How to Adjust Soft Close Cabinet Doors Hinges | Everything Explained

There are many cases when you would feel the need of learning how to adjust soft close cabinet doors. But most probably it’s either because the thing is making too much noise, won’t agree to close, or probably misaligned causing a weird outlook.

No matter what your concern here is, finding out the right way of adjustment, especially for soft close cabinet doors is important. Let’s walk through this whole matter and discover ways on how you can solve things.

Here’s How to Adjust Soft Close Cabinet Hinges Explained

If you’re lucky and the trouble is some bare noise of cabinet door that is bothering you, then focusing on ways to adjust soft close hinge speed should be enough. But sometimes, the matter is serious than that, you will literally need to go for a time-consuming chore for solving the issues. Let’s talk about time-consuming major ones.

Major Concerns & Solution According to That

The very first thing you may experience is the operation of cabinet doors. And the other reason could be its visual alignment. With the operation, its usual doors not getting closed for some reason. While the misalignment can be a big headache to those who just can’t stand something not perfect. Especially if you have the most beautiful kitchen cabinet ready to impress visitors but seems off just because the doors look not aligned.

And both of this concern actually relates to one mechanism. Your cabinet door’s hinges. That’s the main answer to your query about how to adjust soft close kitchen cabinet doors. If you’ve invited in an adjustable friendly soft close cabinet hinge, then there’s nothing to be too worried off. Some simple steps will be enough to sort things well.

However, if the hinges are way old and need your attention, you should first think about replacing them. And chances are, you’re existing concern will go with the old ones.

To Adjust Cabinet Doors That Won’t Close

The first thing you need to do for adjusting a cabinet door that won’t close is to check whether it is overlay or inset. You can simply inspect the cabinet door’s top part to find information. The doors are inset if it fits exactly within the carved-out space meant for cabinet door. However, if the doors seem to cover the cabinet space then it’s overlay type.

There may not be a very obvious difference in both styles. But depending on the cabinet type, the position of hinges can be different. And without knowing that you won’t be able to fix it.

Take a few steps backward. Look at your cupboard. Do the doors look a bit crooked and not straight enough? Then there’s an alignment problem with it and you need to fix this with a Philips screwdriver simply. Use the tool for tightening the screws. Make the doors parallel to each other.

However, if that does not work and the doors seem still unaligned, you need to take them off. Then you need to reattach it back ensuring alignment is correct this time. Without proper alignment, the doors won’t close. Also, the whole task of adjusting hinges will become terribly hard without this.

Then you need to close the door all way so that it’s concealing inner cabinet completely. look at the soft close hinge and you should see adjustment tab. Using your fingertip, try to pull on it. The hinged center should come with a silver or gray plunger. You need to pull it for checking if it’s the adjustment tab. Depending on the model of hinge, this tab can be different. There are even hinges that come with a lever for adjustment.

Next Try Hinge Modifications for Proper Aligning

How do you adjust soft closing cabinet doors by simply aligning them? Well, start by pushing the adjustment lever or tab that you just discovered. You need to keep it retracted. In the case of lever mechanism, try facing the thing toward cabinet’s sidewall. However, if it’s a tab, then just push it in all the way. Usually, with adjustment tabs, there are gaps of at least 0.20 inches in between it and the hinge.

Rotate the adjustment lever clockwise and make it face ceiling of the cabinet. Once again if it’s a tab instead, you want to pull it forward in a moderate amount. The tab and hinge should have a gap of 0.39 inches almost.

Maximum models will work with this setting to adjust soft closing cabinet door hinges. However, with bigger doors, you may have to turn the lever clockwise 90 degrees. And it should face the cabinet’s inside. Some hinge models may need the tab to be pulled even in case of big doors.

After making adjustments, with your hinge model’s preferred way, you need to test the doors. Once the hinges are in the proper setting, they’d close without any problem. If the closing action is too quick, you need to tighten the mechanism for adjustment. This way the hinge will work with more weight. You want to tinker with each door of the cabinet. Do so until the setting of the hinge seems perfect.

Wrap Up

And on that note, you now know how to adjust soft close cabinet doors that shows trouble with closing. The adjustment tab or lever is usually enough to answer for one to correct the misalignment that is usually causing issues.

However, if things still don’t seem to work for you, contact a professional. Let someone expert come and give your cabinet doors an inspection. They will be able to find out the real reason behind whatever trouble you’re facing. If things are pretty serious, you may have to replace certain mechanisms. Let’s hope that’s not the case and you’ll get sorted with these modifications alone.