Kitchen cabinet refinishing ideas

good day - we had laminate installed over our kitchen cabinets and new doors installed by a bigbox store about 10 years ago, and while the new doors are nice, the laminate covering job was fair, at best. Lots of the thinner pieces near drawers have broken, they used caulk to fill in their poorly measured front of the box pieces near the molding, etc. Where the glue bled out, it's discolored (this is a white kitchen)

so we are now looking to redo this kitchen - can the old laminate be removed, and new put on, or what other option is there besides new cabinets, because the doors are actually nice and still in style.

we're planning on selling this house within 3 years and moving to a smaller home, so we hope an updated kitchen helps it sell, but don't want to lose $$ on the remodel too much.

thanks for your thoughts, this forum and its members are great !

 

Might depend on just how bad - can you post some pictures?

 

Several pictures would help tremendously so we can see what you are seeing. Just off of the top of my head I would think the laminate could be removed and new laminate installed but I have absolutely no experience in this field.

 

Many years ago I did a desk laminating job. Turned out well. But I think a kitchen counter needs to be done professionally. Even though you plan on moving in the near future it would well for resale to have it done. Plus you still get to use and enjoy it for time being. In most cases kitchen updates will pay back in future resale.

 

Use a heat gun and putty knife to remove the laminate. All doors/drawers and molding should be removed first.
The face frame laminate should come off pretty easy.
The sides and large panels are either laminate glued directly to the cabinets, or 1/4" plywood was added to the sides and then laminated. The 1/4" plywood is more likely and easier to remove, you just pull off the panels rather than chip the laminate off.

Contact cement gummy residue will stay on all surfaces. The cabinets must be sanded pretty aggressively.

As far as recovering, I would recommend painting the face frames and cabinet boxes. I wouldn't recommend this for any color but white.

I refaced for a number of years and IMO there's not much benefit to have the face frames covered with laminate, that's just how we did it. The paint will look fine.

 

If the laminate on the faces is still stuck on good, and you just want to do the face frames... and don't plan on changing the doors, I wouldn't bother removing the old laminate. I'd scuff the face frames with some rough sanding disks (36-60 grit) then apply new laminate over the top. Any cracks/gaps can be filled with bondo prior to putting on the new adhesive and laminate.


I wouldn't want to go to all the work of removing laminate, stripping the glue, just to relaminate -or paint. JMHO.

 

X reminds me of one point. If the laminate was applied with the "old" solvent based contact cement, the laminate could be very difficult to remove. Difficult as in dime or quarter sized chips and could be real task.

 

Finally replying now that summer is here and the job must be done. Some pics show the points where the laminate was supposed to meet the molding, but didn't and was filled with caulk and has discolored. I hope it's visible on the pics.

Thanks for your input.

 

Some caulks will discolor more than others but generally it's best to paint over cured caulk so there are no discoloration or dirt issues [I know not always feasible] Had the caulking been cleaned up better it wouldn't look as bad.

 

Are you still wanting to remove all the laminate?
Just cleaning off all the old caulk would improve the appearance greatly.

The caulk wasn't applied because the laminate was cut short near the molding, the molding was applied after the laminate was installed. In other words, they nailed on the molding and then caulked the edges (poorly)

I would scrape off all caulk using a plastic tool. You can also use a window scraper (razor). If you're careful with the scraper it won't scratch the laminate.