Sleeper sofa

The plans for the front have changed slightly and I believe I'll be including in the design an infloor fresh water tank, which means moving the fill pipe to the rear or some other means. I want to push the sofa as far front at possible. I plan on using a lightweight sofa from LL Bean. I just hope they don't discontinue making them before I have the funds to buy one. I've looked all over the web for sleeper sofas and I think this one makes the best sense. All the others have this super heavy metal fold out bed or are made super cheap. I saw this sofa on a trip to Freeport and thought it would be ideal.

Here's a picture of the one I'll be using.

More Sketches

My daughter and I have a thing going on now about sketch books. She likes mine and wants to fill it full of pictures of flying cats and rainbows.... I prefer having some pages open for future sketches. In terms of creative households, I think ours is pretty good. M is a retired graphic/web designer and is working on her masters in education. She also does sculpture and stained glass on the side. Me, I like to build stuff and tinker with a wide variety of things. The net, is that we have many interests and if it were not for working full time.... You know.

Here are a couple conceptual drawings of what the curb side fridge, closet, storage bin area will look like and a modified layout. The area that I want to point out is the fridge closet area and how it differs from the orignal layout. The orig had a small 5" closet to the left of the fridge that housed the butane heater. I'm not using one so the space will be taken over by the fridge. The closet to the right of the fridge will be shifted left and the remaining space will be used for the storage bin cabinet. I'll have to tinker with the vents a bit, but that should not be an issue.

Storage Bins

I gave my wife, M, a mission to find some storage bins for the caravanner. M is a great shopper and usually can sniff out some good deals, so when she came home with these I was thrilled and expected to see a big price tag but as usual she found these at home goods for a bargin. I think she paid $9.99 for the small bin and $12.99 for the large one. These are great. They look like leather but they are actually vinyl over hardboard. She also picked up a couple large and small boxes with lids on them.

Keep in mind that I plan on an open floor plan with shelves instead of overhead bins. These storage bins will be incorporated into a pull out shelving unit on the curb side and will also sit on the shelf over the bed and the four drawer chest. The first concern about using bins rather than overhead cabinets was how to secure these to the shelf but also make them so you can pull them out. The idea that I have is to mount an adapter plate on the bottom of each and then a receiver on the shelf where each bin will slide into. Then use a push button latch to lock them into place. I'll build the push button latch into the shelf so the button will be on the edge. See my sketch below.



The boxes with lids will be a similar set-up but I'll have to fashion some shock-cord loops to keep the lids on while in transit.

Gally update

Yesterday the hinges came in from Rejuventation.com and after dinner last night I installed them, along with the push button latch. It took a bit of tinkering to get the push button latch installed, but it looks pretty good.

I like these hinges since they look exactly like the old ones, except they're polished. The push-button latch is pretty slick as well, really cleans up the little door.

Here are some pictures.



Here is the push button latch in the open position. Does not stick out much at all but enough to get your fingers on and pull it open.




Yesterday, Colin and I swapped messages about water tanks and the timeline for him to wrap-up his part of the project. His business is booming and there's this certain owner of a very long vintage trailer that keeps adding work to his schedule...... ;) It's great to see Colin's business take off, I just wish he was closer! Looks like the pick-up date is pushing into the spring.

If you haven't been up to Colins before, it's worth the trip up just to see the wide expanse of vintage trailers. I think he needs a webcam on his roof just so people can oogle the cool rigs he is working on.

D

Savewally.org

vote no ;)



Long Ago...

Spring in New England and other ramblings

Now I believe Al Gore ;) Typically I do not see the first Robin until April, but a flock of fat Robins ran through our yard today. The winter in New England has been very mild and from speaking to several friends in the club, there is a "race horse in the gates" effect going on. Everyone is kicking at the gate looking forward to getting out and on the road again. I wish it would just snow so we feel that we're in winter... maybe it would ease this travel itch a bit.

On another note, I started reading Deb and Lauren's blog about hitting the road and full timing..... ya, thanks that really helps the travel itch loads.... (heavy sarcasm). The theme of their blog is all around them hitting the road for two years before they turn into middle-age, kids, slaves to the school vacation schedule, suburbanites. My wife and I spent a couple years living overseas and moving around a great deal. Looking back, I have fond memories of traveling to new places, meeting new people, and trying to enjoy life before we "settled" down with kids. Now don't get me wrong, I love my daughter and I would not change a thing, but I am very glad to have those experiences under my belt. Once my daughter is a bit older, we are already talking about foreign trips or possibly taking a job overseas again. Until then, it's all about our Airstreams. Renovating and travelling in our vintage rigs is good therapy!

Deb and Lauren, enjoy your time on the road!

D

LEDs

The LEDs that I'm using are from suncorr stainless, here in Massachusetts. With the exception of their stainless fixture LEDs, the individual microstar LEDs are very reasonable in price and work with 12v. I doubt that I'll be able to use LEDs as my primary light source for the entire rig but using them under counters, shelves, pathway lights, and upgrades to marker and porch lights are in the plans.

I've been working on the gally shelf after work this week and added in the LEDs last night after dinner. The individual LEDs were simple to install once I figured out the drill size to use. Each light is rimmed on the top and slides into a predrilled hole. Friction keeps it in, plus they have a ruber backing for extra assistance, but I had to push pretty hard to get them in. The two stainless tri clusters needed to be recessed into the shelf so I used a 1 5/8th fostner bit.





The other part of the gally that I added lights to was the kick board. I put three blue LEDs in the kickboard to light up the path at night. The idea is that I'll use several blue LEDs in parts of the camper to light up the floor.





Here are some pictures

Chest Restore Update and Gally Top Shelf

Last night after work, I took my drawers, which btw need sanding, and installed the center rail sliders. Turned out pretty good, but one thing I found was that using ball bearing sliders wasn't as easy since the depth was 13" and I would have had to scab on extra support members. I chose to use a center slider, very simple, which I cut down to length and the kit came with side rollers. Each kit cost all of $4 at lowes.




I brought up this morning my gally top shelf and placed it ontop of the gally to layout where I wanted my LEDs and plastic wine glass rack. You're probably asking how is he going to secure this shelf to the tailer. I'll post more on this later, but effectively the divider on the left side of the gally will be attached to the ceiling and base cabinet of the gally. This will support the left side. As for the right side, I'll use either a cable at an angle or something solid.... not sure yet. But I do plan to atttache the self to the shell using figure 8 clips recessed into the shelf. The shelf itself will have 12v outlet and a 110 outlet with the switch for the LEDs on the left hand side divider. That's the plan at least.

I've already gotten feedback from someone about how the shelf will be used.... I plan on building purpose built jewelery boxes....I call them jewlery boxes but they will attached to shelf and store kitchen wares. One for glasses, one for plates and so on. So before you call them stupid, let me build them and then you can tell me if my whole idea is crap ;)

Interior Wood Stress

A couple weeks back, I ripped the 3 quater birch into 2 inch strips to make the face frame for the curb side cabinets. One of the interesting things about working with solid wood is the effect of interior wood stress. Meaning that when you look at a larger planned, jointed piece of wood you don't see the areas that could could cup and bow over time. Rip that same piece and you will see each individual piece acts different (cups, bows, bends) when not part of the larger board, this is inteior wood stress. A good friend and cabinet maker, Bill Andrews, has advised me that I should consider glueing smaller widths for my interior cabinet doors, especially the longer ones.

The process of building this interior has been an eye opener on how the original cabinet makers built their cabinets for the Caravanner. I once thought that the use of plywood for the doors was cheap, but think back 50 years and plywood was an expensive process. They used ply because it was stable and did not warp from interior wood stress over time.

I had thought about using good quality plywood as door fronts but I don't like the look of the edge since you see the individual plys and by todays standards this looks kinda cheap.

Maybe a combination of hardwood edges and good quality plywood would be a good compromise.

Drop me a note and let me know what you use.

Who's in Henderson? :)

Airstream work and blogging tend to be weekend activities with some late nights down in the shop, when I get the itch. As a by-product of this blog, I get a couple messages from folks, usually via the forums, about products or just saying that they like my work... But I was never able to tell how many people actually viewed my blog using standard blog hit counters, none are available from blogger.com. So, I went out and signed up for Google Analytics, which is free.

Now I can see my page hits, and roughly WHERE people come from. Bummer, no international traffic yet. Here's a screen shot.



I suspect that Rich L is my 1 page hit from Henderson.... Now we can track his progress across the southwest on a map! Go Rich!

Thanks Roy Lupien

People in the WBCCI region one are most likely familiar with the talents of Roy Lupien. He's one of these guys who has been around for a number of years and seems to like tackling big projects. I bought my first Airstream from Roy and the quality of his work and clever use of marine products certainly made my first experience positive. Plus his wife Debbie made cinnamon roles to help ink the deal one cold February morning.

I met the Lupiens last year at the fall business rally and had a chance to chin with Roy about my project. He mentioned that he had a curb side tub still on the mold. Did I mention Roy was talented? He builds his own fiberglass compoents, large and small. He built a tub for a members 65' safari and while he had the mold, built one on the mold and never used it. He offered the tub up to me and I said I would see if I could use it in the caravanner.

His brother Mark picked it up for me and I picked it up from Mark yesterday. Here's what I'm thinking, the tub fits neatly into the rear curb side corner and is the exact measurements of the existing batroom area. What I thinking of doing is installing the tub, with a marine bilge pump to move the grey water into the under floor mid section tank. Also, I'm thinking of using a marine macerator toilet and placing it in the tub, basically making a wet batch. I still need to figure out if the tapered version of the toilet will fit the shape, but I think I could make it work for a shower, toilet, sink wet bath. Here are some pictures of the tub Roy created with the red, red mold in the background.

Thanks again Roy!

Chest Restore and Gally Updates

The other night I sealed the chest with a satin poly to keep the finger prints and dirt marks down until I can spray it later this year. The veneer, it works pretty well but not 100%. On the top back edge a cup popped and I had to epoxy and clamp it down. No biggie, but after doing this, I wish I had a vacume bag to veneer with. Here's an updated picture.



The same same day I veneered the chest I veneered the gally sides. But I let it sit under clamp for a couple days. The whole veneering process takes less than 20 minutes from cutting it to size to applying to the side the gally and that was taking my time. But what I noticed when I did the chest, the veneer has memory and wants to pull back when under stress. So you have to keep it clamped longer. Be aware if you try to use this type of veneering.

A quick coat of poly last night and here is the latest.

Four Drawer Chest - Restoration 2

Today after work, I pulled the clamps off the chest and took it downstairs to the shop. I used my router with a flush cutting bit to remove the excess laminate. Looks pretty good, you be the judge.







Here's a picture of the welt that I'll use along the cabinet edges. It is off-white from garysupholstery.com. It's the cloest I've been able to find.... Anyone got other options?

4 Drawer Chest - Restore Part 1

The caravanner interior has this very nice four drawer chest with a bent top. I've seen variations in other years, but I believe 56 was the only year that the caravanner did not use this chest as a sink. The chest has seen better days and was in pretty dire shape when we took ownership of the trailer. The top back edge and bottom edges of the veneer where flaking off due to water damage and there is a water/sun mark on the top across the back. Combined with other knicks and dings I considered rebuilding it, but before I took that on I decided to try to repair some of the damage and re-veneer it with PSA veneer.



The first step was to stabalize the existing veneer and strengthen areas that had dry rot. I used a west epoxy with a filler to repair the bottom and top. I also used poly glue and non-stick pads to repair other areas, but the west epoxy was clearly the better choice. I really like the west expoxy since it is not runny and tends to self level.





Once I sanded the out my repairs, removed all the welt and staples, I then applied a PSA birch veneer. I doubt most people have used this stuff, but it's a good option for mess less veneering. The material is about 1/16th of an inch thick with a 3M backing. It's real wood and can be stained or sealed as with any hardwood. Applying the veneer is pretty simple, peal and stick in a nut shell. You will have to use some veneer blades to apply and smooth out the veneer. I really need more clamps!!!!! ;)



Another product that I have mentioned before is Alsa Corp FX sheeting. I bought a small amount to use as highlights in my interior. This is basically brushed aluminum veneer with a 3M backing, much like the psa veneer. You can see a proto-type of the kick board used with the clamp ontop of the chest.




I'll post some finished pictues once I route out the drawers and trip the rest of the veneer.

Doug

What a pain in the back

I told my wife that on Saturday I would do a quick run to lowes and be back to rollerblade in the driveway with our daughter. I kept my word and had a ball, but as soon as my daughter went inside I did the b-line for the shop. Dovetailed one drawer and fitted the bottom mount sliders in place. A productive day. On Sunday afternoon, I decided that the drawer fronts did not look good being flush to the cabinets, so I broke out the originals and crafted a set that were closer to original. They look awesome and have a nicer fit than my more modern ones.

You know you're getting old when you pull a muscle when using a router. Here I was hunched over the work table and pulled a muscle in my back. Now today, I'm sitting very still while on the mend......

For all you vintage restorers or re-mod'rs here are couple products.

The first is for the 50s vintage guys who are sick of their slightly rusted cabinet hinges. Rejuvenation.com has an art deco 3/8" offset hinge which is 95% identical to the ones used by airstream.



The second is for both vintage and re-mod'rs. Part of the problem, but at the same time practical, with the method Airstream used for cabinet drawers was a slide-less drawer system. Meaning, they relied on the friction of the wood and a little notch to keep it closed while in travel. Works nice, but once you upgrade them to modern ball bearing sliders you need a method to lock these cabinet drawers closed. Leevalley.com (which is one of my favorite place for good quality hardware), has these polished nickel push botton latches. I ordered a dozen and will use them in place of the vintage ones from oddie.

>

In prior posts I discussed the position of the AC under the gally, initially I had tought I would position the blower out the right side of the sliding doors. But after careful consideration, I am going to cut a vent on the right side and position the blower behind it. This way the return is on the door side and likely more efficient. In any event, I'll have to include a fan within the trailer to help circulate the cooled air.

Here's a picture of the vent I'll use. This one is square but the one I'll use will be 14'x8'

More Gally Pictures

Last night was a productive evening working on the cabinet. After work I epoxied together the material for the sliding doors, which is 1/8 hard board and 1/8 birch plywood. The birch ply comes from Downes and Reader in Stoughton and is cabinet grade, so there are no gaps an the birch veneer is top quality. I used a west two part epoxy. Once glued I clamped the material between two other pieces of 3/4 ply. Once the epoxy dried, I cut the pieces to shape and then made the sliding door track out of another piece of birch.

The two pictures show the cabinet dry fitted. Nothing is pegged or glued yet and the drawer fronts are just set in place.

The other item that I'm thinking about is how the AC is positioned. Currently it sits with the fan pointing out from under the cabinet, but the return is still on the inside. What I'm thinking of doing is turning the AC sideways and adding in a cutout with a round diffuser on the side. then the return would be where the front is currently. Dave W at Vintagetrailering.com crafted a vent using a round diffuser that caught my eye and it looks sorta modern/commercial/retro at the same time. This might be a good opportunity to build one into my trailer, but it would mean giving up the space next to the cooktop for a fold-up table.

The problem with positioning it this way is that the controls are out of sight. The unit comes with a remote which would solve the problem, but then the 12" round diffuser might not be practical. The other option is to put a rectangular grill there which would be flush, so I could potentially still put a fold-up table there and raise it when the ac is on. Things to think about.


Here are some pictures of my progress. Again, still needs work and veneer. Also, have to cut to fit the back using the original cabinet as a template.... need to taper the the back to fit the contour of the trailer.

Lastly so people don't think I'm loosing my mind on measurements, the far left of the cabinet has a 1/2 gap which will be used to support a divider panel. See prior post for description.

Same DNA? Ok, same cutting board knob

Over the holiday, I didn't just sit on my duff and watch repeats of Ghost in The shell or fly around my daughters inflatable blimp... well not much that is. I started in earnest to put my plans for the new interior to work.... I had already purchased all the materials and I needed to do something with my hands other than eat.

The new gally will be a blend of the old and new. I am sticking to the same layout as the original 56 caravanner, but I am building new and making changes as I like, such as the large rounded corners in the gally. The new gally will be the heart of the camper and will house the circuit breakers, storage for kitchenwares, sink, cook top, and AC. Yes AC, I'm using a portable AC we've used in the house and once used on a trip with the globetrotter. Works great saves me from cutting a huge hole in the roof. I'll vent it directly out the side of the unit through a marine deck vent.

The gally is 2" inches shorter than the original, but the cabinet itself has an extra half inch on the far left to support a vertical divider. The divider takes a little away from the openness of the floorplan, but I wanted to create a little more privacy for the bed area. The divider will also help support a shelf over the gally and over part of the bed. I'll post pictures later of the shelves.

The sink or better said the entire top of the gally was purchased on clearance at my favorite euro furniture store for $25 back in October. I brought it home and put it in my office to ponder what I could do with it.

The cook top replaces the princess stove and will be mounted directly next to the sink I'll be using a 2 burner LP drop in. There are several nice stainless units on the market. You can see on the far right a piece of cardboard which marks the area to be used for the cooktop.

Here are a couple of pictures. One of the original gally and one of the new gally, a work in progress. Still needs work and veneer.