# Upgrade Vintage Tool Chest with Ball Bearing Slides Using Plywood?? by Bill70j



## brino

Great solution!
I bet a bunch of people copy this.
-brino


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## jdedmon91

That is a neat idea. In fact mounting the ball bearing slides this way is better than welding. Also you didn’t alter the appearance of the box 


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## FOMOGO

Great job on the ball bearing retrofit. I own several older Craftsmen boxes with the friction type slides, and have found that a good solvent cleaning and lubrication every 10 yrs or so makes a huge difference in operation.


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## T Bredehoft

FOMOGO said:


> have found that a good solvent cleaning and lubrication every 10 yrs or so makes a huge difference



Thanks for the suggestion, I'll have to perform that operation on my Kennedy boxes. ...


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## Charles Spencer

Also you can now truthfully say "Honey. I still love that tool box you bought me back in..."


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## silverhawk

So, where did you source the slides from?  I've been wanting to do that to my old craftsman boxes so they'd match the new craftsman boxes I have.


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## bill70j

I got a good price here, but had to buy a 10 pair box.  I have also bought them one pair at a time here.  Despite the price difference between the two ($4.75/pair vs $13.30/pair) I can see no difference in quality or performance.

I have found that most full extension ball bearing slides have the same critical thickness of 1/2", and call for a clearance between the side of the chest and the side of drawer of 1/2" + 1/32" - 0".  That is the dimension of the Craftsman chest I modified.

I had the same incentive as you.  There was a huge difference between the friction slides in this older Craftsman chest and the ball bearing type of my newer Craftsman chests.


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## silverhawk

bill70j said:


> I got a good price here, but had to buy a 10 pair box.  I have also bought them one pair at a time here.  Despite the price difference between the two ($4.75/pair vs $13.30/pair) I can see no difference in quality or performance.
> 
> I have found that most full extension ball bearing slides have the same critical thickness of 1/2", and call for a clearance between the side of the chest and the side of drawer of 1/2" + 1/32" - 0".  That is the dimension of the Craftsman chest I modified.
> 
> I had the same incentive as you.  There was a huge difference between the friction slides in this older Craftsman chest and the ball bearing type of my newer Craftsman chests.



Thanks!  This item on my to-do list now has a little more grounding!  Thanks again!


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## TerryH

Great idea and very well executed!


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