The Poet Creek Express - Foamie Hybrid

[KCStudly]

I made it out to the shop on Wednesday, and with Karl’s help manning the shop-vac nozzle, managed to get most of the street side interior wall blocking recesses cut out. Still made a big blue fluffy mess, but not too bad to clean up with the shop vac. Probably never get it all, though… little bits of blue in my clothes, in my ears, in my car…

This is a test glue up using the piece of foam I used to check for depth of cut. I wanted to see whether the GG would force the blocking up past flush.

The recess is 3-1/2 x 3-1/2 x 3/4 deep which matches all of my “standard” blocks; select pine because it is relatively light and inexpensive. I know it is a little softer, so I will use the course Kregg screws to attach cabinets and such, and can inject glue in the screw holes to reinforce them at final install, after dry fitting.

Knowing that many of these blocks will be in the field of the wall, and will only be able to be weighed down while gluing, for the test I just clamped the block down softly near the edge of the bench. The quick clamp only reached just inside of one edge of the block and because it was only clamped softly the GG was able to force the far edge of the block up above flush by at least 1/16 inch. I’ll have to double-side tape it to the bench and do a test with the belt sander to see if I can make it flush without too much drama or distress to the surrounding foam. I don’t think the uneven expansion will be such a big deal with adequate and even weighting, but I may do another test or two, one with GG and weight, and another with TB2 which won’t expand at all. According to the reports on the forum TB2 between foam and wood works fine because the wood can absorb the moisture, right?

Here is the front section up by the head of the bed.

The two upper recesses closest to the door frame are for the front cabinet face frame; the upper one will actually be cut away slightly by the curve of the ceiling profile. The top of the cabinet frame rail will have to be shaved to match the arch. the corresponding recess at the front wall is for the ledger to support the "back" of the cabinet floor at the front of camper. The lower middle one is for the front of the key catcher shelf. The double recess handles the "rear" of the key catcher (front of camper) with the reading/courtesy light and switch below.

Here you can see the bigger picture with the front of the wall farthest away and bottom of wall to the right (in case it wasn’t obvious wink ).


The hole above the back edge of the door frame header is for the dome light on that side. Below that, under the tail end of the door header is for a coat hook. The two pair to the rear of those are for the rear upper and lower cabinet face frames.

You can see where I have started to temporarily attach some scrap 5mm ply to guide the router for the bulkhead blocking recess. Before that I used the small square template to cut a starter hole at the bottom. That gave me the accuracy to nestle into the corner of the bottom stringer and the extra reinforcement strip for the galley drawer/ice chest tray glides. After setting the router up on the guide strips I quickly realized that they are too far apart and the router shoe will drop off on one side before reaching the other; so I will reposition the front one closer, make a first cut, space off of the rear strip to place the front strip in its final position, move the rear strip forward to suit the router shoe, and complete the cut in a second pass (another time).

After that, the two recesses on the left are for the two upper galley shelves, while the three others are for the side support ledgers for the galley counter and under counter face frame. Reflecting on it now, the lower most block on the street side is not required since the ice chest got moved to this side and there is no face frame stile on this side. Oh well, I’ll throw a block in there anyway, just in case I need to strap the cooler in, or whatever the future may bring.

The bottom of the laminated wall edge piece (one of the two curved arch pieces that I glue laminated way back when) will fit into that little corner formed by the wall sill and the added piece for the cooler slides. The rest of the wall blank forms the “bustle” of the hatch and will be trimmed to the profile later.

Here is another look at the bulkhead area. If you look closely near the top you can see a black sharpie line indicating where the top of the blocking will be. This too will be trimmed away by the ceiling profile and the top of the bulkhead will have to be shaved to approximate the arch.


Not much doing on the camper this weekend as I prepare to have a crowd over for Xmas dinner. I did stop in at the shop for a bit today to drop off Karl's presents, pet the cat some, and trim out the fillets in the corners of the recesses left by the router bit.

Hope everyone has a relaxed and joyous holiday!

[bonnie]

Joy and peace to you and yours.

[KCStudly]

Thank you Bonnie. Joy and peace to all.

[KCStudly]

Just after Xmas I came down with a sinus/chest cough thing, so have been taking it easy last week and this long weekend trying to shake it off. The plant was on shutdown today giving us a 4 day weekend w/ the holiday tomorrow.

Had about 8 - 10 inches of snow Saturday night, and the heat was not keeping up in the loft, so I've just been staying in.

Oh well. Would have liked to get some build time in, but have been pretty miserable up until yesterday. Feeling a bit better now.

Maybe tomorrow, Wednesday latest, I can get some more done.

[GPW]

Hope you’re feeling better !!!! Careful of all that wood and foam dust !!!

[bonnie]

Been down sick too. Seems to always happen on those 4 day weekends. Too cold here to work in the garage. I got the graph paper out and started planning the new setup. I hope to at least mock up one section to test.

[KCStudly]

Thanks, GPW. I don't think it was foam/saw dust related. I am susceptible to sinus issues due to my acid reflux, and with seasonal changes (dry air), all of the rich food and drink at Xmas, plus my mom being congested and coughing a bunch at our previous family gathering, I'm blaming it on her.

Sorry to hear you are also under the weather, Bonnie. Here's hoping that we are both feeling better soon.

[bonnie]

Me too. I am also hoping for a bit warmer weather. Kinda cold in the garage right now.

[KCStudly]

Well it has been very cold here, and despite having two 4 day weekends in a row, I didn’t get much done on TPCE over the holidays due to being under the weather in more ways than one.

Now that I am feeling better and we had a little warm up today, I finally got something done and did a camera dump.

Over the last several years I have done a big family turkey dinner and gathering at our house on Xmas, and Mom has done a rib roast at her place on Xmas eve. Get your feed bags on, I’m channeling Grampa Jones!

The hearth at moms was most welcoming. The candle burning in the beehive oven is always a nice touch (the picture does not do the warm glow justice).


Appetizers, clockwise from the nut basket (that mom wove) from top center; pistachio nuts, crackers, goat cheese, chocolate infused cheese (sharp cheddar?), brie, tomato relish that aunt Sandra made (wow!), and cranberry infused cheese (mild cheddar?)


An antique country Xmas setting.



The trivets are interlocking Kauri wood from my mom’s trip to New Zealand last year. The green depression era glass finger bowls had green and red peanut M&M’s. Star napkin rings, red and green plaid napkins, real silverware, and the Curtis family heirloom crystal goblets.

It seems fancy (because it is… mom has made a hobby out of this), but don’t get the wrong idea…we are not wealthy folk… at least not when it comes to money, just lots of love and dedication, and many years collecting and inheriting cherished possessions.

Here’s a shot of some of the gifts to be exchanged sitting on the wood bench in the “living” room. Many years ago I did the layout for the pattern for the stencil painted floor.

On other occasions Bill has used the griddle to make old time griddle cookies, and the pot to roast chestnuts over the hearth.

My cousin Aaron and his wife Patti were in town from Rio (recently moved from Norway) with their two kids Lucas and Isabella. Lucas had fun playing Santa’s little elf bringing presents from the front room for all to open.


Rib roast crusted with black pepper, yum. Mom usually has me carve, and of course we need to make sure everything is edible for the guests.


Individual corn pudding soufflés. They had not set entirely, but were delicious just the same with a touch of black pepper and sweet, sprinkled with minced chive.

That’s the bones trimmed from the roast in the background.

Dinner is served!

Sweet potato and carrot (?) tart with pecans in the foreground, and asparagus with roasted lemons in the background.




Waldorf salad with dried cranberries instead of raisins, one of my favorites.


Cranberry Jello mold “salad”.


And that’s where I put the camera aside and dug in. There was a scoop of peppermint ice cream and various home baked holiday cookies for dessert.

Now I have to apologize up front. For my Xmas buffet dinner I had planned on doing a sort of “cooking show” presentation, showing the inner workings of my meal prep with the grand finale being pics of the spread right before everyone dug in. Unfortunately, when the chips were down and I was playing host with my sleeves rolled up, in the heat of battle I forgot to take pics of the buffet and dinner table.

But I’ll go ahead and show the preamble anyway.

Fresh herbs, rosemary, thyme and sage (poultry seasoning mix) to make herbed butter. Some to be packed under the skin of the turkey breast for roasting, and some to be served at the table.





I wish you could smell how good this smelled.

The cream sherry was for sipping while I did a separate batch of sherry butter that would be served with the roasted root vegetables.

Whipped herb butter.


Served in a couple of small bowls spun and glazed by my wife Yvette.


Fresh cranberry relish. Easy peezy. Rinse a bag of fresh cranberries, add a navel orange (sliced into wedges) and about 3/4 to 1 cup sugar (more or less to taste) in the food processor, and presto.

Let it sit in the fridge for a few days, yum.

I blanch whole green beans in small batches in advance. Set up two Dutch ovens with boiling water, two strainers go in and out like steamer baskets, and a big bowl of ice water to seize the beans from cooking. Do a couple of handfuls at a time for just 3 min’s until they taste sweet and the starchy taste has gone. Do ahead and store in a gallon freezer bag in the crisper drawer of the fridge. On Xmas day I just bring these out ahead of time, let them warm to room temp (or zap them in the nuker just to take the chill off), then warm them the rest of the way in the chaffing dish, no cooking to do. Sauté a mess of sliced almonds in butter with a bit of honey and pour that over the top. No recipe, just cooking freestyle like.


Roasted root vegetables; sweet potatoes, red bliss potatoes, parsnips, and celery root (that ugly dirt ball looking thing in the produce section at your grocery store… wash, slice off the rind, and chop into cubes). I usually include a few cloves of garlic and some red onions cut into wedges, but I forgot those this time… still good served with the whipped sherry butter.
Before the oven tossed in olive oil with salt and pepper…


And after roasting until fork tender.

These are even better left over. Smash them a bit and simmer in a cast iron skillet with some of the sherry butter until golden browned into hash (bubble and squeak!).

Brine for soaking the turkey; water, salt, honey, maple syrup, cinnamon stick, candied ginger, oranges and lemon boiled. Remove from heat; add fresh poultry herbs, and a bag of ice. Chill, then submerge the turkey and leave on your cold screened porch up to 24 hrs.



(The wood shed in the background was there when we moved in, but I removed the rotten flat pitched roof, making it a salt box and added the door… the upper portion of the door is galvanized construction mess for ventilation to allow the wood to breath and dry.)

Corn bread for the “stuffing”.


I make this before going to mom’s on Xmas eve and when we get home I break it up and let it sit over night to dry a bit (Mom claims this as her recipe, but Heather and I seem to recall that Dad was a big contributor if not the original creator).


Diced celery and onions sautéed in butter, more ground fresh herbs, toasted and diced pecans, minced parsley and celery leaves, and canned mushroom stems and caps with the juice. Add the leaves and herbs at the end, then stir in the cornbread, do not over stir or it will turn to paste. Secret family recipe, yum.


Only ten people this year, so a small 16 lb. bird, stuffed with apple, onion, cinnamon stick, fresh herbs and a dash of pumpkin pie spices. Herb butter under the skin, onions, carrots, celery and homemade stock in the pan underneath. At about this point (1 hr before done) I shingle on some thick slices of smoked bacon from the butcher shop.


Mom always helps make the gravy, with pan drippings (including the carrots and onions smashed up), a little more butter, molasses, sherry, more herbs, flour and some more stock. Here I am dicing the giblets and bacon that also go into the gravy.



My brother in law brought his infamous pork pie and two varieties of fresh baked bread, plus a triple throw down six layer carrot cake with coconut, pineapple, walnuts, cream cheese frosting between layers, and an amaretto frosting on the outside.

Yvette sets the table and coordinates the serving dishes.


And the dessert table before everyone else arrived and loaded it up with even more goodies; oatmeal cookies with raisins and butterscotch chips, spritz cookies, rum balls, peanut butter balls, Martha’s Candy (chocolate and peanut butter covered oatmeal balls), mom brought pecan pies, and Yvette made fudge.


Rocky didn’t mind the crowd at all, nor playing cards with Yvette’s nephew Carson.


Hope everyone had a merry Xmas.


That’s a wrap for now, more progress to be reported in my next post.

[KCStudly]

Okay, couldn’t sleep yet.

Last week after Xmas Karl gave me a pair of the Bob Vila cutters and a package of utility blades (which I needed!).


I had dropped off his present before, a bunch of vernier, dial, and digital calipers to replace the broken and busted up ones he had.

My sister had given me a toy ballista kit, and since it was too cold to do any gluing, and I didn’t feel like dealing with blue foam dust, I set in to assemble the ballista.





And after a week of freezing weather, today I finished it up.



A fun little project. It will hurl the little wooden bolt about 30 ft and has no problem throwing a volley of three all at once.

I brought the turd along to use as a supplemental heat and light source. When I opened the cap it still had pressure in it from months ago when I first got it, but I had to work the leather pump over again with my fingers in order to pump it back up.

When I first arrived at the shop around 1pm the outside temp was 40F (according to the Ford dash). With the electric radiator running on high the whole time since my last visit, the recording thermometer in the loft said that the lowest reading had been 27F and the high was 54F. The 54 was probably what it was when I last left, as the weather has not been much above freezing for most of a week. I know that we had some mornings that were in the low teens during that period. Current loft temp was 46F. At 4pm after running the lantern along with the heater the loft was up to 50F, but after the sun went down it started dropping back to 48. Which was when I left; the Ford said outside temp was 32F. So it looks like I’m getting anywhere from 6 to high teens rise over ambient. Still not up to the recommended 55 degs for TB2. Maybe I need to get the 228E restored and get it burning, too. Karl and I both frowned at me using a kerosene heater as they can be sooty and stinky (and there is already enough of that to go around from the metal shop downstairs.

Here are some pics of the turd burning.



A very pleasant addition to the shop.

Next I wanted to do a test using the belt sander to level my little wall blocking glue experiment, to make sure that I could do it if need be without gouging out the foam. Stuck it to the bench blotter with a couple of patches of double sided tape.


At first I tried to use just the nose of the front wheel thinking that I could better direct the action that way, but laying the sander down flat on its shoe worked better (…makes sense, I guess).


I’m pretty sure that the low spot in the foam on the left was from an excursion while trying the nose wheel.


Here is the router guide set up for the street side recess for the bulkhead blocking. You can see that I have moved the front (right hand) strip back so that the router shoe does not drop into the hole.


Wielding the router and the shop vac hose at the same time was less than optimum, and with the heater on it ended up tripping the breaker, but I managed to make the cut.




Then I moved the right strip back to its original position (measuring carefully off of the rear strip), before moving the rear strip forward to close the gap.

Actually, after taking this picture I moved the rear (left) strip even closer so that the vac wouldn’t have to work so hard pulling on the open side.

Safety first. If you look closely you can see flecks of blue foam in my hair. I would normally be wearing my safety glasses with side shields, but must have left them at work… unusual.


Here’s the recess after a bunch of vacuuming and removing the guide strips.


And here it is with the 1x4 blocking test fit.

Not too bad, if I do say.

I wasn’t very ambitious today, but I decided to lay out the profile templates to get a good look at it before I left for the day. Unfortunately I found a few issues.


For one, the middle piece is 18 inches too narrow. I guess Rover Mike was conserving material. The 520 inch radius crown appears to be correct on this piece and seems to end at the appropriate location for this width, so all is not lost. I can shift this piece around to use for that big radius, or use it to make another full size template.

However, the same ceiling crown on the other two templates, the front and rear ones, are inverted. They dish in instead of bulging out. Drat.
Front.

Rear.


The starting and stopping points appear to be correct, but the arc is in the wrong direction. Poop.

Nothing that can’t be worked through with more time and likely some more material.

Oh well, at least the lantern had a calming effect.


And that brings us up to date. Thanks for watching.

[GPW]

AARGH!!! And I’m on a Strict Diet .... Thanks KC ...
Trailer parts looking Sweet eh !!!

[bonnie]

Thankfully, foam is forgiving. Those dinners made me very hungry. Yum. The details in your photos help inspire solutions for some of my building issues. You have a beautiful turd going there.

[KC's Mom]

The pecan-studded tart on Xmas Eve was Carrot-Parsnip Tart. It was supposed to be a side dish, but was sweet enough to be used as a dessert, if desired. The cornbread stuffing did start out with Kevin's dad, but I've adapted and changed it a bit and have been making it for many, many years so feel I can claim it. All in all, our Xmas Eve and Xmas Day dinners were indeed yummy.

[wagondude]

Welcome Mom! Nice to see you checking up on your son. I can vouch that he plays well with others. You folks enjoy some wonderful looking meals.

[KCStudly]

You have a beautiful turd going there.

Yes, she performed very regular. Thanks for the words of support, Bonnie. Glad you are getting useful input; it is always a good feeling to give back something to the board.

GPW, Sorry about the food porn (...not really, just saying ). We could all probably do better by eating healthier; keep to your goal.

Despite the little snags and set backs, I am encouraged at how the parts are coming out. Sometimes I question my decision to go with such a complex build, but then, in this case, life is both in the journey and the destination.

Wagondude, Thank you for the kind words.

Thanks mom!