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Welcome to the Bunnings Workshop community @WagwanDC. It's brilliant to have you join us, and many thanks for your question about creating an outdoor kitchen.
This is a really workable idea, and those trolleys make a good base for a budget-friendly outdoor kitchen, so you are definitely on the right track.
For the benchtop, you can place a new top directly over the existing stainless steel surface as long as it is flat and secure. You do not need a full substrate underneath it. The usual approach is to thoroughly clean and degrease the stainless, lightly scuff it with fine sandpaper, then bond the new benchtop down using a high quality construction adhesive or polyurethane adhesive. This allows for a small amount of movement and avoids drilling into the trolley. For stone, you will need to keep the thickness modest to avoid excessive weight, while for an outdoor-rated laminate or compact laminate, it is even more forgiving and lighter, which suits these cabinets well. There is no real benefit in adding a sheet material in between unless the stainless top is uneven, which it generally is not.
For joining two units in an L shape, the simplest and cleanest solution is to push the cabinets together so their sides meet neatly at the corner rather than overlapping one in front of the other. That way, no drawers or doors are lost. The gap that forms behind them in the internal corner can be hidden by extending the benchtops so they meet over the corner, effectively bridging that void. This is very common in kitchens and works well visually, especially if you choose a timber top that can be scribed or mitred neatly. Internally, you do lose a small dead corner, but externally, the kitchen looks continuous and intentional. Remember that the benchtops will need to be supported in the corner, and this can be done by mounting brackets or a timber plate to the wall.
As for removing the wheels, yes, this is quite doable. Most of these trolleys use threaded castors, so once you remove them, you can usually replace them with adjustable furniture legs or cabinet legs with the same thread size. We do carry adjustable cabinet legs that can work for this, although you may need to check the thread diameter to get a perfect match. Another common option is to build a simple treated pine or composite plinth that the cabinets sit on, which gives a more built-in look and keeps everything level on an alfresco slab.
Overall, with timber tops, fixed legs or a plinth, and careful placement in the corner, you can make these units look far more like a permanent outdoor kitchen rather than mobile trolleys, without blowing the budget.
Here's an AI-created image to give you an idea of what it could look like.
Please let me know if you have any questions.
Mitchell
