[andream]

This is my first time posting but I've been reading through all of the threads and you all seem so helpful I hope you can calm my panic!

Basically I just realized the refrigerator I ordered is a few inches taller than what I'd planned for in the Ikea software--I got carried away when looking at the features and thought the one I ordered had the same outer dimensions as the others I was looking at. I already have all of my Akurum cabinets, I've assembled them, and am planning on installation for next weekend. The refrigerator I just ordered is 69.25" tall and I had planned for a 24" above-the-fridge cabinet on top of that. To the left of the fridge I have the 88" tall pantry cabinet, and to the right I have a row of 39" upper cabinets. Of course, in my Ikea planner this all looks great and I have a bit of space between the top of the fridge and the bottom of the cabinet but the fridge in the planner is a couple of inches shorter than the one I ordered.

My installation DVD says that for 39" upper cabinets, the tops of them should be at 92 5/8". In my current layout, I would need a height of at least 93 1/4" plus whatever space is recommended for clearance between the cabinet and the top of the fridge. I think that if I didn't have the tall pantry I would just hang all of my upper cabinets an inch and a half higher than the DVD says and hope it didn't feel "off" once my kitchen was done--and I'm guessing I wouldn't notice the difference. But of course the top of the tall pantry needs to line up with the tops of the other cabinets so can I account for the extra height needed in that cabinet by adjusting the legs? My assembled tall cabinet measures 88 1/4 inches and I found something on Ikea's website that says the legs can be adjusted up to 5 3/8", so theoretically can I make this cabinet 93 5/8" tall and hang the rest of my upper cabinets at the 93 5/8" line?

If I can adjust the pantry cabinet in that manner should I leave the rest of the base cabinets at the 4 3/8" leg height that Ikea recommends? The pantry is the end of my kitchen on that side, and will be separated from other base cabinets by the fridge, so I don't think it will be noticeable if that toe kick has to be higher than the others. Does the 4 3/8" leg height just make the cabinets some sort of industry standard? I am planning on getting 3cm Zodiaq countertops installed if that matters at all.

If I can do all of this upward adjusting and make the tops of the upper cabinets hit at 93 5/8", will that be enough? By my calculations it will leave me with 3/8" between the top of the fridge and the upper cabinet above it. Is this too close for comfort?

Thanks for any help or suggestions!!

[climber_grrl]

First of all - Don't panic. We'll help you through this and any other installation questions that may come up next week.

I am not the expert, but yes, you can adjust the legs to that height. We have a very wonky floor and our legs (Capita) had to have lots of "adjustment" so that the cabs at the low point could be level with the ones at the high point.

The standard kitchen counter height is 36, but I'm not sure how this factors in considering you are trying to position the uppers. What you might want to figure out is how much space is between the top of the counters and the bottom of the cabs (w/light rail). The min is 17" so if by raising the uppers you are somewhere in the 17-19" range you'll probably be fine.

That being said, I might be a bit concerned w/the 3/8" clearance above the fridge. Can you go on the manufacturers website and read the installation manual? It might give some guidelines as to how much space is needed for proper heat ventilation (not sure if that's the right way to say it, but hopefully you understand what I mean).

HTH.

[DulcineaK]

and you can always let something be staggered, like the height of the above fridge cabinet. how high is your ceiling? (gosh, i'm thinking you might have said,,,, gonna have to look) you could choose to make it taller. my fridge is flanked by a 15in and a 30in pantry with an above fridge cab bridging between them. All three are different heights, i used molding and facia boards to "blend" up to the crown molding

[stacylu]

Another thought - make a custom pantry base and don't worry about them when you place your wall cabinets. This is what we did to maximize storage for our lower ceilings.

As far as the fridge clearance, you should check in your fridge manual. They give clearance measurments

[andream]

Thanks everyone for your ideas! As long as I can raise the pantry high enough I think I am going to just hang the uppers a bit higher than usual to be even with it. I never thought of making a custom base, so I can always do that if the legs can't get it high enough--good idea!

Dulcinea--I live in a loft so I have pretty high ceilings (12 feet), but adding a piece of cover panel or something to the top of the pantry to blend with the rest of the uppers is another good suggestion.

Found my fridge manual online and it suggests 1 inch clearance on top for ventilation/installation purposes, so I definitely need to inch everything up a bit!

I was messing around with the planner software again and found a fridge that is only 3/8" shorter than mine--and the planner let me slide that into the space I have. Is there any way to tell how high the planner is setting your base cabinet legs at so I can tell how much room is left in that plan for adjusting? The website says the legs are "preadjusted" to 4 3/8". Is it safe to assume that the Ikea kitchen planner automatically sets the cabinet legs to that height too?

I know I will probably be able to figure all of this out as I'm doing it on the fly but I like to know what I'm getting myself into, and I have a friend coming from out of town to help me install and I promised him I'd be as prepared as possible!