hi do you have any tips on how to repair wardrobes where someone has lifted them by the side panel and the metal peg that screws into the side panel (and then is has the circular cross head lock on the other end in the shelf or base) has been ripped from the hole taking some of the surrounding wood with it so the hole is now to big and the side panel just pulls away?

Hi Gary,

Firstly, you might need to strengthen the joint. If the damage is at the base, this will probably mean removing the contents and the doors, before tipping the wardrobe onto its front. This will give you access to the base where you can secure one or more small L brackets or plastic blocks. Once this is done you can stand the wardrobe up again. If it is at the top then you will need to effect a similar repair discretely.

If you have any of the damaged wood particles, I would use some PVA wood glue and push these into position around the hole. This will take around 24 hours to dry. You should be able to push these pieces back and cover the hole to some extent. Use a reasonable amount of glue to ensure it is solid and wipe away any excess.

To tidy up the visual aspect. Nip into yuor local Tool Station who supply wax touch up crayons in a variety of finishes they are likely to have a pack which will match. These cost about £3-£5 each so are not expensive and will cover up the mess nicely.

Edwin

i PURCHASED DRAWERS FROM YOU AND THE RUNNERS BROKE i ORDERED NEW RUNNERS BUT THEY DIDN’T COME WITH THE GRUB SCREWS TO FIX THEM TO THE SIDE OF THE DRAW. SIZE IS 9MM LONG 4MM WIDE CAN YOU HELP AT ALL. I NEED 8 ALTOGETHER.

No you didn’t. I don’t sell furniture!

My son is in a furnished flat. He has “lost” the back of three wardrobe drawers. This is the type of drawer that you describe elsewhere as: “back and sides come as one piece with each side hinged using the plastic laminate finish.” Do you know if it is possible to buy replacements?  We do not know where the wardrope came from. BTW there is a groove cut into the three sides for the drawer base to slide into.

Hi Paul,
They are from Argos/Homemade (it’s the same company).  Go on the Argos website and find their spares hotline. They should be able to help you.

NB: there will be a cheap chest of drawers they do with the same  drawers in the same size. If Argos can’t help you, buying a new of these might get you the right drawer backs?

Edwin Cooke

Thank you very much for this suggestion. Unfortunately, neither Argos or Homebase wanted to know without the furniture part number. I ended up getting some board cut to size for the drawer end. I could not manage the groove in this but resorted to corner fixings and glue. So far so good.

Thanks again,.

Paul

We need to remove the doors so we can move the wardrobes to get carpet fitted - although we have the instructions - and can get the outer door off the top runners - we cant seem to get them off the bottom at the same time. Ive slid the two grey ’square shaped’ blocks which sit on the top of one door towards the back and the other ‘clip’ on the inside top of the other door which I understand release the doors but its not working.  Any help gratefully received.

Hi Lesley,

In order to do this you may need to remove some of the Komplement fittings you might have, such as drawers near the bottom of the unit. Most of these clip out quite easily.

You will need to create some space in one of the widest units so you can climb inside. You can then unscrew the lower guides off the outer door.

If you do not fancy doing this, you can still do it by creating the space (as indicated above), and then leaning inside to unscrew the first lower guide nearest to you.

In order to access the other lower guide, you will need to create some space on the opposite side of the wardrobe, then simply slide the door back and repeat, taking care to hold the outer door away from the inner door so you do not scratch it.

Once you have removed the two lower guides, you can then easily lift the door off. Be especially careful not to catch the inner door with the upper runners when you remove the outer door.

I hope this helps. If you still have difficulty you can give me a call to discuss or let me know where you are and I can get someone to help.

Edwin

We have some John Lewis Bunk Beds (it looks very like the Ashton, only it’s pine), & have just moved house, and all the dowels and screws that were taped to the beds have gone missing. Any suggestions?? Do you know anywhere we can buy their special screws?! Thanks.

Hi Emma,

I cannot reply as you have not left an email address and I am not calling an international telephone number.

Most of the fixtures will be available from wholesalers, however first you should contact John Lewis Customers Services as I am sure they will do their utmost to assist you in supplying them. If they cannot help, try to obtain a copy of the instructions on a PDF and I will see what I can do.

Edwin.

Hi - can you advise on the best method of removing the back panel from a wardrobe (flat pack from Argos, now assembled) without damaging it so that the wardrobe can be semi-disassembled to move house and then re-assembled?  The wardrobes are pine and the back panels are pinned in place using small nails (that came with the wardrobe).  Thank you.

Hi Neil,

You can do it but it requires a bit of care and patience.

You will need:-

- Largish flat headed screw driver (at least 7-8mm across)
- A pair of bottle nosed pliers

The way I do it is as follows:

- pull the wardrobe away from the wall so you can get access the inside and the back. Remove the doors and any other loose shelves rails, drawers etc. try to leave enough room so you can tilt it forward to lie on its front later (see BOLD type below).
- estimate where the pin/nail is in the back (say measure 20cm from the top on one side, then measure ~18.5cm on the inside to allow for the thickness of the top panel).
- gently (but firmly) push the back panel with your fingers close to where you have measured the pin to be. It will either: not move; shift a little or move freely.
- If it doesn’t move, find and try another one.
- If it comes out freely then great!
- If it moves a little, use your pliers to remove the pin from the back.

- Once you have removed one pin, there should be some give in the panel when you press it from the inside and it should be easier to locate the next pin. This time you can either repeat the above method or slide in the screw driver along the loose groove to the next pin. Once you are as close as you can be, then use the screw driver as a lever to gently loosen the next pin.

This is quite time consuming, some will come out easily others will be difficult but if you take your time you can usually get them out. Even if you only move a pin by 2-3mm, this is usually enough to get your pliers in to finish off the job.

Don’t get carried away once you have removed a couple, thinking this is easy, take your time.

Don’t worry if you damage the back panel a little when doing this as sometimes the pins can pop through the back panel. This is inevitable, but when you come to reassemble, they should be hidden from view, and hammer a new pin in near to the hole.

As I say it takes a bit of time but can be done with most items of furniture.

BE CAREFULL TO ENSURE THE WARDROBE IS PROPERLY SUPPORTED WHEN YOU REMOVE THE LAST FEW PINS ON THE LAST RIGHT ANGLE. If you don’t the wardrobe might collapse under its own weight (flatten like a cardboard box). Get someone else to hold it or lie it on its front. Also note when moving it, without the back on, it can still collapse like a cardboard box if you move it laterally, so get its front onto the floor so you can undo the remaining panels.

I hope this helps,

Edwin Cooke

Hi im a single mum and recently bought rauch sliding glass wardrobe from ebay,the wardrobes didn’t come with instructions so my daughters boyfriend tried to do the best he could, but when it came time to putting on the two glass doors we have found they are not lining up correctly one door has huge gap at top and wont close the gap the other door is playing up as well. we followed the instructions this site gave us but dont know where we went wrong and help or suggestion would be fantastic.

Hi Jane,

The most common reasons for this is that the wardrobe is not level. A quick way to establish this is to just push or pull the wardrobe back and forth at each side and see how this influences the alignment of the doors.

Use a spirit level and check the following:-

- Floor of wardrobe is horizontal and flat (left to right and front to back). Check in several places behind both doors.
- Side panels are vertical (again check in a few positions, top and bottom, front and back both sides.
- Wardrobe is not leaning forward / backwards on one side.

If it is not level, you will need to insert some cardboard, plastic chocks or similar under the wardrobe at various points to level the unit. Only do this where the vertical side panels rest on the floor, otherwise the fixings can break. Depending on the age of your property your floor will be more or less uneven. The wardrobes are about 2 metres wide and a few mm over this distance can make a big difference, in severe cases the difference is a couple of inches and must be rectified otherwise the wardrobe will collapse in time.

Once you are satisfied the wardrobe is level you can look at the finer adjustments but this should not be necessary. Avoid phaphing about with the adjustable settings on the wheel bogeys until you are certain the wardrobe is level.

——————————

If one door is lower than the other. It could be one door is upside down. They put a red sticker on the inside to indicate which way up is the top. The holes where the wheel bogeys and the guides are attached are slightly closer to the edge (at the top I think) and so getting this wrong will cause problems.

I hope this helps let me know how you get on.

Edwin.

“I’d like a wardrobe or storage unit in my lounge and am thinking of the Pax Wardrobe 236 cm tall.. I have 300 cm tall room and wanted to mount it to the wall but also see if I could put the stepping stools on the bottom making it taller. Also I have uneven floors. Is this doable?”

Hi Mark,

I am not quite sure exactly what you mean by “Stepping Stools”. However it is probably not a good idea to put anything underneath the wardrobes. Each 1 metre wide unit weights over 30kg and with the extra weight of internal fittings, doors and drawers, the weight could become excessive once you start putting clothes and possessions inside.

I would approach it the other way around. Ikea do an extension unit (I can;t remember the name) which can increase the height of the Billy Bookcase. It is not as deep but might help you achieve your aim.

One point about the Pax wardrobes the top and bottom are connected to the side panels with three minifix fittings and two thin dowels at each connection to a side panel. If you stand on the base near to these fittings it can collapse under your weight. This is only really a risk during assembly especially with the corner Pax robes, but nevertheless, they are not designed to be built on stilts or have extra heavy units placed on top of them. If you go down this route, make sure you reinforce the fittings and consider how the weight of the upper units will be supported.

I am sorry I cannot be more helpful.

Edwin.

“Have assembled a NEXT corner tv unit, all looks fine, drawers fit onto runners, but wont shut fully. Have spent hours taking drawers out and putting in again. “

Hi Sharon,

The most likely cause of this is that you have screwed the runners onto the unit using the wrong holes. On most runners there are a lot more holes than you will need and it can be difficult to tell which ones to use.

If none of the drawers shut, then you have probably made the same mistake on all of them.

Also it might be that they shut easily on one side and not the other. Try pushing the front of the drawer on both sides, if you get less resistance on one side this runner is probably in the correct place and will give you an idea of what to do.

On some units there is a sucker punch and this is that you need to use different holes on different runners. So you can’t always use the same ones.

I would have a closer look at the instructions as well.

I hope the above can be of assistance.

Edwin.

I have been assembling these doors for several years now and the first time I did it I thought it would be quite intimidating to do. I hate working with glass and the the overall process is quite tricky. Furthermore the instructions are not that easy to follow and the first time I did it part of me thought have I done this right? So I scoured the instructions over and over again to ensure I had, looking at every part of the Ikea instructions. The nice think about Ikea instructions is that usually every piece of information you need is there, just presented in an international non-language specific diagrammatical way!

So far I have written the following sets of instructions on Ikea Pax wardrobes:-

• How to build an Ikea wardrobe standing up.
• How to rectify a collapsed Ikea wardrobe
• How to build the Ikea Pax Sliding Doors

All instructions are available at:-

Ikea Help