A kitchen cabinet door is a vulnerable component of a kitchen unit. Once the hinge is loose a serious fix is needed. This Instructable shows how to secure a hinge with through-hole technology.

The hinge type in question is typical for frameless cabinets (European style cabinets): concealed hinges mounted to the inside cabinet wall. The hinge indicated here is a presumably cheap pre-fab one, mounted using a press fit to pin up the (white) plastic base part. The problem is that once the initial press fit is hanging loosely, the hinge tilts and the cabinet door is hanging askew.

The through-hole technology (THT) mentioned above is a concept to mount electronic components onto printed circuit boards (PCB), later outrun by surface-mount technology (SMT). For kitchen cabinets, it is just the other way round: surface-mounted hinges can be repaired with a through-hole fix!

The approach may be original and useful to others, reason enough to document it in an Instructable.

Outline
In this Instructable Step 1 below explains the preparations and shows where to locate the hole in the hinge base. Step 2 documents the through-hole fix and Step 3 spends some words on readjusting the hinge. Finally, Step 4 explains the CC BY license of this Instructable.

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Step 1: Preparation

The idea is to first drill a hole in the hinge base (see pictures, here white plastic). Use the hollow cylinder in the foot for this purpose (see picture). Secondly, a hole is drilled in the inside cabinet wall as shown in the pictures in Step 2.

Step 2: Fixing

Let the hole in the hinge base guide the bit and drill through the cabinet wall. In the example in this Instructable the screw measures 40 mm (length, 1.6 in) with M5 thread and a hexagon head measuring 8 mm = 0.31 in. The head fits exactly inside the metal cover of the hinge. Screw on a nut at the other side of the cabinet wall and use a ring to better distribute the pressing force towards the sidewall.

The head of the screw makes that the positioning of the hinge should be redone. This is shown in the next Step.

Step 3: Readjusting

After assembling the hinge, the screw for readjusting and leveling the cabinet door is now touching upon the head of the screw, therefore it needs to be loosened quite much, see picture.

Step 4: License

This Instructable is being made available through a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license. This through-hole fix is an original solution to repair kitchen cabinet hinges that hang loosely.

Republishing this Instructable is allowed provided that it is properly attributed (cite the name openproducts, link to www.openproducts.org, www.instructables.com/member/openproducts, or the original Instructable). For other arrangements send a Private Message through the instructables member page (www.instructables.com/member/openproducts).