Display Cabinets, the Curiously Dummy Design

We don't see no 2-by-4s, Joe!

We run across some pretty strange concepts once in a while, and this one has to be one of the strangest in a long time. Here's the background: our founder inherited a collection of Matchbox® cars when his father-in-law passed on, and he decided to put them in a little display cabinet. If you'd like to see his design for the cabinet, well he actually wrote a blog post of his own. He thinks it's cool; YMMV. What brought this discussion about? someone nominated the OurPastimes.com post "How to Make a Hot Wheels Display Cabinet"¹ for DotD... and we're happy to present the award to Joseph McAllister.

It's always a dead giveaway when you pull up the references an eHowian provided and they have zip to do with what the drone wrote. That's definitely the case this time: McAllister's two references consist of a page of links to display cabinet plans for sale and a single image of what appears to be an etagere. Neither included Joe's fine plans, which include such useful suggestions as,

"...you can adjust the height to your personal preference, although 5 feet is a popular choice... Most choose to include about four shelves in a 5-foot-tall display case."

Although McAllister informs you in a "tip" that,

"The shelves do not need more than 3 inches of space between..."

We guess that means four shelves per foot, or twenty in five feet. Sounds... busy. Some of Joseph's other instructions are a bit weird, too, such as,

"Cut four equal upright posts for the corners of the display; 2-by-4's [sic] provide good support."

Really? 2-by-4s? Why not 1-by-3s or 1-by-4s; both of which are readily available in many species. Furniture-grade 2-by-4s aren't that easy to find, and construction lumber needs more than "sanding." And then there's McAllister's whole "groove" hangup:

• "Mark the position of each shelf at equal intervals across each of the corner posts... Using a router, cut grooves at each mark..."
• "Cut a groove along the entire length of four of the end frame pieces with the router..."
• "Cut 16 short end-frame pieces of the same thickness as the outer posts to brace the display case. These pieces should match the width of the glass display case shelves. You will need four braces for each side of the case."
• "Cut a groove along the entire length of four of the end frame pieces with the router. These four pieces will form the back of the display case. You will line up the grooves along these end pieces with the grooves across the four posts to form the supports for the glass shelves."
• "...line up the grooves along these end pieces with the grooves across the four posts to form the supports for the glass shelves"

We kinda get the feeling that he wants dadoes cut in the uprights and rabbets at one edge of the crosspieces, but who knows? Maybe if he'd known the words "dado" and "rabbet" he'd have used them (but they apparently don't use those words in Liberty University's J-school). Finally, Joey wants you to,

"Fasten the crosspieces to the upright posts to form the back and both sides of the cabinet using two wood screws per joint and a Phillips screwdriver"

Let's face it: young McAllister gave utterly useless directions for measuring those "crosspieces," did not in any way provide direction for the joints, blew off the whole "screws" thing, and in general barfed up the sort of "plan" and "instructions" that put the dumbass in Dumbass of the Day. You go, Joe (and take your journalism degree with you!)

¹ The original has been deleted by Leaf Group, but can still be accessed using the Wayback machine at archive.org. Its URL was   ehow.com/how_12213504_make-hot-wheels-display-cabinet.html

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