Sorry, this is a bit of a rant…

I had to assemble an IKEA flatpack cabinet today.

I always find this process painful because, to me, the instructions are always lacking (and a lot of other flatpack kits have followed IKEA’s trend of picture-only guides). How hard is it to put a name below each component on the parts page (so I know what this weird thing is when it appears on page 22!), or indicate what’s the top/front/back/etc.?

Today it would have been really helpful to know which edge was the top and front for the sides of this kit, rather than flipping back-and-forth through the manual to work it out. The irony is that they got so close to realising this was a factor, since the instructions did actually have two procedures (depending on whether your ceiling was high enough to stand the cabinet up after assembly or whether you needed to assemble it in-situ).

Is it just me and does everyone else just find it easy to follow the instructions, or do a lot of other people struggle with them too?

  • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish
    32·
    4 days ago

    I buy a lot of IKEA stuff for home and work. I have literally never had an assembly problem or alignment problem. Nothing ever cracked, and the furniture lasts forever.

    I hate to break this to you guys, but those pictogram instructions are designed for someone with a third grade education world wide.

    • Australis13@fedia.ioOP
      2·
      4 days ago

      Well, all I can say is that clearly there’s a subset of people that those pictograms don’t reliably work for. I am tertiary educated, so well beyond third grade!

      As for the products, I have not had issues with longevity - most of the kits are chipboard (particle board) and I have reasonable expectations for it (as long as you avoid moisture it can last ages).