building Plan B....

[mike_c]

Good to see you back "at it". The headboard/closet thingy is beautiful! You do very nice work sir!

Thank you-- it's a learning experience! Hey, is that a long pull out drawer in the design you posted (part of your sig, I think), or does it hang from the outside of the trailer? We're thinking about an external chuck box for the stove and some additional space, mainly because I moved the rear bulkhead back nearly a foot-- I'm tall and don't like to sleep scrunched up-- and didn't leave enough room to install the Camp Chef in the galley. But since our TV is a Ford Ranger, there's room in the back for the stove, and a chuck box will both store it and create a stand to set it up on. But outside the galley proper, similar to your design.

--Mike C.

[mike_c]

Two build updates in one week! Woohoo!

Aside from the obvious narcissism, one of my main motives for posting this build journal is to encourage others to take the leap and start their own projects, whether it's building a trailer or doing something else entirely. I had very little experience with woodworking and building, and none at all with welding, wiring, and etc when I began this project. I had only a few rudimentary hand tools and no place to do the work except my backyard. The first things I had to do to start this build were to assemble sawhorses and work tables, as there were none initially. The photos others posted of their builds convinced me that I could do it. I've made lots of mistakes-- and spent lots of time correcting them-- but if I can do this anyone can. It is very satisfying. If you're hesitating to begin your own build because you doubt your ability to do the work well, I hope this journal and the others here can convince you to begin making sawdust fly!

I made some clamping squares-- I've needed these for a long time, finally got around to making some. All the blue tape is to make cleaning up the glue squeeze out easier.




You can see some of the completed squares on the left. These are the handiest things imaginable.




Cutting half inch baltic birch plywood for cabinet boxes and making lots of pocket holes in them:






Building the upper galley cabinet boxes. These are just butt joints held with Tightbond III and pocket screws-- I'll add a 1/4" back panel to help keep it all rigid, and glue/screw it to the back bulkhead and the galley sides. Look at those clamping squares in action!





Laying out the galley cabinets and stuff at the end of the day, with the glorious northern California summer sun streaming through the backyard. MUST. REMEMBER. DRAWER-PULLS!!!




That's all for today!

--Mike C.

[pjo129]

Nice work.

Thanks for posting the step-by-step on the cabinets and the clamping squares. That's gonna be helpful if I ever get started on my trailer.

[mike_c]

It's just about one year since we started this project, i.e. last June I started ordering tools and stuff. I didn't actually start making sparks and sawdust until early July, if I recall correctly. We were ambitious. We made plans for autumn camping in the teardrop, LOL. Last autumn!

So incremental progress continues to be made. I made reading lights, and painted them blue. Ultramarine blue, beautiful and deep. It's very transparent however, so you need lots of layers-- most of the blue trim I'm making gets several coats of white primer-- as many as it takes to build a thick, smooth surface-- then five or six coats of ultramarine blue. It's artist's acrylic, mixed with matte medium and thinned with water, so I can get two or three coats on each day, but it's still slow going. I'm using this color on the cabinet turnbuckles and most other trim, too. The reading lights are fixed, not adjustable, but they project over our shoulders like the lights on airplanes, and they're quite bright. Wiring these, I learned that polarity counts with LEDs-- you can't just stick them in series willynilly like incandescent bulbs. Who knew? Much grumbling and rewiring occurred.








Work continued on the galley.




Earlier I complained that the JET cheapo combo jointer/planer I bought was more aggravation than it was worth, but noted that I did make some nice drawer fronts with it. I needed some 1/4 in. cherry slats for the galley, and the JET did a great job on them. This was the second job I used the JET on. Here's the pics, but don't be fooled into thinking this is a worthwhile machine.





Looks good, huh? I thought so too, but the THIRD time I used it some chip accumulation on the planer bed caused one of the bolts used to secure the dust collector nozzle to push upward INTO THE ROTATING KNIVES, shearing a quarter inch from the bolt and trashing the knives, which will need to be replaced before the fourth time this machine gets used. I think it has a date with Craigslist. Admittedly, the user's manual does caution against allowing any chips to accumulate there, but every user's manual contains similar cautions. I would never have guessed that those bolts are unsecured just millimeters from the rotating cutters, and a quarter inch of sawdust and shavings would push them into the knives. Who would design a machine in which such a thing could happen?

We taped the trailer up and CPES'd it with magic anti-moisture juju. It took a gallon of CPES and some other fluids to complete the job. Man I'm glad I did this outdoors!






When the solvent smell was mostly dissipated I followed the CPES with oil-based primer in the galley. Eventually there will be some other color on those walls, but now it's primer white.




Gluing the face frame on a galley cabinet on the last drizzly day of the year (knock on wood!). I had to move it inside on the floor and off the deck.




Kathy padded two coats of polyurethane spar varnish over all the interior surfaces, which had all been finished but buffed dull in preparation for a final finish.






I built a thingy for the galley. I really have some purpose envisioned for this thing, like holding spices and long handled implements in the galley, but it will likely be repurposed as the Tequila Shrine. Kathy made only one single design demand-- the teardrop trailer must have a place to carry a bottle of fine tequila, for emergencies or breakfast as the case may be. Breakfast tequila is a fine camping tradition. You don't want to do it all day, but nothing gets you out of bed like a hot cup of coffee and a shot of tequila. Anyway, what follows is a bunch of construction pics. I had a lot of fun building this thing. The basic structure is half inch baltic birch ply, the face pieces are maple, and the slats for keeping stuff on the shelves are cherry, cut from the heartwood/sapwood transition, a piece that would ordinarily have a hard time finding a use. I think it works nicely here.

Dry fitting:




Gluing and such:














Tired of that yet? Don't worry, you'll see it some more.

Futzing with the galley layout-- oops, need some more primer behind those open bins! I finally got the draw pulls installed!




Attaching the lower tier of drawers, for good or worse-- these have laminate on top:




Working on the rest of the galley components:

















I've made more progress this last week, but Kathy's visiting grandkids in Texas and has the camera, so more pics will have to wait for the next update.

It's proving quite a challenge to find outer skin material locally. That's the next big hurdle! Thanks for watching!

--Mike C.

[Forrest747]

I am so jealous of your cabinets. Love the work

[Oldragbaggers]

We were ambitious. We made plans for autumn camping in the teardrop, LOL. Last autumn!

The best laid plans, huh???

That's really some galley you've got there!! Very very nice! You're giving me galley envy.

And your interior cabinets are absolutely gorgeous. You say you had little experience with woodworking when you started. That is so hard to believe. Those cabinets look professional.

[mike_c]

I am so jealous of your cabinets. Love the work

Thanks! I'm just about ready to trade good looks for speed though. There is some irony in the fact that we're having a beautiful summer here this year and I'm spending my days building a camper rather than camping. We made the decision early on to put lots of time and effort into the woodwork because Kathy and I hope to be looking at those cabinets for a long time!

[mike_c]

You say you had little experience with woodworking when you started. That is so hard to believe. Those cabinets look professional.

Thanks! I built a bookcase thirty years ago. Other than some small carpentry projects around the house, that's pretty much the extent of my woodworking and building experience prior to beginning this project. I can see great improvement over the length of time it's taken-- and all the learning is part of why it's taken so long--but that's actually a source of anxiety. I REALLY wish I could do the first bits over again, including the steel work, because I've become so much more careful and aware of what I'm doing now. I'm a bit worried about the quality of my early work on the trailer-- but I over built everything, so here's hoping nothing falls off on the highway!

One thing about the cabinets (and everything else)-- they were built in my backyard, mostly during winter, using just a couple of big-box-store quality (i.e. low end) power tools. I think they look impressive because they're hand made-- they're certainly not professional in any sense. And wayyyyyyy too slow!

[KCStudly]

You're just being modest. Those inside cabinets are really beautiful, not just because of the straight lines and apparent good fit, but because of the woods and stain combination you chose. That takes a certain skilled eye to pull off right and achieve "that special something". You can put up as many pictures of those as you want. I will not get tired of seeing them.

re: Tequila and coffee for breakfast. That's an old Poet Creek tradition that will be resurrected. Pour a little tequila in the morning coffee and call it a tequila sunrise! A toast to my father.

[mike_c]

You're just being modest. Those inside cabinets are really beautiful, not just because of the straight lines and apparent good fit, but because of the woods and stain combination you chose.

Regarding those straight lines and good fit, one of the lessons I've learned during this build is to use the ruler SPARINGLY, mainly just to establish the more-or-less correct sizes of whole objects, e.g. the galley cabinets are 56 inches wide and 13 inches deep. But to actually cut most of the parts, I've learned to ditch the ruler and cut pieces to fit instead of to measure. I spend a LOT less time redoing things now because I mark and cut pieces to fit exactly where they're supposed to fit, with a knife instead of a pencil if the fit is critical (i.e. visible), and don't have the slightest clue what their exact measurements are.

When I started this project I was a slave to measurement, measuring everything over and over, then wondering why the pieces were always just a hair too long or two short.

Second lesson-- NEVER EVER accept the angles and lengths marked on contractor grade power tools, like table saws, or the factory settings on built-in stops. Get a big 45/45/90 deg. drafting triangle and use it EVERY TIME you change any setting on the tools-- this is especially necessary if you have only one table saw, one chopsaw, etc because you're changing saw blades and tool settings, moving the fence, and so on all day long. I didn't cut anything really square until I figured that out, and had a hell of a time getting pieces to join correctly. On the table saw I run the blade up as high as it will go, then stick a couple of magnets-- both the same thickness-- on the blade to clear the set of the carbide teeth and lay my triangle against them. Align the magnets vertically to check against the table top for tilt, and horizontally to check against the miter gauge for square cuts.

So make certain that you cut the angles you think you're cutting, and cut pieces to fit rather than to measure. That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

--Mike C.

[KCStudly]

Yeah, I check stuff when I change setups, too, but the trick with the magnets is a good one that I had not heard before. Cool.

On the table saw at work what I do is cut a miter at the angle I want on the trusted chop saw and use that angle block to adjust the table saw angle. I just put it up against the saw teeth and sight the gap between it and the rest of the blade, making sure that the gap is consistent. It has worked pretty well so far.

I'm enjoying your build.

[Oldragbaggers]

Lots of good suggestions for cabinet building here. I love how we all learn from each other. I love this forum!!

[mike_c]

Update! Sawdust flies!

We bought some nice 14" x 21" camper windows, one for each door, with built in screens. They're dark tinted so we'll look mysterious, LOL. Haven't started on the doors yet-- I learned my lesson building multiple sets of drawers-- when something has to fit inside of something else, and I want it to fit well (like a door in its frame), wait until the first item is finished before building the thing that fits inside it. In this case I'm waiting until the aluminum skin is on and the door frame trimmed out before I make the doors. But the windows are sitting on the back porch waiting. Shoutout to vintek1958 on Ebay for the windows and hinge-- great service and quick delivery!

Last week I got a chunk of work done on the galley woodwork. I painted the galley walls a beautiful deep transparent blue-- it took six coats to build an even color. The paint is acrylic latex exterior paint over a couple coats of oil based primer, which itself was applied over the curing CPES. It's blue:




I finished work on the bins that will sit on that top galley shelf, below where the wires emerge from the rear bulkhead. The box and face frame was already assembled, so I cut and dry fitted the pieces that go on top and the bin doors:






Gluing it all up:






And here it is finished with three coats of exterior polyurethane spar varnish, with door hardware and turnbuckles installed. Sure makes those sawhorses look good! I worried endlessly about mounting those doors hanging from their hinges-- every bump and jolt will work on pulling the threads loose from the face frame and from the doors themselves. I replaced the half inch screws that came with the hinges with 1 1/4" screws driven deep into the face frame above, and used every mounting hole each hinge provides to add as many attachment screws as possible. Still, I'm gonna keep a close eye on those doors and their hinges. Since this piece will mount onto that rear bulkhead shelf, I'll install LED puck lights on the inside of the bin doors, which will provide spot light on the galley counter top when open horizontally. I'll use simple wooden braces to hold each door horizontal when we want it that way.




Installing it all in the galley, from the bottom up:








Still needs that last drawer front on the left, some trim molding, and the lighting. Couple of very minor paint touch ups to fix a tiny scuff we made sliding in the wood work-- we lined everything with waxed paper before sliding it in, then pulled out the paper before seating the box in construction adhesive and running in the attachment screws. It will NOT be coming out again.

We made some fundamental decisions about the galley early on. First, there isn't any dedicated storage for the Camp Chef, which is just too big and unwieldy to store in the galley-- keeping it there would have dictated a very narrow approach to designing the galley, with little room for counter space and much less storage. AND the high chassis clearance puts the galley floor so high that the stove top on the Camp Chef is inconveniently high. So the Camp Chef goes in a chuck box in the back of the tow vehicle, a compact pickup-- and the chuck box will open to create a regular height support for the stove/oven and a place for the propane tank that powers it. Ditto for the cooler-- it too will ride in the truck bed. There is plenty of room under the galley to store it in the shade while in camp. We also opted for external water storage rather than a built in tank-- that's what those extension wings on either side of the galley are for.

My battered old Coleman white gas camp stove fits nicely in the top middle storage bin however, and it sets up on the galley counter, so that's always an option when I don't want to pack the Camp Chef. And without building in the stove or cooler storage, the galley has tons of storage for other stuff in drawers and bins. Both the counter top and the top of the leftmost drawer cabinet are covered with plastic laminate.




Here is a pic with the turnbuckles turned horizontally to travel position:




That's it for today. Still to be done in the galley: that missing drawer front, the LED puck lighting, some trim molding to cover the, um, stuff that needs to be covered, LOL, some wiring, something to cover that blue floor-- I'm worried about the paint's durability in that application-- and of course, the hatch. I think I'll start the hatch in the next few days.

Oh, and our aluminum supplier moved up the arrival date on our order of 5 ft x 10 ft sheets of 0.040 aluminum for the siding, so we MIGHT have that in hand by sometime next week!

Thanks for watching!

--Mike C.

[KCStudly]

WOW! Your cabinet building skills continue to impress! I don't care if this is your first cabinet project. You have got it licked!

The dramatic grain contrast on your drawer fronts is fabulous!

The royal blue works.

I designed my galley to "Get 'er done" with generic spacing for the upper shelves and may regret that latter (being a Foamie means that the blocking must be well thought out in the beginning).

I'm impressed. Good job. Every day I thank my lucky stars that I have a superior location to do my build, and yet you are turning out a stellar job from a tent. You, sir, deserve special recognition.

[mike_c]

WOW! Your cabinet building skills continue to impress! I don't care if this is your first cabinet project. You have got it licked!

The dramatic grain contrast on your drawer fronts is fabulous!

The royal blue works.

I designed my galley to "Get 'er done" with generic spacing for the upper shelves and may regret that latter (being a Foamie means that the blocking must be well thought out in the beginning).

I'm impressed. Good job. Every day I thank my lucky stars that I have a superior location to do my build, and yet you are turning out a stellar job from a tent. You, sir, deserve special recognition.

Thanks! It's been a lot of fun.

Yeah, "git 'er done," I completely get it. I think if I ever do this again there will be substantial streamlining. In fact, if I ever do this again that will likely be part of the goal. Like I said earlier, the irony of spending my summer working on a camper instead of camping is not lost on me. But this feels like the right way to build it.

As for the dramatic grain contrast on the drawer fronts, I can't take credit for that-- they're gifts from the tree!

Best,
Mike C.