VHB found a home adhering zinc diecast logos and such to painted steel in automobiles. It typically eliminates at least two studs, with corresponding nuts and washers or pushons, and especially the punched holes that accumulate road salt that eventually breaches the paint and holes the panel.
I am aware of a very small sample of such logos that 'just fell off'. Given that the parent population is huge, the bond failure rate may be very low, but it is finite. And the applied load is almost vanishingly small.
I recall repairing or replacing some object having a structural VHB bond not long ago, but I'm not recalling what the object was. I do recall being surprised and disappointed that the object 'just fell apart'.
My oldest toolbox was made for the US Army some time prior to 1960, of thin steel, with some lockseam edges and very little welding. It has been repainted twice and is still in service. Given the quantity of hard steel that's been carried around in it over the decades, I'd have to assert that it has no non-structural parts.
IOW, IMHO, I wouldn't use VHB for a structural application at all, and I'd want to have a backup, like pop rivets or RTV, for a decorative application.
Let's guess for now that your toolbox is currently constructed with folds and corner welds.
To replace the welds with VHB, you have to add flanges to get enough bond area. You have to buy more metal to make the flanges, and worry about another set of tolerances for the bending operations, also added.
You also can't have a U-shaped part bonded on three/six edges, because you can't shear/slide the adhesive face during assembly. The face of the tape has to meet the metal in a normal direction, in the exact location it needs to be, exactly once. Then you have to apply a little pressure, again in the normal direction, to set the bond. That makes assembly of a box more complicated than it would be with, e.g., corner welds.
Given that you have to add operations and flanges to use VHB, it would be little more difficult to use lockseams instead, perhaps with some sealant.
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA