Building islands

[PMMully]

What is the best way to address islands? I normally build in a plumbing/utility wall as most of them have a sink and or power. I have been using a half wall for that. What is the best way to close off the ends? Cabinet partition, filler? I close the top with a custom countertop. I have closed it with a cabinet that I just make small and remove the face, or leave the door face as a panel removing the knob - false door. In reality, the cabinet makers use a filler. Looking for the best way to solve this. Not sure why I have a double image here.

 

[robdyck]

At the minimum I'd be using the partition tool to add a flat panel to each end, but not filler. That will result in a closed toe kick. If you want the open toe kick, use a base cabinet:

Or for something more detailed:

[Alaskan_Son]

Is this is Chief question or a general construction question?  

[PMMully]

2 hours ago, Alaskan_Son said:

Is this is Chief question or a general construction question?  

Most definitely a Chief question. 

 

From what I can tell, if you want to use the cost/MTO functions of Chief for kitchens/baths, you must be careful of using the Chief tools to make the designs look right, and what that turns out to be. In practice, they build a small baseplate and essentially use a filler. The installers do not use a cabinet to close up the ends. In practice, the plumbing walls are just like base cabinets on normal walls. I have a contractor that is considering using Chief as an MTO tool through the designs. Not sure about how accurate it could be.

[GeneDavis]

Describe this plumbing wall and how it's integrated into the group of base cabinets and end panels you're calling an island.

 

Even better, post a picture.

 

And describe this MTO.  Are you meaning Material TakeOff?

 

Have you examined Chief's cabinet schedule capabilities?

[PMMully]

The picture is above. The plumbing wall is just a 2x6 wall, with or without drywall. Sometimes we drywall them for stiffness. It allows plumbing and or electrical to have a place to enter the island from below (i.e. slab, floor). From there, there is lots of room to plumb sinks and or install outlets, etc.

 

Yes, sorry, MTO is Material Take Off.  I am starting to dabble with the Components and material list master aspects to start to apply to cost information for the actual build. So I am trying to use whatever it is in CA that would approximate the real way it will actually be ordered and built. So take a cabinet for example. If I add a side panel, it could be $100 extra, etc., so it is fairly easy for cabinets. I saw a video on custom crown molding today that went into real detail on how to build it up for multi-layer crown. So I am looking at the tools under the materials list to see if I can offer a decent MTO/cost aspect of my service to some of the people I do business with. My first runs at this are "if you can really nail this, you get all my design business".

 

So, in the past, I have used things like fake cabinets to close out the plumbing wall gaps, fillers, whatever it took to make it "look" right as the plan was regarded as conceptual only. But, the materials list does not reflect reality as I took a shortcut as I was learning.

 

So my real question is, what would be the best CA tool to reflect the finishing of each end of the island as above so that I could most accurately provide the materials list for a kitchen that had an island with a very common center wall. I do not think it is a cabinet.

 

So far, the material list for standard stuff like doors, flooring, etc, seems to be simple enough.

 

 

[Alaskan_Son]

37 minutes ago, PMMully said:

So my real question is, what would be the best CA tool to reflect the finishing of each end of the island as above so that I could most accurately provide the materials list for a kitchen that had an island with a very common center wall. I do not think it is a cabinet.

 

The real key to the whole thing is effective utilization of that Components panel.  Yes, it helps to model things like they will actually be built, but it's important that you:

A.  Have your various objects set up to report the appropriate Component information.

B.  Have all the desired objects and ONLY the desired objects reporting to your Materials List.

 

There are more tricks and details to be considered, but I would recommend you start there. 

[GeneDavis]

I'm in Florida.  There are probably 70 houses in the process of building here in my subdivision, by six different builders.  Every kitchen has an island with plumbing.  There are no plumbing walls in these islands.

 

Before cabinetry, three pipes are sticking up through the slabs where the islands go.  HW, CW, and drain.

[joey_martin]

I've never seen a plumbing wall either here in Indiana...almost all basements...but I would say to model it exactly like you are going to build it. 

9 hours ago, Alaskan_Son said:

Yes, it helps to model things like they will actually be built,

as @Alaskan_Son says, that is my default. In all cases I will model like it's to be built before I start scratching my head to come up with a "fix".

[PMMully]

20 minutes ago, GeneDavis said:

I'm in Florida.  There are probably 70 houses in the process of building here in my subdivision, by six different builders.  Every kitchen has an island with plumbing.  There are no plumbing walls in these islands.

 

Before cabinetry, three pipes are sticking up through the slabs where the islands go.  HW, CW, and drain.

 

We used to do it that way at one time. But you wind up effectively sacrificing a cabinet where all the stubbing comes up (yes you can build out and hide it). If one is happy with that, so be it. The use of a plumbing (sanitary, supply) wall allows the plumbing to come through the cabinet back just like any other wall, and any cabinet that has power has no power strung through it. We do high-end custom homes and the market wants a clean look.

 

It is very simple, clean, cheap, and adds stabilization and structure as these massive islands (60" by 120" or larger are not unusual).  My drawing shows only 4 cabinets as an example, we would not likely employ this technique for such a small island. Most of these islands also have bar seating on one side as well for 4-6, with a 12 cabinet in front of them for storage. and supports if the overhand is gets large. Relying only on cabinetry for such large islands can be problematic based on the quality in our experience. Most importantly, it adds a few inches of freedom for the final setup as the layout of the plumbing and electrical can vary a small bit based on how they pulled the tapes from the form boards, if they accounted for foam insulation, etc.  Like all construction, many ways to do it, It's just the way we do it.  In actual practice, there is often an outlet on each side where the plumbing wall ends are, cased by two trim panels, which is why they basically use fillers to trim the gap. The trades and cabinet guys seem to like it also. Happy trades, happy builder, happy customer.

 

@Alaskan_Sonyou nailed what I was looking for, thank you so very much. I should have suspected it to be configurable :-), like the schedules.

 

 

[rgardner]

14 hours ago, PMMully said:

What is the best way to close off the ends?

I have seen this in various different areas and have used it in some island cases.  The issue with this is it only really works if you have less depth on the cabinets on the backside as otherwise you are getting too wide for most solid countertops.  

But to answer your question I do two different methods.  I usually do a Base filler there set to 3/4" deep if its closed toe or 3" deep if not closed toe and end the wall at the backside of that cabinet base filler  This will report as a filler just like any others.  The second method I have done is setup a 6-12" (depending on cabinet manuf.) deep base cabinet(s) the whole width of the island and put in shelves or doors, or whatever is needed for that particular job.

[PMMully]

23 minutes ago, rgardner said:

I have seen this in various different areas and have used it in some island cases.  The issue with this is it only really works if you have less depth on the cabinets on the backside as otherwise you are getting too wide for most solid countertops.  

But to answer your question I do two different methods.  I usually do a Base filler there set to 3/4" deep if its closed toe or 3" deep if not closed toe and end the wall at the backside of that cabinet base filler  This will report as a filler just like any others.  The second method I have done is setup a 6-12" (depending on cabinet manuf.) deep base cabinet(s) the whole width of the island and put in shelves or doors, or whatever is needed for that particular job.

 

Have you seen the jumbo quartz that is now coming available? Pretty darn big. My local granite shops are starting to have 72"x 134-144" slabs now. Apparently, the no-seam message has been received. I have done one with a small set of drawers on either side as you describe, turned out great. I have several countertops that are also very long in these monster homes, can not get away from the seams. In that case, we use the best fabricator we can find. The one I use often has a $1.8M CNC table, driven off of digital templates, all robotic, water reclaim, very sophisticated, very cool. You have to really look to find his seams, and I know where they are!

 

Thanks folks for all the inputs.