind of a baseball thing. It really pays off when I put glue on my gussets up here. Cause this thing is cantilevered out at a funky angle.
And that no drip glue does a nice job of just hanging there instead of ending up in my face. In addition to those glue surfaces let me check my miters here. I also wanna get glue on the miter joint itself. Now we're ready to put everything together. Well, that is a crowning achievement For this cabinet, it does a great job of really dressing it up on the top there.
I just had my last piece to put on that side and crown molding on this project is all done.
This was a disappointment coming frong fro the guild. Tje laying flat method of cutting tje crown on a compound miter saw with the appropriate angles would be the modern way of cutting, rather than the cumbersome, less accurate, upside down, backwards method, not even discribed here.
Useless what angle is he using?
I agree with one of the suggestions...clamp a block to the face of the cabinet on the other end, to rest the crown on while your measuring/gluing/nailing. That especially prevents smearing glue on the cabinet face. The other point is: if this happened to be a repair of an antique cabinet, the glue used would most likely been hide glue. It would be good to use the same kind. Old Brown Glue can be bought, which has urea in it, to keep it liquid. It works great.
Crown molding and gusset angles would be a big improvement to the video.
Thanks for this very helpful video. Could you please comment on whether it is advisable to apply wood finish (lacquer, stain, etc) before or after cutting and assembly?
I watched the video "how to install crown molding on cabinets" it's great. But what I need is paper drawings or plans on how to do it so I can take it into my shop in the garage. Does WWGOA have such a thing and if so where should I look? Can you help me and if you can email me at nancy3304@yahoo.com. Yours truly, Nancy
Not much information on creating "Gussets" ie making them and how to fasten them?
Any idea on what to do to the top of this when cabinets are installed in an open floor plan, and the top of the cabinets can be seen?
This video could have been much more informative if the person explained the compound angles needed for each of the 90* corners. Since the molding does not lay flat against the cabinet, it is much more complicated to get the angles correct. This is my weak point in installing crown molding.
two things.. you still got glue on the face of the cabinet while positioning the crown. and a note to the web designer. Move the video left or move the social media buttons somewhere else. Very annoying.