Rant: the pocket screw jig crowd never learns to cut a real joint
I have been building face frames in my shop outside of Dayton for 22 years, and last month I had a kid fresh out of a woodworking program show me his "frameless" cabinet build where every joint was a pocket screw and glue, no mortise and tenon anywhere. He asked me why I still bother cutting real joinery when a $40 jig does the same thing in half the time, and I told him to come back in 5 years when those frames start racking under the weight of a granite countertop. Am I the only one who thinks we traded lasting work for speed and nobody wants to admit it?
Pocket screws have been around for decades and plenty of those old shop cabinets are still holding up fine. Granite on a face frame is a whole different story though, that is real weight and the screws can pull. But a lot of the racking talk comes down to how the cabinet gets tied to the wall and the box, not just the frame joints. A kid with a jig and no clue will build a bad cabinet either way, same as a guy with a dovetail saw and no clue. Five years from now half those pocket screw builds will be fine and the other half would have failed with any joint.