A long time ago I went looking for a middle tool chest riser for my short Husky toolchest, but I couldn’t find one. I did purchase 2 tool chest risers for my Craftsman tool chests, but they didn’t fit the Husky tool box. The upper Husky box was too wide to fit in the Craftsman middle riser. Undeterred, I chose to make my own, better riser.

This is the middle tool chest I have for my Craftsman tool chests, and I do like it. It matches nicely, and is good enough quality. However… I don’t like the fact that it is not full depth. So the first thing I did with my middle chest was to make a box that was the full depth of my lower tool chest. I then promptly filled it with crap an went on to other projects for about a year. It turned into quite a disorganized, messy shelf looking something like this:

You can see that the space isn’t used efficiently at all, so all that “extra” space I got by making it full cabinet depth is wasted. Time to add some drawers! Since it is January, my mind is set on organizing, and one of the best ways I find to do this in the garage is to use up some scrap wood. All of the wood used for this was scrap left over from other projects. The only thing purchased were

These drawers used 3/4″ plywood for the sides and 1/2″ plywood for the bases. The first drawer I made used only glued and screwed butt joints. nothing fancy, and I kind of regret having the screw heads visible on the front. After seeing that, I decided to go with a bit of joinery for the rest of the drawers. I chose the blind rabbet joint because it is fast and easy to make with my table saw and router, plus it is super strong.

Once the other 2 drawers were in place, I got to work on handles. I had some scrap 1/2″ thick maple laying around that already had a 45 cut on it, so that seemed like a great starting point for a handle. I don’t like knobs that reach our and grab clothing, so all edges are mitered.