4-Day Weekender - Toddler bed!

[KCStudly]

Nice job getting through at the end and making the trip! It looks like all of your hard work has paid off in a successful first outing.

Makes me slightly jealous, but in a good way. (Some day in the not too distant future I hope to have a similar experience!)

[Gunguy05]

I will have to admit, I have been following your build off and on for a while (since before I started mine) and I wasn't a fan of the weekender design (I'm more of a curves guy ).

BUT

You have made it look outstanding. I especially like the color scheme/design. It really complements the squareness of the camper well. I think it looks awesome!
Great work and congrats on the first trip out!

[Kharn]

I took it easy and did a few minor things today.
The garage now has the proper outlets installed, so I can charge the trailer at home.

I put in the sliding door tracks over the foot of the bed, I used 3/4" brads and a nail punch which worked much better than countersinking and using #6 screws like I did in the galley. I would've loved to use my brad nailer, but the head was just too large to fit into the space. I also need to get some 1/2" brads (didn't see any at the store last week) so I can put the tracks on the headboard shelves. I also need to order a new section of track, when I was cutting the last segment of track for the headboard, I must not have had a good grip on it because the miter saw grabbed it and smashed it up pretty well.

20141025 foot doors small.jpg (90.16 KiB) Viewed 2885 times

I drilled the finger holes after taking the pic, I'll varnish them together with the headboard doors after I put their track in and make sure they fit properly.

I shaved the lower headboard doors down, two by 1/16" and one by 1/8", that should eliminate the rubbing problem I had when I tried to install them the other week. I'll paint the cuts tomorrow and install them this week.

I also put on the second side table, the surface of the cooktop is 38" above the ground, exactly the same as the top of our gas stove at home so my wife's super happy.

20141025 oven table small.jpg (170.71 KiB) Viewed 2885 times

[Kharn]

Just a few minor things, I put the upper and lower headboard doors in, except one set of the sliding doors where I'm waiting for a new section of track thanks to the miter saw destroying the last piece...

20141102 lower doors small.jpg (89.27 KiB) Viewed 2819 times

20141102 upper sliders small.jpg (104.85 KiB) Viewed 2819 times

I used little brass double ball catches for the lower doors, and plan to add them to the sliding doors if they work themselves open or out of their tracks while driving, but I ran into a problem because the catches have extremely low tolerance for misalignment. Even 1/16" is too much out of position for them to work correctly, so fitting them was a gigantic chore and the middle door's catch is still misbehaving.

I also added drawer pulls and the bottle opener to the galley.

20141102 galley handles small.jpg (165.14 KiB) Viewed 2819 times

I'm going to use the plastic bin for our dry food, I'll just add some wood reinforcement inside it so the footman loops won't destroy the plastic and some padding underneath so it won't scratch the countertop. I also have hooks to add to the underside of the hatch for dish towels to dry on, I need to find a quality under-cabinet paper towel dispenser to put up there as well, I'm thinking drilling each side of the dispenser and wrapping a small bungee cord around the roll while we drive will keep it from unrolling.

[Glenn Butcher]

It turned out really nice. May it bring you and yours some great camping...

[Kharn]

So we finally made it out to our first trip in the rain and third trip with the camper since Oct '14 thanks to weather, tow vehicle problems, school, etc, getting in the way of other trips.

Turns I forgot to caulk the rear of the hurricane hinges on the tongue box and AC door, so water was sneaking in between the body and the hinge. Luckily I checked the tongue box in the middle of the night and sponged out the 1/4" of water before it could reach anything important. I definitely need to look at moving the bus bars on to some 3/4"+ material so if it happens again we won't get a short. The galley stayed perfectly dry, to my surprise.

Next big project is getting the bunk hardware installed, since we now have a 9 month old baby and the weather will be warm enough to bring her along on our next trip.

Trap Pond 20160320.jpg (123.23 KiB) Viewed 2384 times

[Ned B]

Just read through your entire build this morning, great job of both building & documenting it!

[Kharn]

Our last camping trip was a bit interesting, luckily it was very close to home because I hit a gigantic pothole while pulling into our local gas station (I was looking in the rear view mirror making sure I wasn't rubbing the trailer tires on the curb) that knocked the hell out of my truck's alignment so we wobbled the ~10 miles to the camp site. And then, on the way home, something in the hitch didn't clamp correctly to the ball because when we hit the strategically placed speed bumps exiting the park, the hitch popped off the ball, it also turned out my chains were a bit too long because the tongue hit the pavement. It was super fun to lift the tongue back up off the ground, I normally wheel it around using the tongue jack and crank it into position rather than lifting it so I'd never realized how heavy it was. So I've got a few things to triple check and adjust before we head out again.

The weather is looking great for our camping trip next weekend with the TearJerkers that I shouldn't have any problem convincing my wife to bring our daughter along (now 15 months) instead of leaving her with grandparents. So here's what I came up with for her to sleep in:

Toddler mounts

20161006 mounts small.jpg (250.59 KiB) Viewed 2111 times

Bed closed

20161006 bed closed small.jpg (376.5 KiB) Viewed 2111 times

Bed open

20164006 bed open small.jpg (357.38 KiB) Viewed 2111 times

I dado'ed the T-track into the support boards, very, very carefully made the pilot holes and countersinks for the support screws (1 1/4" #8 deck screws, using a Rockler 38068 bit) and T-track screws (7/8" #8 stainless I had lying around). Lots of while drilling and worry that I'd punch through the exterior skin. Center to center on the poles when open is 19", I went cheap and bought a single piece of 48" T-track to cut in half when I should have gotten two 36" so the track could go all the way to the door. The bed material is a simple sleeve of 12oz denim with 5 tracks of upholstery thread holding the seam together. The rod hardware is just metal closet rod fittings and two closet rod dowels. Careful use of a non-marking mallet was needed to get the T-track into the painted dados.

There's more than enough room for our feet, legs and hips underneath as is, but collapsing it makes getting into the foot cabinets much easier. I'll cut the extra thread off the T-bolts before we head out, and hopefully I can coax our daughter into napping in there tomorrow to make sure she likes it. The only problem I have now is when I clamp the moving plates to the wall plates, it peels a bit of the paint off the back of the moving plates. Maybe I'll put some white masking tape on the back? Blue painter's tape stains if you rub it.

[Kharn]

And here's our first test, daycare moved her from a crib to a cot for naps, so she should be right at home.

Looking for trouble

20161007 cabinets small.jpg (327.98 KiB) Viewed 2084 times

She's not as confident as I am about the hardware.

"I hope you know what you're doing..."

20161007 you sure small.jpg (339.71 KiB) Viewed 2084 times

The nightlight (off in the pictures) is a bit strong, it may need a bit of wax paper or contact paper on the lens to mute it.

[KCStudly]

Search for "lighting gels".

[Kharn]

Our first trip with the toddler was a success, first night was a bit rough as we arrived 2 hours after her bedtime and she slept the entire ~4 hour journey, so she was wide awake and refused to stay in her bed. She announced that it was time to wake up the next morning by climbing off of the bunk and diving onto my stomach. Second night went much better, she was ok with going into bed and fell right asleep. The outside light coming through the vent and window shades was enough for her to not freak out, while also letting us get some sleep.

I made some portable patios out of five-quarter deck boards, just 18x18" to put outside the tear next to our step stools, they made it much nicer to put shoes on without standing in the dirt/mud. They're made from three 18" pieces on top, two perpendicular on the bottom, so each was easily made from an 8' board.

I have to remake one of the sliding doors for the galley, it has begun to bow significantly and is rubbing to the point of sticking in the track.

Other to-do items include:
Installing flip-out exterior door hooks (bought them years ago, just never installed...),
Slow the Fantastic fan via resistors,
Add a paper towel holder to the galley hatch,
Come up with some sort of pocketed organizer to hang on the walls between the doors and front cabinets for our cellphones, glasses, chap-stick, keys, watches, etc, so we're not blindly groping around on the shelves for those items and making a ton of noise in the middle of the night. I think that sewing something out of the excess bunk denim and stiffening it with a piece of cardboard inside is the way I'll go, I couldn't find anything close to my intended size/features on Amazon.

[tony.latham]

Great job on everything but specifically the toddler bed!

I think it's extra cool you're taking that character camping at this point in her life.

Tony