Storage Bins
Just like in an airplane when you open the overhead bins after a flight and have to dodge the falling objects, we had the same problem with our ceiling cupboards. No matter how carefully we put the items in the cupboards, they'd always shift and want to fall out when you opened the doors.
To combat this, we decided to build some lightweight removable bins that we could put items in. We tried some store bought baskets, but they didn't allow us to see what was inside. And since we have a dozen or more cupboards, we could never remember what was in any particular basket. So we'd end up pulling down basket after basket trying to find what we wanted.
Solving this frustration was just a matter of building our bins with clear fronts so we could see at a glance what was where. We wanted the bins as light as possible, so we used 1/8" baltic birch plywood for the sides, and 3/8" for the floors. The corners were all reinforced with 1/4 round maple moulding. The fronts were made from 1/8" clear polycarbonate sheet. The wood was all varnished before we glued on the clear plastic fronts. Finally we put in tiny screws through the clear plastic, into the wood, to ensure nothing would pull apart when we lifted them out of the cupboards.
Inside the cupboards themselves, we glued in stops on either end of the cupboard to hold the bins from sliding side to side. The bins couldn't fill the whole side to side dimension because of the hardware that holds the doors in the up position when opened. These fold in alongside the inside panels of the cupboards.
