When an upper kitchen cabinet falls, the cabinet itself is rarely to blame; the wall type, anchors and hangers usually are. Learn the warning signs and the principles of safe installation.
In recent months, Turkish and German newspapers have published several reports of kitchen cabinets falling and of disputes between owners and installers over who is responsible. German searches are also full of questions such as how much weight a wall cabinet can hold and how high upper cabinets should hang. All of this points to a problem that is common in Iranian kitchens too: mounting kitchen wall cabinets looks simple from the outside, but mistakes can stay hidden for years.
In most cases the cabinet carcass is fine and the weakness lies in how it is fixed to the wall. The common causes are:
A wall cabinet is only as strong as its weakest anchor, not as thick as its carcass.
The reliable method in professional workshops is to hang the cabinet on a steel hanging rail or on adjustable cabinet hangers. The rail is screwed to the wall with suitable anchors at adequate spacing, and hangers fitted inside the top corners of the carcass hold the cabinet on the rail. These hangers also let the installer adjust level and wall distance with a screwdriver after mounting.
If the top of the cabinet has pulled away from the wall, the doors no longer close in line, the cabinet floor is sagging, or you hear a knocking from the fixing points when you close a door, empty the cabinet and have the fixing checked. These signs usually appear before a fall, and ignoring them is the most common mistake. We cover other planning errors in common kitchen cabinet ordering mistakes.
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