I had planned to use roller drawer guides for our two remaining small drawers. We even made a purchase - before we took them back to the store.
The original setup was a single under drawer guide, made out of soft wood, in the profile shape of a tee. The "upper tee stroke" slides along and inside a plastic slide mounted to the bottom, back of the drawer box, in the shape of a - well - in the shape of a "negative of a tee".
I decided to use the original design, but to adapt it to "whatever felt right". You know, modus operandi.
Using side mount roller drawer guides required a wider opening - I think it was 1/2" each side - than what I had. That would have meant cutting the opening wider to make space for the guides, and then the drawer front would be too narrow to cover the opening! Side mounts wouldn't work. Rather than try a new style bottom mount, we just went with old school, new wood.
The old wood guides had seen many years of use, and had probably functioned very well, until that day when the previous owner placed too much weight in the drawer, or tried to pack up too quickly because DH had said "let's go" or something. Then, snap! Part of the tee finally gave up in that spot where the grain had already made it weak. And from that day forward, the drawer flopped and DH placed the repair on his "to do" list, eventually selling the camper instead.
Making my replacements out of new - well chosen, tight grained and clear, knot free but still - soft fir wood, might see a similar occurrence in future, but if so, two small screws and it pops out, and I'll get some hard wood for a second attempt.
In reality, DW is careful with things like that, so I doubt it will become an issue. If it breaks, it'll probably be because I myself got too western with it. "Stupid drawer! Why won't you shut? Oh, there's a house behind it. My mistake".
So I spent some quality time with the table saw and made a couple guides. This picture also shows mounting blocks for the guide ends.
That's the set for the upper drawer. Here's the lower drawer set already in place.
Notice two things here. The front mount block has two unused holes in it. Those were first used to fasten the mount to the back of the galley cabinet face. And the second is that there is now a gap between the back of the face, and the front of the guide. Of course the addition of the gap prevents the mounting of the block to the face back. Here's why.
This is the front bottom of the drawer. There are two small notches. Those notches fall over the back of the face board and allow gravity to hold the drawer in a closed position. To open, you lift the front of the drawer slightly and pull out. It's a slick design that has been around forever. Anybody who has ever owned an older RV knows this method.
When I first built the guide, it reached all the way to the face back. The drawer slid in, but didn't fall down into "hold closed" position. In order for that to occur, the guide had to be mounted slightly lower. In order for it to be slightly lower, a gap had to be placed so the plastic slide could engage.
You can see where I temporarily fastened the slide via one screw to do test fitting. Once complete, I'll remove the slide for drawer finishing.
Here's the drawer, almost in far enough to engage the gravity "hold closed" feature.
And in "hold closed" position.
Here's the back side with the bottom drawer all the way in.
I had also first made the top drawer glide as on the bottom drawer, where it extended all the way forward to the back of the galley face board. Now I modified it with the addition of a second block to mount to, because there was nothing below it to use, such as the wing surface enlisted for the bottom drawer.
And here's the results, with both drawers in place. Note the top drawer has a cut-out for clearing the underside of the sink. Because we have moved the sink closer, there is need to make a slightly larger cutout.
This is the last remaining particle board in the camper. Did I mention I dislike particle board? Oh sure, it has it's place. Very nice to use as an engineered flat surface for installing counter top plastic and such, but when used for construction, and especially unfinished, it holds marginal value to me.
Next I'll replace the particle board backs with plywood.
