Building Arabella

[4GNomad]

Nice job Almost. It looks great...

Was a bit warm today so I stayed out of the midday sun. Going to do a couple smaller project in the evening when it cools down.

 

[Almost There]

And today I got the wheel wells done!



They'll both be inside the bed cabinetry so I used standard plywood instead of GIS at half the price.

I'm just about at a standstill here!

I need 1/8" Lauan and dimensional birch next and the closest lumber store that has it is 2 1/2 hours away. The good news is that I'll be right in the neighborhood on Monday anyways picking up the rest of the order of closed cell foam that was on backorder and doing eldercare for my mother.

I got some odd jobs done today like cutting and fitting the foam for the head banging places. I'm putting beach noodles on both the front and rear original roof edges and 1/2 pipe insulation across the passenger side door 'ouch' spot! They'll all be covered in vinyl when I'm done - for right now they're just sitting in place so I can quit giving myself headaches...

Tomorrow I can start pattern making the front overhead ccf/vinyl and maybe get started on patterning the rear edge of the kitchen cabinet uprights.

Maybe even get some beach time in... if it doesn't rain!

 

[Bela's Mom]

Wow!  You do some awesome work!  I'm envious of your skill!  Thanks for sharing your build and pics!

 

[Almost There]

Wow!  You do some awesome work!  I'm envious of your skill!  Thanks for sharing your build and pics!

A picture taken from 6 feet means that the little uh-oh's don't show up well.

That and I plan for the just slightly less than straight cuts to be hidden in the finished view...

 

[akrvbob]

It's surprising how hard it is to make perfectly strait cuts! I don't think I've ever done it without a jig of some kind to act as a guide.

Your skills are night an day better than mine!
Bob

 

[Almost There]

It's surprising how hard it is to make perfectly strait cuts! I don't think I've ever done it without a jig of some kind to act as a guide.

Your skills are night an day better than mine!
Bob

Thanks!!

Part of it is sewing skills - power tools are power tools... I know a bunch of guys who call a sewing machine a 'thread injector'

This whole project is being done with a jig saw, a drill and a palm sander for power tools.

I cheat a bit (ok, a whole lot... ) and have the long straight cuts done on the neat machine at the lumber yard. Yesterday I had them rip a 4x8 sheet of plywood into 12" wide boards for me. That wood was the wheel wells. I also had them do all the straight cuts on the birch sheet that will be the upright panels on my kitchen unit.

I will say that the two best things I've had to buy for this whole thing is my Kreg jig and a pair of knee pads!! The Kreg jig has allowed me to do things I only dreamed of doing.

Btw, anyone interested but cautious of the price of the full size Kreg jig, there's a mini Kreg available. At the high Canadian prices it was only $20 as compared to the over $100 that they wanted for the regular 2 hole one. It only drills one hole at a time but for 99% of the work I'm doing, the 2 hole jig wouldn't be of any use at all.

 

[4GNomad]

Nice work on the wheel wells and floor. I will have to check out this Kreg jig you talk about. Take care and Live Simple and Enjoy Life!

 

[rvpopeye]

To listen to you I'd have to guess you're a cabinetmaker for sure now !
AND It's not cheating to get the lumber yard to do some cuts , you are deciding what they are and assembling them . Those that are doing the cuts are just like any other tool you have.

You should be very proud of the skills you have developed !!!
Your new home will be something you can tell people "I did it all myself ! "

It's been a long time since I had my wood shop and I'm not sure if they still make them but you can buy extra wide blades for a sabre saw that will make straight cuts much easier.......just go slooowwww.
And making a guide from a piece of straight wood and a couple of C clamps will make those straight cuts easier too!

 

[ttpadilla]

I love witnessing your progress! It's such a nice, clean, professional looking job. Can't wait for the next update!

 

[ccbreder]

That kreg tool, i have the two hole thing, with kreg's "right angle clamp". I would not be without it. Now I want the next-up set. I have a 10" miter saw and find the square cuts make a big difference with the kreg tool. Harbor freight has a cheap rip off version. But mine came with USA body and drill bit.

 

[Almost There]

That kreg tool, i have the two hole thing, with kreg's "right angle clamp". I would not be without it. Now I want the next-up set. I have a 10" miter saw and find the square cuts make a big difference with the kreg tool. Harbor freight has a cheap rip off version. But mine came with USA body and drill bit.

Well, at these prices, I'm perfectly happy with the Jr set...

http://www.homedepot.ca/webapp/wcs/...atchallpartial&Dx=mode+matchallpartial&s=true

After all, I only expect to do this job once!

And truthfully, so far all the work has been single hole anyways.

There's only a couple of places in the kitchen cabinetry where I will need 2 holes and I can set it up twice all by myself...

 

[4GNomad]

Almost,

What size plywood did you use for the floor? Are you securing the floor to the van with adhesive or is it free floating? Just curious...

 

[Almost There]

Almost,

What size plywood did you use for the floor?  Are you securing the floor to the van with adhesive or is it free floating?  Just curious...

I used 3/4" GIS plywood so that I was assured a depth of wood deep enough to handle screwing all the various components into it. With the Kreg Jig it's easy to mount all the 'furniture' to the floor. By furniture I mean the toilet compartment, kitchen unit, bed and two rear storage closets.

It's free floating in that I didn't glue it down BUT I did the layout such that there will be no seams in the plywood in the open. All the seams will have the various components essentially bridging them. For example the rear seam will fall under the bed and the wheel well covers.

This and close cutting has the floor plywood wedged between the edges of the van and then further held in place by the 'furniture' screwed down to it.

 

[Almost There]

Correction to the last post - I realized today that the front corner of the full sheet that runs from behind the passenger seat back - well it's not laying down flat against the floor, it's lifting a little. Soooo, before I lay the finished floor on it, I'll squirt some PL Premium in there and put something heavy on it. The PL will glue it down to the metal so that it won't ever bounce again. I wouldn't glue the whole thing down - not necessary, but this one corner is going to have to behave itself...

Today I got the front overhead cabinet lined with the vinyl panels and both of the overhead cabinets now have a 'floor'.



Tomorrow I start putting face frames on the two cabinets...should be a 'wonderful' job - trying to square off oh so not square openings and get them so that they are perpendicular to the floor! The front one will be hell because the roof is on a slope at that point - at least for the back cabinet, the roof is only arched on one plane. I'll do that one first...

I picked out and bought the paint today. Originally I wanted to stain and polyurethane all the cabinet wood. I bought birch plywood to use for the kitchen cabinet unit and had it all cut to size for me. Then found that dimensional birch is, ummm, pricier than hell. I found a specialty lumber shop that could order it in for me but when I figured out the cost, it was on to Plan B. It was going to cost me something like $250.00 plus tax to buy 1x2 for the cabinet doors and the small amount of 1x6 and 1x8 that I needed. Sooo, all the wood, which will be mixed species now, will be painted! But now I can get my light pine floor instead...all is good!!

 

[ttpadilla]

Thanks for the update! I always check new posts to see if there is one, and today was the day!! Looking good, and I'm still super impressed.

 

[Almost There]

And today's work!!

Patterning the face frames for the two overhead storage compartments was every bit as tedious and problematic as I expected! Talk about trying to stuff a square peg in an odd shaped hole....

And just when I thought I had it beat I discovered that I can't fully assemble and then attach - once a face frame is all screwed together, it won't fit past all the obstructions on the side walls. Good thing the glue wasn't dry yet - I was test fitting before I laid it out flat for drying. Got one end panel off before the glue dried. Now I have to paint it in pieces which means I can't fill the seams with wood filler and hide them...sigh!!

I don't know who did the high top but whomever they are sure didn't worry about both sides being equal...  

Good thing the roof and side panels in the middle section will hide the edges of todays' work!!



That's the back one, the front one looks the same only different...

Painting starts tomorrow - I'm beat tonight!!

 

[Almost There]

What I've been doing for the past 2 days...

Watching paint dry is BORING!!



15 minutes of painting primer on one side of the boards, wait an hour flip and primer the other side, 4 hours to recoat time, 20 minutes of painting first coat, dry overnight and then another 15 minutes of painting. It will get better when I get to larger items like the kitchen unit and the bed!

OTOH, it gave me a chance to figure out a better way to attach the bumper pads that will protect my head from ouchies when bending over at both the front and rear original roof levels.

I'm using swimming noodles covered in vinyl. I stuck them on the cut metal part of the van roof and tested them   - they'll work just fine!!

 

[rvpopeye]

I wouldn't be worried about filling the seams !
Unless you need to make people think it's fiberglass.....

Looks great from here.

 

[Almost There]

I wouldn't be worried about filling the seams !
Unless you need to make people think it's fiberglass.....

Looks great from here.

Thanks!!


That's the inside of the boards - I painted them now because once they're all in place, I'm not crawling inside the cabinets to do it. I won't fit... :dodgy:

The reason I wanted to fill the seams is to hide the, ummm, uneven cuts....

But I figured out how to do that too!

The whole interior of the van is being built with nothing more in the way of power tools than a jigsaw and a drill. I can follow a straight line pretty well but with a jigsaw you don't get the perfection cuts of the more powerful table or chop saws.

Part of it is an experiment to see if it can be done and the other part is so that others who want to follow but don't have a full woodshop at their disposal will have a frame of reference. And then there's the 'I'm too economically minded to buy expensive tools to use once' thought as well...

 

[Almost There]

And the overhead cabinets are finally done...yeehaw!!

The rear one:



And the front one



Getting the head banger protectors in place was kind of interesting. The vinyl had to be screwed to the face frame before the frame was installed. The face frame was installed with the vinyl hanging loose. Then masked off so I could paint the face frame. After that I could glue the pool noodle in place, then glue the vinyl to the pool noodle. To make sure it sat exactly where I wanted it to, I then used contact cement to glue the rise at the back of the vinyl/noodle to the face frame and finally got the loose lower edge of the vinyl tucked under the ceiling liner in the cab and glued to the raw van roof in the rear where it will be covered when that section of ceiling goes in. It sounds kinda complicated when I try to describe it doesn't it...

And then I was off and running on the cabinets - long awaited progress!!

I got the pantry all patterned, cut out and ready to assemble. I'm painting the inside before it's put together and putting the drawer slides in place on the flat boards. That's a trick I learned while watching YouTube videos on cabinet making - it means you get the two sides exactly equal without having to worry about how level the van is. Primer is drying as I type!!

Here's all the pantry boards laid out for painting