After sitting on the fence for several months with this item in my Wishlist, an Seller called River Oak Group listed this cabinet for the lowest price I had seen, $199 shipped. With some trepidation over the transit of a 115lb. package consisting primarily of glass from Florida to Los Angeles, I pulled the trigger. There was also a post-sale issue which ROG responded to quickly and professionally, so kudos to them.
The cabinet arrived via UPS glass-intact, which is a minor miracle, considering UPS is a BRUTAL environment for any package. Ironically, by a label on the bottom of this unit, the U.S. distributor for this Taiwanese-built cabinet is only 40 miles away from us, but ROG is in Florida, so the cabinet went all the way from California to Florida to ROG, then all the way BACK again to us. The global economy, sigh.
The following is our experience in unpacking and assembling this cabinet. We offer it as some dos, definitely some donts, and some off-the-cuff ideas for getting this thing assembled and installed in your home.
First of all, you ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY, do not want to open this package inside your house. There was a mountain of of styro-detritus inside this package which came flying out once it was opened. We unpacked ours on our front porch (see photo), and had to use a Shop-Vac after we were done to get all the tiny bits and pieces of styrofoam cleaned up. If you have animals, you definitely want to make sure none of these bits ends up where they could consume them, as the ingested styro could block their intestines and potentially harm or kill the animal.
As to the design and construction of the cabinet itself, surprisingly, the exterior rigidity of the cabinet comes primarily from the glass sides and rear. Those four black wooden struts you see in the stock photo are primarily there to hold the shelf clips, and provide only minor structural support.
About those struts: There is a recessed metal insert in each end which is threaded for included allen-headed screws. These became a major problem: As the screws were tightened, several of the inserts began to back themselves out of the strut end. We had to carefully thread the inserts back into the strut after coating the exterior of each with Gorilla Glue to anchor them (WARNING: you DO NOT want to get any glue inside the insert itself). Also, on two ends, the wood had not been drilled deep enough for the screw length, so we had to drill those out AFTER the insert was reinserted and the glue had dried, carefully making sure the drill bit did not ruin the inner threads of the insert. This was NOT fun.
The struts themselves want to turn off-center as the screws on both the top and bottom plate are tightened. We had to use a paper notepad, inserted between the glass and the strut, to keep the strut in the correct orientation during this part of the assembly.
Once we got past those obstacles, it was time to insert the glass. The instructions sequence is the rear panel first, which is inserted in a groove in the base, then the installation of two plastic pieces (that run hte entire length of the glass) that have channels for both the rear glass panels and the sides. This was pretty nerve wracking, as the glass is not only difficult to get into the groove in the plastic, it made a continual snapping noise that sounded like the glass was cracking. Getting the plastic channel to seat on the glass edge was NOT easy.
After this comes the installation of the shelf clips. The clips themselves are made of a soft rubbery plastic material that are a molded single unit combination of a barrel and suction cup, and a 2 screw which inserts in the barrel and then is screwed into metal threaded inserts in the struts. Caution needs to be observed when tightening each shelf clip, because the soft plastic will compress and possibly crack/break if over-tightened. It is also not exactly easy to operate a screwdriver on each of these, as they are nearly up against the glass. You want to put a towel in the bottom of the case while youre doing this, because if you slip and drop the screwdriver, youre going to most likely going visibly gouge/damage the finish.
Again, surprisingly, the shelves themselves float independently inside the cabinet entirely on the suction cups, and provide no additional structural support to the cabinet itself.
The door installation was pretty straghtforward. Start (from unpacking) to finish (doors on and glass wiped down from installation fingerprints), it took us around 3 hours, due to all the above-described custom fixes we had to engineer. Weve given this unit a four-star rating, but if half stars were possible, wed give it 3-1/2: It was definitely a more difficult and trying assembly than we would have liked.
A final word: This unit sat in my Wishlist for several months while I monitored the price. It ranged from low 300s to $245, then suddenly, for just a few days in July 15, ROG listed it for the $199 price. As of this writing, ROG doesnt have any listed, and the price has risen back to $245. So, you may want to be patient, drop this into your Wishlist and monitor it. After everything we went thru to assemble this thing, if we had overpaid $50 -$100 for it, wed REALLY be unhappy. As is, were semi-OK with the entire transaction and the finished product.
Purchased from Seller River Oak Group for $199
After sitting on the fence for several months with this item in my Wishlist, an Seller called River Oak Group listed this cabinet for the lowest price I had seen, $199 shipped. With some trepidation over the transit of a 115lb. package consisting primarily of glass from Florida to Los Angeles, I pulled the trigger. There was also a post-sale issue which ROG responded to quickly and professionally, so kudos to them. The cabinet arrived via UPS glass-intact, which is a minor miracle, considering UPS is a BRUTAL environment for any package. Ironically, by a label on the bottom of this unit, the U.S. distributor for this Taiwanese-built cabinet is only 40 miles away from us, but ROG is in Florida, so the cabinet went all the way from California to Florida to ROG, then all the way BACK again to us. The global economy, sigh. The following is our experience in unpacking and assembling this cabinet. We offer it as some dos, definitely some donts, and some off-the-cuff ideas for getting this thing assembled and installed in your home. First of all, you ABSOLUTELY, POSITIVELY, do not want to open this package inside your house. There was a mountain of of styro-detritus inside this package which came flying out once it was opened. We unpacked ours on our front porch (see photo), and had to use a Shop-Vac after we were done to get all the tiny bits and pieces of styrofoam cleaned up. If you have animals, you definitely want to make sure none of these bits ends up where they could consume them, as the ingested styro could block their intestines and potentially harm or kill the animal. As to the design and construction of the cabinet itself, surprisingly, the exterior rigidity of the cabinet comes primarily from the glass sides and rear. Those four black wooden struts you see in the stock photo are primarily there to hold the shelf clips, and provide only minor structural support. About those struts: There is a recessed metal insert in each end which is threaded for included allen-headed screws. These became a major problem: As the screws were tightened, several of the inserts began to back themselves out of the strut end. We had to carefully thread the inserts back into the strut after coating the exterior of each with Gorilla Glue to anchor them (WARNING: you DO NOT want to get any glue inside the insert itself). Also, on two ends, the wood had not been drilled deep enough for the screw length, so we had to drill those out AFTER the insert was reinserted and the glue had dried, carefully making sure the drill bit did not ruin the inner threads of the insert. This was NOT fun. The struts themselves want to turn off-center as the screws on both the top and bottom plate are tightened. We had to use a paper notepad, inserted between the glass and the strut, to keep the strut in the correct orientation during this part of the assembly. Once we got past those obstacles, it was time to insert the glass. The instructions sequence is the rear panel first, which is inserted in a groove in the base, then the installation of two plastic pieces (that run hte entire length of the glass) that have channels for both the rear glass panels and the sides. This was pretty nerve wracking, as the glass is not only difficult to get into the groove in the plastic, it made a continual snapping noise that sounded like the glass was cracking. Getting the plastic channel to seat on the glass edge was NOT easy. After this comes the installation of the shelf clips. The clips themselves are made of a soft rubbery plastic material that are a molded single unit combination of a barrel and suction cup, and a 2 screw which inserts in the barrel and then is screwed into metal threaded inserts in the struts. Caution needs to be observed when tightening each shelf clip, because the soft plastic will compress and possibly crack/break if over-tightened. It is also not exactly easy to operate a screwdriver on each of these, as they are nearly up against the glass. You want to put a towel in the bottom of the case while youre doing this, because if you slip and drop the screwdriver, youre going to most likely going visibly gouge/damage the finish. Again, surprisingly, the shelves themselves float independently inside the cabinet entirely on the suction cups, and provide no additional structural support to the cabinet itself. The door installation was pretty straghtforward. Start (from unpacking) to finish (doors on and glass wiped down from installation fingerprints), it took us around 3 hours, due to all the above-described custom fixes we had to engineer. Weve given this unit a four-star rating, but if half stars were possible, wed give it 3-1/2: It was definitely a more difficult and trying assembly than we would have liked. A final word: This unit sat in my Wishlist for several months while I monitored the price. It ranged from low 300s to $245, then suddenly, for just a few days in July 15, ROG listed it for the $199 price. As of this writing, ROG doesnt have any listed, and the price has risen back to $245. So, you may want to be patient, drop this into your Wishlist and monitor it. After everything we went thru to assemble this thing, if we had overpaid $50 -$100 for it, wed REALLY be unhappy. As is, were semi-OK with the entire transaction and the finished product.