The Poet Creek Express - Foamie Hybrid

[Wolffarmer]

Mastering the hand plane is like this. Wax on, Wax off.

First part is getting the blade scary sharp. I am almost to scary sharp. While I won't brag about being able to shave hair off my arms. I can cut a lot of hair. Just not quit there yet. You can buy very expensive planes that are ready to go out of the box. Those only cost about $300 and up way way up. I have seen some that cost $7000 and he can't make them fast enough. Or for what looks like what you will mostly be doing is get a cheapo, Even the Harbor Freight one will do. Sharp the blade correctly, flatten the sole of the plane and after about 2-3 hours of work have a plane that will probably do very good work for what you are doing right now.

I have a plane that cost me almost $300 brand new. I love it but in other sizes of planes I have cheapos, medium priced ones and used ones. After a bit of work on them they all are sweeties.

Oh, and if you buy a plane that less than $250 or so you have to sharpen it. that is just the way it is. The real perfectionists sharpen all new planes.

Randy

[KCStudly]

Thanks for the tips, Randy. I don't think that my interest in planes will ever run that deep or steep, but I don't mind dipping my toe into the shallow end of the pool.

I did sharpen the new chisel yesterday evening after using it to shave away some glue blobs and some of that junkie scarf joint. The two wedge shaped laps of the scarf did not mate well and left a small flap of very thin wood "flash" that had not joined properly. I trimmed away the loose stuff and chiseled some of the upper plys away into a trough to accept a bit of filler (which I will apply next time... pics next time, too).

I have a nice Norton double sided whetstone and have been sharpening my own knives and tools for years (something dad always did for himself), though I am by no means an expert. Most of my kitchen knives can easily slice paper cleanly, and I did manage to remove some hair off of the back of my hand with the chisel, but I wouldn't have called it a clean shave. Close enough for my little project, tho.

My wife was a hair dresser for many years before becoming an RD. You want to talk about sharpening skills? The professionals that came around to the salons in their vans to sharpen the girls scissors could teach us all a thing or two. Those scissors can run beau coup bucks and, man do they get them sharp. Mad skills.

The pamphlet that came with the el cheapo plane ($39) did suggest honing it out of the box, but I have not had it and my stone in the same place as of yet. The handle is already loose, same as my old Stanley's broken handle, and the leveling adjustment (the lever thing sets the blade angle... I'm sure that I am butchering the terminology here) seems to have a mind of its own, but the adjustment doesn't seem to change enough for me to notice it. Like you said, it's doing the jobs that I am asking of it, mostly well. I'll have to pay closer attention to the finer points as I get more familiar with it. We have a big reference surface stone at work that I could probably hone the shoe on, and I like to use the band saw table as a flat surface for quick hone jobs using 400 grit for things like my trusty putty knife/gasket scrapper, which I can make scary sharp (for a putty knife).

[GPW]

For even scarier Sharp, I use a paper wheel to mirror finish the edge after honing ... Shaves most anything ... Gotta’ be Careful , a touch is a cut

Ps. I use that on knives and broadheads too ...

[KCStudly]

Well, I had a "Sequence Error" with the HP software that works with my camera, and, unfortunately, I had the settings so that it would delete the pic's from the camera after download, so I think I know what the sequence error was. Lost about 20 pics.

I'll try to catch you up and see if I can get some similar pictures to replace them.

I think I mentioned that I had gouged out a trough where the bottom middle floor skin scarf joints didn't come out well. Then I sanded the trough out by hand to get rid of all of the splinters and unevenness. I had some Bondo on the shelf and I used that to fill in the trough.

Then I set up the router and started cutting the dado's for the door jamb corner blocks (that will get the door corner radii cut into them) into the wooden rails that will be glued to the bottom of the wall foam. Used the same setup to begin making rabbets in the vertical door jambs for the same blocks. Basically, the corner blocks are 2x4x4 (1-1/2 x 3-1/2 x 3-1/2) let into the wall sill rail and door jambs by 1/4 inch. The radii in the corners of the door opening are 3-1/4 and on the door they are 3 inch, giving a door to door opening gap of 1/4 inch. By recessing the corner blocks into the door jamb frame work the strength of the frame is increased and the radii will not come to a thin edge of the block, making it less likely to chip or splinter out.

I'm thinking that I will frame the wall with the door and jamb frames all built out using the corner blocks to hold all of the alignments, then use a router template to cut most of the way through the blocks, then apply the interior skin, then cut the doors free by jig sawing the skin, then route the skins flush to the door and jamb, then cover the other side with canvas. The canvas at the door opening can wrap all the way to the inside wall skin and then get captured by the inner door seal shims and door seal surround, but I'm not sure how I'm going to terminate the edge of the canvas on the door itself.

Yesterday I spent time after work detailing the bulkhead wall, and tonight I detailed all of the cabinet face frames (need to source that material).

The lumber yard came out to Mecca yesterday (?) and exchanged the 1/2" thk foam (it was nasty dirty like it had been left out on a job site in the mud) with the correct tongue and groove 3/4 inch stuff. Since they had to order in the 3/4 inch thk stuff, it was nice and clean.

Tonight I also ripped a piece 3-1/2 inches wide off of the big drop of 2x10 cedar that I had left, and cross cut the eight door corner blocks, Then I ripped two lengths of 1x2 to add centerline blocking to the bulkhead, making up for the decision not to use scarfed joints on the panel skins (the rest of the bulkhead sub frame members were pre-cut in the Rover Mike list).

Then I did a dry fit layout of the bulkhead frame work, and marked all of the joint edges (to aid in alignment at glue up) and the biscuit center lines. Cut all of the biscuit slots, drilled all of the pilot holes for my spring clamp screw technique, then started at the center and worked my way out a few sticks, working towards one of the side stiles. The problem I ran into using the screw/spring clamp technique is that you need access to both sides of the glue up. If you try to lay it flat on the table and just clamp one side, it pinches the near side together and rolls the two pieces toward each other opening a gap on the far side.

Also, working with the 3/4 inch thk 1x stock in the flat, I used one longer screw going all the way thru the board, with the head sticking up on one side and the tip sticking out on the other, rather than a screw on each side.

I got the center piece and a few of the cross pieces glued up and will get more pics tomorrow. I am hopeful that now that I have it partially glued I may be able to do the rest flat on the bench. I have some pipe clamps that might be long enough to go from top to bottom, so will bring those to Mecca with me as well.

I'm sure I am forgetting some things due to the loss of the pic's, as those usually help jog my memory while composing. Oh well.

The build marches on. The shear number of hours are starting to take their toll on me, but I need to stay focused and keep building... need to keep that vicious "teardrop time" at bay.

[mike_c]

Dude, I officially have shop envy now! Wow! Great build though-- I can't wait to see the walls go up. Exhaustingly documented-- I just spent a very entertaining couple of hours reading through from the beginning. Figuring out how to make things is one of life's greatest pleasures. Learning to make them well is one of the most satisfying things ever. One of the things I really like about forums like this is the concentration of folks who understand that and revel in it.

Sometimes I think it'll be hard to go back to camping rather than building the camper, which has been such a great source of fun. Not for long though.

Looking forward to your next installment!

--Mike C.

[KCStudly]

Well a hardy 'thank you' to you, Mike_C and I'm pleased that you have enjoyed reading my build.

Karl sharing his shop has been a godsend. There is no way I can thank him enough. No truer friend.

Exhausting is an understatement. Between my regular day job, about 30-32 hrs/week working on TPCE, and trying to keep up with the forum, I'm falling behind on the updates. Started drafting my next entry yesterday and should finish up later tonight after the drags are over. Nitro Rules! Pop.

The bulkhead is all framed, foam fit, and cabin skin glued up. Stay tuned, lots more pictures and narration to come.

[KCStudly]

Yahoo! When I went to download Saturdays photos, Friday's lost pic's miraculously appeared! Yippee!

So this may get a little disjointed as I will attempt to retell the story with pic's, plus I took new photos to fill in the blanks, so they might seem a little out of order. Not to mention that I completed the dado and rabbeting of the wall door frames today, so those will be in order of task done.

Karl had jumped in and rough trimmed the floor bottom skins using his cordless Makita panel saw. So when I was ready to trim the top skins he jumped in again. This time he went around and traced a reference line equal to the thickness of a carpenters pencil. He indicated that having the line would give him more confidence to hold the line and less concern about accidentally under cutting the floor proper.


Sawdust, ya think?

Note Karl's full face safety shield/respirator. He learned long ago that metal work is bad for you. PPE, just wear it!

Here's a closer look at the pencil mark. Again, the top skin is down so that the saw blade cuts up into the presentation side; less splintering that way.


Okay, here is the floor with the top skin rough cut and flipped up.


And a longer shot. I think it's time to clean the camera lens.


Next I routered the top floor skin flush to the outside of the floor frame (no pic).

Here's that nasty scarf lap on the bottom middle after I carved and chiseled away the loose flaps.


And here's a couple of close ups after sanding the roughness away.




Bondo (polyester body filler).


The dark rings around the mounting holes were caused by the wood glue dripping down through from the top skin and reacting with the steel table top. Should have put plastic down. I have also noticed that the cedar gets a blue haze or dye look when it reacts with the salt in my sweat (...not that I sweat much, not).

Here is the start of the galley bulkhead inner frame work (had a dry fit pic of the whole assembly somewhere, guess some pics are still missing).


Using my drywall screw and spring clamp method, rather than long pipe clamps, meant that it could not lay flat on the table. Fortunately everything was cut very square so with the biscuits it was self aligning. If you look closely you can see that I used a single drywall screw sticking out both sides of the hole, rather than trying to drill multiple holes, or trying to screw two screws into each side of the same hole.

While the glue was setting up I got some more pics of the door corner block dado's. Here are the long rails, or sill plates, that go at the bottom of the walls (standing up in a corner of the shop with some unrelated drip molding).




Here are the door headers (with dado's) and the door jambs (with rabbets).

The door surround frame is a little beefier stock at 1-1/2 x 2 inch actual, giving plenty of meat to support hinge and latch hardware.

Here are the door corner blocks.

Ben's table saw is a joy to use! (echo, echo, echo...)

Okay, here's the set-up for rabbeting the door jambs. The quick square is clamped on to guide the router shoe. The door headers are clamped to the table on the right hand side to provide something the same height and support the far side of the router shoe, and I used the utility knife to score the edges of the cut to minimize chip out.



I found that the cedar cuts so easy that I could make the 1/4 deep cut in one pass, no need to make a shallower first cut.


Since the cut was wider than the offset of the router shoe, I would stop short of completing the cut and add this little 1/4 inch spacer (taped down so that the wind from the router didn't blow it away on approach), allowing the router to bridge the gap without falling into the hole and making a big gouge (not gonna show you how I learned that).


And here is the result.


My cheap utility knife broke. The little nub that the blade hooks onto broke clean off of the thumb slider mechanism. Karl had one just like it, so I was able to continue (the long reach blade makes cutting foam possible, and makes it easy to reach in to cut biscuits sticking out, but that leverage is probably what broke it). I'll get another on my way to Mecca today.


There was sawdust involved.


Back to the bulkhead framework. Now it can lay on the bench and hang off for the clamps.



My overconfidence in being able to do the scarfing well led me to decide to make all of the bulkhead skin panels the same size; not planning for the seams to land on the planned xmbrs or studs. I wished I had thought that out a bit more and landed the seams on frame. I decided that, similar to the floor, I wanted to add more frame members for the panel butt joints to land on, so it appears that there is a lot more wood in there than you would think is needed. Ripped the added extra bits from the big hunk of drop cedar using Ben's table saw (that thing is sooooo sweet to use). Rest assured, the frame is super light weight.

The top header and bottom sill are the longest parts. The side stiles cap all of the xmbrs. Here are those dry fit pictures out of order. In the first pic the bottom is nearest.


In this overview the bottom is to the left.


The members running through the centers, the 'X', were added to support the panel seams. The two cripples in the lower section give the under counter dividers something to screw into. The lowest xmbr is for the counter support, and the uppers are for the galley shelves and inside cabinets.

So, like I said, I started gluing biscuits in the middle and worked my way out to one side. Then I kept adding xmbrs and center blocks until they were all in place and I could add the other side. When I test fit the other side the extra center piece (the one that I cut, not Rover Mike) was just a hair longer than the rest. Since that main part of the frame was still setting up, and trying to trim the long piece would upset the glue up, I chose to chisel a pinch of material from the mating area on the side stile.

Fit like a glove. Also note that I avoid setting the chisel on the steel table, so as to reduce the risk of dulling it.

The new biscuit slot gluer works a treat, is quicker, saves on glue and squeeze out. Just do it.


During periods of waiting for the next stage of glue up, I started cutting out foam. The 3/4 thk x 2 x 8 ft foam is thankfully 3/4 thk. It came as tongue and groove with a round tongue and groove. I started by using Karl's "utility knife" to trim off the rounded tongue.


Here is the finished bulkhead sub frame. You can also see the progress made on rough cutting the foam filler panels.


Wife came by to visit the kittens and snapped this cameo of me about to adjust my glasses (filler pic 'cuz my posts are too short as it is). Did I mention that it was humid again today?


When I got to the end of the sheet the last piece was just about right to fill in one of the voids, except it had the groove in it. Having never used Gorilla Glue (GG) I decided that this was a good place to experiment, so I fished the cut off tongue out of the trash and glued it into the groove using painter's tape to clamp it.



Worked really well.

I clamped the long sanding board that I made for leveling the floor foam to the bench and ran the foam panels over it a few strokes at a time to get the fit close, then fine tuned with my smaller block.



Foam fit exceptionally well using this method. Also note that I used a few smaller slivers to fill in the narrower slots, rather than resorting to using a second sheet of foam.


The camera makes it look curved, but it came out surprisingly square (within 1/32 on diagonals) without having to force anything.

At this point the whole assembly could easily be moved around and couldn't weigh 10 lbs (although I did not weigh it... it was feather light).

Here's what was left of the foam sheet. Pretty great yield.


The 3/4 thick foam cut with just two passes of the razor knife; long drawing slices with the blade extended out and at a very shallow angle.

Here I have used the same technique as on the floor and have set guide nails for the panel alignment using a string to find straight centerlines.


Also have already scratched up the surface of the foam using the sanding block.

Shop-vac is the right tool to use for cleaning up foam dust.

Here are some of those recovered pic's showing some more details on the door corner block dado's and rabbets. Scoring the edges of the cuts to prevent chip out.


At first I thought I would need to make a couple of passes, so these are shallower than the previous pic's.


Intermediate spacer helps bridge the gap.


This is either the door surround headers or the wall sill plates.


This might help explain the whole dado, rabbet, door corner block thing better; a couple of shots of the plans (macro setting on camera seems to be working better now).



That brings us to today, Sunday.

Started out by doing the masking thing to the bulkhead inner skin panels.


Laid down some plastic drop "cloth" to protect the bulkhead from staining and contamination from the steel bench. Also keeps glue off of the bench.


Got everything ready and laid out, then applied the 30NF adhesive.



Peeled the tape off of the backside where the wood glue will go.


Waiting for the adhesive to dry on the foam it was time to check on the kitties. Wood pile makes a great 'Kitty Condo'. High above any predators in a good defensive position.


At first they would climb in to the nooks and crannies of the pile and nest inside, but now they have found the top of the pile and seem to like it there better.

I've been calling this little guy 'Sport'.


This is Rocky. Yvette and I have pretty much decided that we will be taking him home with us when they are 9 weeks and have finished their run of med's. Rocky has three little white hairs over the corner of his right eye and a few little stray white hairs on his forearms.


This is 'The Girl' with white boots, bib and belly. Chris and Karl will likely be keeping her.

That's Rocky in the background.

The Girl, not too happy about the camera flash waking her up.


Kind of a big pile for these little kitties to be rough housing an top of.


Rocky being adorable.


Family photo.


The pictures do not do justice to just how entertaining it is to watch kittens being kittens.


Okay, back to work.

Here is a piece of scrap luan that I cut out a 3-1/2 x 3-1/2 square to act as a router template for gouging out the wall foam where each of the cabinet mounting blocks will be set in.

Just used a sturdy utility knife and metal straight edge to score it out. Touched it with the small 100 grit sanding block to remove any loose splinters.

Once the adhesive had dried on the bulkhead parts I started in gluing the frame and masked areas of the panel backs, then using the slat stickers to help align the panels against the alignment nails prior to sticking a brad in to lock it in place. Since I was working alone there aren't any pictures, but the process was the same as for the floor.

The bulkhead was the perfect size to allow me to clamp the bottom and both sides right to the edge of the bench. Along the top will be hidden by the inside cabinets so I used the brad nailer to fix that edge and down about half way along the upper middle seam. The rest was just weighted down to cure. I had originally thought that I would flip the extra plastic up over the skins before adding the weights, but some of the glue squeeze out dripped down the plastic, so I didn't do that. I just used scraps of cardboard to protect the skins from the grunge of the weights.




Whew. Now we're all caught up.

[Facemeltingly Epic]

Great progress so far!

As for the kitty pics, I know how much fun it is to have them around. I have two of them who are just shy of four months old. Monkey is the one on the left; the lynx-point kitten is Janis.



They also have two littermates who've gone to new homes - a black female named Licorice (that name came from her new people; I had originally named her Jimi) and an orange tabby male named Morrison.

[KCStudly]

Thanks FMEpic (Scot). I appreciate the kind words. Cute cats you have there, but aren't they all cute? My wife and I like to joke about the different adjectives that are synonymous with the word cat. Cute, silly, adorable, nutty, crazy, etc.

And now the news:
Monday after work I went out to Mecca and unloaded all of the weights and whatnot off of the bulkhead.

After peeling up the cardboard that had absorbed some of the glue squeeze out, carefully peeling up the masking tape, scraping glue squeeze out, hand sanding a bit with the small oak block/100 grit, and sanding with the palm sander, here is the inner bulkhead skin.

(Camera lens still has sawdust.)

Cleaned the camera lens, ran a carpenter's pencil around the frame and used the panel saw to rough trim the skin for routing.


Trimmed the skin flush with the router.

Used the small oak sanding block to clean up any spots where I had missed glue bumps etc. and trued the edges up. Just kissed the sharp edge a touch, without rounding it over, to knock off any splinters and prevent new ones from forming.

Used the new 1-1/4 dia rabbeting bit with the 7/8 bearing to step the sides 3/16 inch x 3/16 (5 mm) deep.



The rabbets will form a cabinet corner with the cabin wall skins. The wall templates are based on a 3/4 inch separation between the rear cabin skin and the galley side wall skin. This forms a dado for the bulkhead sub frame to let into and screw into blocking in the side walls using a Kregg from the galley side, and the rabbet in the inner bulkhead skin allows it to overlap the wall skins. The galley skins will be added later so as to cover the Kregg screw holes. My hope is to have a nice tight joint that does not require corner trim. If it doesn't work out so nicely I can always use a small 1/4 round trim.

Here I am test fitting a small scrap of the 5 mm ply. Looks pretty good, no?


The rabbeting bit worked so well I took a few extra pics.



Still thinking that you all don't have the time to read my long and arduously detailed posts. Or maybe you are having the same dilemma as me, not enough time to read all of the posts that you are interested in if you spend too much time commenting. I get that.

I'm at that point where it really looks like I am not going to meet my schedule and it's a bit depressing given all of the hours that I am putting in. I just need a little fix of that good old positive feed back to help me soldier on.

Tomorrow (Wednesday the 4th of July...one month and 6 days before our allotted vacation...eek!) is a day off from work so I hope to start assembling the wall framing. Stopped at the orange crate today after work and picked up three 1x4 pine boards for the wall blocking, 64 linear feet of 1x2 maple for the cabinet face frames and shelf rails. Also got 10 more of the cheap spring clamps. Could have used them on the bulkhead and will surely find a use for them on the walls. Add $105 to tally.

Doesn't seem to matter if I try to figure out how long I expect it will take to finish. I am building at a steady pace, I don't think I am wasting time (at least not in achieving what I envision... maybe that is more than needed, but what's the point in building if it is not mine?), and still I just don't see it happening in time. Won't rush quality. I'm not perfect, nor is my work, but I am sticking to my own standard, so I'm happy.

If sis says she's good to go, then we go. If sis says she can't make it happen this season, then I get a reprieve; Vette and I will take a much needed weeks vacation and I will spend the other week building. Either way, due to my natural tendency to procrastinate, I will keep pushing through until the end (campable plus 95% complete...it must be true that they are never really complete).

[High Desert]

You just keep right on posting those details KC. Your attention to it all is nothing short of impressive, I enjoy reading about all those little things. No better way to learn next to doing it myself.

And don't forget "teardrop time". When ever you finish, you'll be able to know you did it just the way you wanted.

[KCStudly]

Whew. Thank you Shaun. My ego meter is now off of "empty" and I have the will to carry on. Thank you for the reassurance.

[linuxmanxxx]

Just remember if its a cosmetic flaw and not structural, if it gets embedded in a wall or covered in trim or covering let it go and build on. If you hit a problem area go work on other parts and mull it over.

[KCStudly]

Thanks Linux. Good advice and brings up a good question. Just how well does the canvas and latex paint cover small flaws? In order to prevent the transitions from foam to wall frame or blocking from telegraphing through, how flat, true, gap and dent free does it need to be?

I don't like tedious body work/prep, but I'm thinking that quite a few warts will project through if not faired well. I'm not going to try for a glass smooth paint job; I like the idea of the canvas texture hiding minor imperfections, but I do want it to appear flat, smooth and crisp in general. No big blobs, steps or transitions jumping through and screaming, "look at me, I'm sloppy".

Another question. I'm thinking ahead to covering the walls and doors. I'd like to build the walls and doors as single assemblies up until the inner skins are on, then cut the doors out, router trim both edges, then wrap with canvas. On the door surround I can rabbet the inner wall skin a whisker and wrap the canvas all the way around the jambs burying it under the door seal trim. But on the doors I am not planning to have inner trim. I had planned on putting the door seal on the wall recess (thinking it is more protected there and less susceptible to damage). But if I were to put the seal on the inner face of the door I could wrap the canvas around to the inside and staple it through the inside face of the door, just enough for the edge of the canvas and staples to be hidden by the seal. Any thoughts on this?

How much thickness does the canvas and latex paint add?

[eaglesdare]

add me to your meter fill tank. i am still awatchin you. it is looking real, real good.
love your kitty pics btw.

i can comment on the canvas adding thickness issue. i am no expert, i think i have a foamie that looks "sloppy" as you say, however, watch out for the canvas/paint. it will for sure add thickness. sometimes you can stretch it a little thinner, sometimes not. so do keep that in mind. i think the best thing might be to do a canvas/painted piece and test for yourself. that way you will have a much better idea about the fitting on your real area. another thing to watch for, once you have the foam covered with canvas it sort of pulls in the foam. not sure how to explain that, (remember i am not technical) but i guess for a lack of a better term, it can warp the foam, bend it sort of? you should be ok though if your foam is surrounded by wood. i have one door that warped on me (won't even close anymore) and i have one door that does close but gets stuck sometimes.

[KCStudly]

Thanks Eagle. I think a small test piece is a good idea when I get closer to that step. I need to start thinking about sourcing canvas and the sequence of applying finishes.

Stain first or the mixture; mix stain in with the mixture(?); where to leave raw wood for assembly glue; when to apply stain/protection vs. assemble, and on and on.