Construction – Page 2

2013/10/25 By John 2 Comments

Countertop complete

We finished laminating the countertop!

We just bought a roll of slate print laminate to attach to our plywood counter. It was actually pretty easy to install. We didn’t take any process pictures, but there’s a tutorial on youtube that we leaned pretty heavily on, and I highly recommend it if you’re looking to try this instead of buying an already finished countertop.

This had the added bonus of allowing us to use a little of the excess laminate to make our refrigerator match the counter.

In other news, our woodstove has arrived!

It’s a cool little gasifier woodstove originally designed for use in boats. It’s really tiny with minimal clearances, and uses small stove pipe, so it’ll be a great fit. There’s lots more info here. It still remains to be seen whether we work on installing this next, or our electrical system.

Either way, we start attaching our ceiling tomorrow, so things are about to get weird. Brace yourself.

2013/10/05 By John Leave a Comment

Upholstered

Nishi made short work of upholstering the port bench. It’s a massive single piece, but we think it came out looking pretty alright.

The foam cushioning we used was neither long nor wide enough, so we used spray adhesive to attach four together.

We traced the pattern of the bench on top of that, and cut it to size.

A sheet of batting gives the seat a softer feeling.

We stapled it to the frame, and cut off the excess.

Our fabric of choice is an indoor/outdoor navy blue upholstery fabric, that we think will hold up well to whatever gets thrown at it. We used a single continuous piece, with no seams.

While Nishi positioned the fabric where it needed to be, she let me do the stapling. Thankfully, the stapling doesn’t have to look good.

She dealt with the corners herself (thankfully).

The finished seat top:

We still have to build and install the drawers underneath, but it’s looking better and better each day.

2013/10/03 By John Leave a Comment

Port Bench Assembled

The port bench is a huge seat/guest bed/dresser running 13′ down the side of the bus. We’ll be storing our clothes in there, and it can sleep two easily.

We made a neat and nifty insulated box for our wheel well.

This wheel well looks much cleaner than our starboard side, but it may not insulate as well.

We cut our pieces for the bench, and threw ’em together to see what it would look like.

Then we started by attaching sections of the bench together, then to the floor and walls.

We cut out the seat top and threw it on.

Both benches are going to be upholstered this weekend. Next week I’ll be working on the drawers.

2013/09/25 By John Leave a Comment

Roughing out appliances

Just a peek for now – nothing is attached or permanent, but after we made the cut outs in the counter we plopped things into place to see what it will look like. From left to right, we have our propane cooktop, our 12v fridge, our deep sink, and our hot water heater. Not much room for storage left over, but nearly all of our appliances fit neatly into this tiny space.

Today was a rest day for us, since we work through the weekends we’ve taken to using Wednesdays as our day off. Things are moving along briskly, and it’s a good thing, since the weather is starting to get brisk as well. We attached the ladder to the back of the bus, making access to the deck much easier. No more clambering up the hood!

Countertop complete

Upholstered

Port Bench Assembled

Roughing out appliances

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