Author Archives: BRF

2015/09/08 (T) Polyurethane

I was awakened at 6:30 AM by heavy rain. I was not sleeping comfortably and had to get up anyway, so I put on my lightweight robe and slippers and took my iPad to the living room. Naturally the cats wanted to be fed so I took care of that and then settled in to put the finishing touches on yesterday’s blog post. The rain lasted for about 20 minutes. I e-mailed the post to myself at 7:15. Linda got up at 7:30 AM so I made coffee but we deferred breakfast until later.

I was thinking about the house battery voltage issues Butch was having and the role of the Vanner battery equalizer in his (and our) house battery system. I did another Google search on “battery equalizer …”, and selected “batter equalizer circuit” from the list. One of the listings was for the original patent application by James D. Sullivan as assigned to Vanner, Inc. ( http://www.google.com/patents/US4479083 ). (I found it interesting that Google has a special directory for patents.) As I expected, it is a DC-to-DC converter and in its most common configuration it is designed to take charge from the upper portion of a series battery pack and supply it to the lower part of such a pack or to any loads connected across just the lower bank.

One of its features is that it looks at the voltage across the entire battery pack and uses a voltage divider network (two resistors in series) to generate a reference voltage that is compared to the voltage across the lower bank. Differences as small as 0.01 volts result in the transfer of charge from the upper to the lower bank when the lower bank has the lower voltage. As implemented for use with buses and other vehicles that have 24/12 dual voltage DC electrical systems the divider network consists of two equal resistors and the reference voltage is 1/2 the overall battery pack voltage. The design can “balance” other configurations, in which the “upper” and “lower” banks do not have the same voltage, by changing the divider resistors to have the correct ratio. I will call Butch again this evening to report what I found and see how things stand with them in general.

When we had consumed a sufficient amount of coffee to be alert enough to work intelligently and safely we went to the garage to finish assembling the left plenum/support box for the built-in sofa. I forced mating pieces into alignment while Linda drove in the screws. These parts dry fit perfectly so this should not have been a problem. I blame the slight misalignment on the corner clamps that I used. I was reminded, once again, that cheap tools are almost never a bargain.

We had breakfast at 8:30 AM; homemade granola with leftover mixed berries. We also spilt a banana that was getting past ripe. As we were finishing our meal I got a call from Steven Weber at Martin Spring with another question on the Webasto system in the Prevost Bus Conversion he is servicing. He had isolated a cracked fuel pipe and needed to order a replacement. I suggested Sure Marine Service but also mentioned Lloyd DeGerald and Darin Hathaway.

Linda needed to spend some time at her desk preparing for a 1 PM meeting with the I.T. department at the University of Michigan Ann Arbor so I took a shower and got dressed to work. I gathered up the laundry, started a load, and then spent some time in the garage sanding pieces of the built-in sofa while Linda showered and got dressed for her meeting. She planned to leave at 11:45 AM. I left at 11:30 and went to Lowe’s to buy tack cloth.

Tack cloth is like sticky cheesecloth and is probably called that because it is “tacky” to the touch. It is used to remove sawdust, drywall dust, and other little tiny particles from surfaces such as sanded wood just prior to the application of finishes. While I was there I looked at inline water separators and inline oilers for use with air compressors supplying air to pneumatic tools. I also looked at copper fittings to see if they had 90 degree elbows that I could use to modify the Aqua-Hot coolant lines that feed the two front fan-coil hear-exchangers.

Linda left before I got home. I moved the laundry to the dryer and went back to the garage to work. I was contemplating what I wanted to do next when Keith pulled up in his truck and trailer. I chose to skip having the lawn mowed this week which will help Keith get the rest of his clients taken care of in his shortened 4-day workweek. The grass has grown since last Monday but not that much and is still short and brown in places. With rain in the forecast today, tomorrow, and Thursday giving it another week should be good for it. I showed him the floor in the bus before he left.

I returned to the bus project and realized that I needed to stain the underside of the built-in sofa shelf as part of it might be visible through the notch in the vertical front panel at the floor. As long as I was staining that I also stained the tops of the plenum/support boxes so they would blend with the two stationary pieces at either end of the seat.

With the staining done I came inside to make a few phone calls. The first one was to Josh Leach at Coach Supply Direct to check on the details of the Corian countertop for the custom desk. Josh said the Corian normally comes bonded to plywood which protects it from cracking in shipment. I want to go ahead and cut the 3/4″ plywood top that will join the two pedestals together. I also wanted to know if his Corian vendor could come out on the afternoon of the 14th to measure and possibly install the countertop by the end of the week. His vendor turns out to be an Amish craftsman who does not “come out and measure” or “come back and install.” Josh said he would check with the vendor to see if he would use my plywood base and also see if he had the Sandstone product in stock.

My next call was to Pat Lintner to check on dinner plans for the upcoming GLCC Surplus and Salvage rally. I need to coordinate with Crimp Supply to have them provide catalogs for the attendees and perhaps speak to the group before dinner. I got his answering machine and left a message.

My third call was to Jim Miteff (N8KUE) returning his call/message from earlier. We had a long chat about RVing and Prevost bus conversions. It’s a big topic and I sometimes forget that I have spent the last 10 years learning about it. When I think back to the beginning of this adventure, however, I recall how exciting yet overwhelming it was initially. I see Jim in the same place, but he is a very quick study and professional researcher so he will get past the overwhelming part fairly quickly.

While I was talking to Jim I heard a loud bang and then another one. They sounded like it had come from within the house. After the second one I got up to investigate. As I peeked out the front door a Consumer’s Energy truck was backing out of the driveway. I flagged the driver down and asked what was up. He said they had detected a leak and that he had just fixed it. I presumed it was at our meter but he wasn’t any more specific than that. I thought it was odd that he did not knock on the door first to let me know he was on site, but I guess they have the right to service their infrastructure. I have smelled gas on that side of the house occasionally ever since they installed it but dismissed it as a “purge valve” doing its thing. We had the same issue at the old house and they kept telling me it was a “vent” mechanism on the meter. I never belief that, but whatever.

I wrapped up my call with Jim, put in another load of laundry, and returned to the garage to apply polyurethane to as much of the built-in sofa pieces as I could. Each piece has to be done in two steps and requires two coats, so that’s four applications that will have to spread out over a couple of days.

There wasn’t much else I could do, and I did not feel like working at my desk, so I hung up the dry laundry and then worked on my iPad in the living room. Linda had made an appointment with Renee to have her hair cut at 4:30 PM. She stopped at Meijer’s on the way home and finally arrived at 5:45 PM. I went back to the garage at 6 PM and applied another coat of polyurethane.

Linda bought an Amy’s Roasted Vegetable pizza for dinner and made a nice salad to go with it. I had some more of the Leelanau Cellars Apricot wine and we had the last two vegan cupcakes for dessert. I tried calling Butch twice but his phone was either off or out of range. I called Pat Lintner again and this time he was home. Saturday dinner will be at a restaurant so that will not be a good time for Crimp Supply to talk to the rally attendees and pass out catalogs. I will call them tomorrow and see what I can arrange.

I headed back to the garage yet again, applied polyurethane to all the surfaces that had not yet been coated, put the brush in the soapy water, sealed up the can, and closed up the garage. I think I have just enough polyurethane left to put one more coat on the top surface of the shelf. I plan to do that in the morning before I start anything else.

On the drive home Linda heard a weather forecast that thunderstorms were headed our way this evening with up to 1″ of rain, strong wind, and possibly small hail. Linda headed off to bed at 8 PM to watch NCIS and I caught the last half of the show. I turned the channel to Create on Detroit PBS and watched A Chef’s Life, a series about a wife and husband who run the Chef & The Farmer restaurant in eastern North Carolina, and then turned the TV off.

I checked the weather with my iPad and it appeared that system had fallen apart although there was still a reduced chance of scattered thunderstorms at 11 PM and again from 2 to 4 AM. I turned the light out at 10:30 PM.

2015/09/07 (M) Grouted

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Linda got up at 6:45 AM to get a shower before Madeline woke up. She peeked in the bedroom at 7:30 and there was no Madeline to be seen! She pushed the door open a little farther and felt some resistance. She looked behind the door and there was Ms. M, playing hide and seek with Grandma Linda. 🙂 Madeline was not fully awake, however, and sat with Linda on the living room sofa and read stories for a while.

All of this was retold to me as I was up late last night working on yesterday’s blog post and did not get up this morning until 8 AM, just in time for breakfast. Breakfast was gluten-free toaster waffles with real maple syrup and mixed berries on the side (blackberries, blueberries, raspberries, and strawberries); simple but delicious.

After breakfast Linda took Madeline to the Brighton Mill Pond Imagination Station Playscape. They needed to return a book to the lending library and Linda wanted to make sure Ms. M had an active morning so she would be tired enough to lie down for her nap at 1 PM.

Bruce grouting the tiles in the hallway by the new bus refrigerator.

I got back to work on the grout immediately after breakfast. My goal was to be done by noon as it needed to cure, undisturbed, for 24 hours before we could clean it and resume working inside the bus. I picked up where I left off last night with the area in front of the refrigerator where the kitchen blends into the hallway. I was now out into the front half of the bus which is much more open than the hallway, bathroom, and bedroom. Also, most of the tiles in this area are full 16 inch squares so I thought I might be able to work faster. That was optimistic to say the least.

It was forecast to be hot today with a high near 90 degrees F and elevated relative humidity. I turned on the front and middle air-conditioners initially but eventually had to turn off the middle unit when I got to the point where I would no longer be able to reach it. I was a bit surprised that the front A-C alone kept the coach comfortable but we are approaching the autumnal Equinox so the transit of the sun is enough lower in the southern sky that the coach is in shade for most of the day.

It felt like I was moving right along but by noon it was obvious that this was going to be an all-day task so I stopped to have lunch. Linda served vegan hotdogs with pickle relish and onions and set out a large bunch of grapes. After lunch I resumed the grouting while Linda and Madeline watched a video. Madeline laid down for her nap right on schedule. Linda then took a few minutes to help me move the Aqua-Hot fan-coil heat exchangers so I could grout the area where they had been sitting on the floor. Linda cleaned up the kitchen and then had some well-deserved and needed quiet time.

I had a call from Butch around 1:30 PM. I was in the middle of applying grout and said I would call him back later. They left on Saturday for the southwest U.S. and were planning to spend this evening at a Walmart near Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. By 5:25 PM I had one small set of inter tile spaces to grout when Linda and Madeline came out to tell me that dinner was ready. I had just finished a section so I had already cleaned my tools. I put the lid back on the grout container and went inside to eat.

Dinner was mock chicken tenders (vegan), green beans, kale chips, sliced plums, and grapes. There was a little left over “gravy” (vegan) from last night so I had that on my chicken. Madeline helped make the kale chips and really liked them. As soon as I was done eating I excused myself from the table and went back to the bus.

I finished grouting the last four grout spaces and then cleaned up the tools and put them away. I also cleaned up the cockpit area of the bus which is where everything ended up as I worked my way out of the living area. I turned off the front A-C and locked the bus. While I did that Linda cleaned up the kitchen and then gathered up all of Madeline’s things.

When I was done with my chores I cleaned up and changed clothes. The three of us then loaded all of Madeline’s things into Linda’s car which has had the car seat in it all weekend. We closed up the house and headed for Ann Arbor. Linda drove so that I could return Butch’s phone call.

Butch had a possible issue with his house battery bank and wanted to discuss it. He bought eight AGM batteries last winter in Quartzsite, Arizona and finally installed them over the summer. They are 12V DC batteries and he has them in a series-parallel configuration to make a 24V DC battery pack with a 12V DC center tap. A 24V Magnum 4024 inverter/charger is connected to the +24V and DC ground and a Vanner Equalizer is connected to those same points and to the 12V center tap, which is where 12V DC loads, like the water pump, draw their power. In addition, Butch wired three LED display voltmeters to the battery pack; one for the lower 12V bank, one for the upper 12V bank, and one for the overall 24V bank.

His issue/concern was that the upper and lower 12V banks were not reading the same voltage. They were different by one volt, which is a lot, and the upper bank had the lower voltage, which I agreed was an odd situation. Without the Vanner Equalizer 12V loads would draw their energy from the lower 12 V bank and as the charge in that bank got depleted the voltage would drop. The Vanner Equalizer’s purpose in the system is to draw charge from the upper battery bank to make up for this depletion and keep the voltage the same, or equalized, on both banks. I presumed that all three voltmeters were accurate and that the Vanner was connected correctly, all of which would be easy enough to check.

After talking about all of this his plan was to temporarily disable the Vanner by removing its connection to battery ground and see what affect that had. He also thought the Vanner might have a circuit breaker and would check to see if it had tripped. I could not confirm or deny whether this would work. I have looked for information on how the Vanner does what it does and not found much although I have found circuit diagrams for other battery equalizers. My presumption is that it is a small inverter/charger, taking DC power from the upper 12V bank, creating some sort of AC waveform, and applying it to one side of a 1:1 transformer. The other side of the transformer sees the same AC waveform, converts it back to 12V DC, and applies it to the lower battery. The transformer is the key as it isolates the two banks relative to ground. I wrapped up the call a few minutes before we got to our destination.

We arrived at Brendan and Shawna’s house at 7:45 PM. They had pulled up just minutes before us and were unloading their car. They had not dropped Jorge at his home yet so we got to visit with him too. Madeline had me read her a book about what happens if you give a cat a cupcake. We stayed until 8:15 PM and offered to drive Jorge home as Brendan and Shawna had to get Madeline to bed and then eat something for dinner. Madeline got out the cupcakes she helped make and offered those for their evening meal. Tomorrow is a work day for her parents and she has to go to her new school. Jorge is also starting a new job as the wine department manager at the new Plum Market on the northeast side of Ann Arbor, so everyone needed their rest this evening.

We were going to stop at Meijer’s supermarket on the way home but encountered rain before we got to the Brighton exit. We stopped at the Shell station instead, filled up the gas tank, and bought two large decaf coffees at the Dunkin Donuts co-located with the station. Back at the house we each had a vegan cupcake and then sat quietly in the living room working on our iPads while enjoying our brew and the company of our cats. By 10 PM Linda was sleepy and went to bed. I was also tired but stayed up longer to finish this post. Scattered thunderstorms were forecast over a several hour period starting at 11:30 PM. That is when I turned off the light but they had not yet started. We could use a good soaking rain so I hope we get one overnight.

2015/09/06 (N) Grouting

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We got up quietly at 7:30 AM as Madeline was still sound asleep. Linda did not want to let her sleep too long and get off schedule so I got the “all clear” to grind the coffee beans just before 8 AM. I made the Costa Rican half-caff because I am trying to use it up so we can replace it with something we like better. Madeline emerged with Grandma Linda a few minutes later. After stretching they decided to sit quietly on the living room sofa and read stories while everyone woke up and the adults enjoyed our coffee.

Sometime between 9:30 and 10 AM we left for the Howell Farmers Market. We walked from one end to the other, with Madeline in her stroller, scoping out this week’s bounty. We then walked back through and Linda bought a few things including hard stem garlic which we had never seen before. We stopped and chatted with our favorite vendor, Marjorie.

When we got home and put the produce away Linda prepared a snack lunch for herself and Madeline. The two of them then went on an outing to the farm at Kensington Metropark (KMP) while I stayed behind to work on bus projects. I decided to start by finishing the assembly of the pieces for the built-in sofa. I attached the center support for the return air shelf as follows:

I determined the center of the long edges of the shelf and drew a line between them.
I carried these center marks to the other side and then measured 3/8″ to either side.
I connected corresponding marks to create a pair of parallel lines 3/4″ apart and centered on the underside of the shelf.
I placed the support in position, determined its fore-aft position, and marked the ends.
I then marked a piece of scrap wood, cut it into four pieces, and used them to hold the support in place; two long pieces the same length as the support, and two short pieces across the ends.
This allowed me to turn the shelf right side up with the center support held in the correct place and then mark and drill countersunk pilot holes for the screws.
I removed the support piece, sanded off any rough spots, put Titebond II wood glue on the edge, and replaced it between the temporary blocking.
I stood on the shelf to force the pieces together and ran all the screws down tight.
I then removed the temporary blocking.

After sleeping on it last night I decided I would attach the plenum/support boxes to the vertical front panel and the wood wire chase on top of the HVAC chase rather than to the adjacent cabinets or to the floor. That meant I could go ahead and assemble them as complete, single units. Easier said than done.

Even though I used right angle corner clamps the two halves I built for each box did not want to go together perfectly. I managed to get one of them assembled but could not complete the other one by myself. The problem was that I needed both hands to pull the pieces into alignment and two more hands to operate the drill and screw gun.

By now it was 1 PM, which is Madeline’s normal nap time, but they were not back from the Metropark yet so I gathered up all of the tools and materials I needed to grout the floor tiles in the bus. That included the special Armstrong S-288 Glacier White sanded vinyl grout, a flat blade screwdriver, the 4″x8″ hard edge float, the smaller margin trowel, the 2″ putty knife (wall scraper), the ScotchBrite sponges, the Revel scrubber, two large buckets for rinse water, paper towels, a large cloth towel, and paper bags.

Madeline pets one of the sheep at the Kensington Metropark animal farm.

Since Linda and Madeline had still not returned I had a few pretzels with hummus. They finally got home around 1:30 PM and I heard all about the farm and the animals Ms. M got to see and touch. The 2-day old piglets were apparently a big hit but so was the playroom. It was a good outing and I wish I could have gone but I got stuff done that needed to be done.

Madeline finally laid down for her nap at 2 PM but Linda could not help me with the tile grouting as she needed to be within earshot of Madeline’s bedroom. I decided that we could not afford any further delay for this aspect of the interior remodeling project and resolved to do it by myself. Without Linda to walk me through the steps, have materials ready, and clean the tools, I needed to be very clear about the steps and their timing. I must have read the directions on the container of grout a dozen times in an attempt to internalize them but they just would not stick with me. I needed a spray bottle for water so Linda found one for me.

The afternoon was very warm so I turned off the air-conditioning in our home library, closed up the coach, and turned on two of the three air-conditioners, making sure they were on opposite legs of the electrical service. I staged all of the stuff in the bedroom storage box as I planned to start on the back side of the bed in the driver side corner by the head of the bed and work my way out.

I finally got started at 2:30 PM. The grouting involved a specific set of steps that got repeated many times as the directions said to only do 6 – 10 sq. ft. at a time. That range had to do with the time required to apply and strike the grout, setup time (3 – 8 minutes), misting with water, waiting 20-30 seconds, scrubbing, and finally wiping with a square edged cellulose sponge. I had to divide the U-shaped bedroom floor into six sections and it took me until 5:30 PM to do that much so my average time was 30 minutes per section, each of which was smaller than 6 square feet.

I took a short break, had something to drink, and checked with Linda on the timing of dinner. We settled on 6:30 PM and I returned to my grouting. I had to do the bathroom floor in two sections, which got me into the hallway and joined up with the work from the bedroom. I went in to clean up for dinner and was greeted by the smell of something baking. Madeline wanted to make cupcakes so Linda assembled the ingredients and walked her through the steps, letting her do as much of the work as possible. For not even being three years old yet she is very interested in cooking, but only if it is something she will get to eat! 🙂

Dinner was vegan cheeseburgers, corn-on-the-cob (from the Farmers Market), left over black beans and edamame, and sliced pears. I worked in the bus from 7 to 8 PM and finished the hallway as far as the bend that transitions into the kitchen. I cleaned all of the tools and sealed the grout container using Cling-Wrap pressed down onto the surface of the grout to keep air away from it, and locked up the bus.

I washed up and turned on the Yaesu FTM-400 2m/70cm radio in the ham shack while Linda helped Madeline take a bath. Steve, N8AR, was serving as net control for the weekly SLAARC information net and had already started the net but not yet called for check-ins so I got to participate in the entire net. We had a small group this evening, most likely due to it being a holiday weekend, but it was still a good net.

I came upstairs to have dessert with Linda and Madeline; chocolate cupcakes (vegan) with sprinkles. Yum. I then returned to my office to re-read an article I wrote about replacing the speedometer in the bus and editing it to indicate where the pictures should be placed. I dealt with several BCM related e-mails and then came upstairs.

Madeline was in her pajamas and sitting in her portable bed while Linda read a story. She decided that she wanted me to read a couple stories too, so I did. We got her tucked in with her stuffed animals arranged at the four corners of her bed, turned on the night light, and left her to fall asleep.

I opened the bottle of Apricot wine that Brendan and Shawna picked up from Leelenau Cellars and we each had a small glass. I worked on this post while Linda cleaned up the kitchen. It had been a long and very tiring day for both of us but a very satisfying and productive day as well. We don’t mind that kind of tired.

2015/09/05 (S) Building the Built-in

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We set the alarm for 7 AM as we had to return the 100 pound floor roller to The Home Depot by 8:08 AM. We got the roller out of the bus, reattached the transport wheels, and loaded it into the back of my car. We positioned it so that Linda could hold on to the handle while I drove. One-hundred pounds that is designed to roll is not something you want loose in your car. We got to the store at 7:40 AM but the associate was busy renting a ditch digging machine to someone. We had to wait 15 minutes but that was OK. After returning the roller we drove back to the house so Linda could get her car and our iPads and then drove separately to Panera in Brighton.

Linda had her usual Everything bagel and I had my usual Cinnamon Swirl & Raisin bagel, both sliced and toasted with nothing on them. Two large coffees rounded out the order. The coffee was hot and did not have grounds in it (for a change). For some reason we got an extra Everything bagel that we did not order so which we split it.

Linda left at 9 AM to drive to Ann Arbor to pick up grand-daughter Madeline who will be with us until sometime on Monday. Her mom and dad are attending a wedding on Sunday in Madison, Wisconsin so they are driving over today and driving back on Monday. I stayed at Panera getting my money’s worth of coffee while finishing yesterday’s blog post and starting on today’s missive.

I left Panera at 9:45 and stopped for gasoline at the Shell station on the way home. $2.29/gallon. I would love to see $2/gallon gasoline again. Better yet, I would love to see $2/gallon diesel fuel. Linda planned to stop at the grocery store on the way back but I wanted to start a load of laundry and be home when Linda got back to the house with Madeline.

I got the laundry sorted and the first load started and then spent a little time at my desk. I had to reset a password for someone on the SLAARC website and I logged in I was reminded that WordPress 4.3 was now available. There were seven other updates available as well; three plug-ins and four themes. I don’t use any of those themes and should probably delete them, but for now I just updated WP and then updated everything else. I then logged in to our personal website, the FMCA-GLCC website, and the FMCA Freethinkers website and did the same updates.

While I was in our personal website I cleared out the 104 spam comments that had accumulated since my last house cleaning. In the Freethinkers website I activated all of the plug-ins except Wordfence. I have problems with this website and tech support at iPower says it is the Wordfence plug-in that is at fault. They ask for permission to deactivate it and I give them permission but ask that they only disable that one plug-in. Instead they disable ALL of them; every time. I would really like to move this website to QTH.com and I may just do that as an add-on domain to our account. Unfortunately our e-mail reflectors are set up on through the iPower account and I doubt that the club will want to pay for two different web hosting services.

It was a nicer day than we have had for most of the week, cooler with clearer skies and a nice breeze, so I opened up the windows in the motorcoach and turned on all three ceiling exhaust fans to air out the interior and get rid of the lingering smell from the floor tile adhesive. (Yes, that is one, long sentence, but since I have added this one, it is now a proper paragraph rather than a single sentence paragraph.)

Linda and Madeline stopped at the Whole Foods Market in Ann Arbor, which is not far from our son and daughter-in-law’s house, and got to our house at 11 AM. Madeline and I helped Grandma Linda unload the groceries and put them away. I moved a few things from the front hallway into the library where Linda put most of the bus drawers last night (three of them are in our bedroom). Madeline wanted her inflatable porta-bed set up so Linda took care of that. Once her bedroom was arranged we got out her toy box and started playing with things. She also had a couple of bags of things she brought with her and got a small soccer ball out of one of them. We had a great time throwing and rolling it around the living room. It is always wonderful to see the pure joy of a young child at play doing something as simple as this.

By 12:30 PM Madeline was ready for lunch so Linda made a PB&J sandwich and washed some green grapes. She washed some black organic grapes for us and I had a few pretzels dipped I Sabra Roasted Red Pepper Hummus. It’s my favorite hummus from them, or pretty much anyone else.

After Madeline laid down for her afternoon nap at 1 PM Linda and I both got busy with chores. As much as I would like to have taken today off, at least from hands and knees work, we only had eight days left to get some significant tasks accomplished on the bus. In terms of a critical path view of the overall project the critical task is grouting the floor tile that we finished installing at 9 PM last night. Not only will it take some time to do but once it is done it cannot be walked on for 24 hours. As much as it needed to be done, however, I needed a day of not being on my hands and knees. If I get it done on Sunday I can resume work inside the coach on Monday.

While Linda made a batch of granola I worked on assembling some of the pieces for the built-in sofa. My plan was to fully assemble the two plenum boxes that will support the ends of the plywood seat, and I intended to do that by gluing and screwing the four pieces together for each. In order to do that I needed screws of the appropriate type (#6 SR) and length (1-1/4″) so I went to Lowe’s to get them. While I was there I looked at continuous hinges and angle brackets but did not buy any. I need a 72″ hinge but all they had were 48″, 30″, and 12″. I may be able to use two 30″ and one 12″ but I need to check the actual dimension. I also needed a #6 drill but with an integral countersink but Lowe’s did not seem to have what I needed so I went to The Home Depot and found something there.

I think this marking scribe belonged to my mother’s father and is at least 100 years old.

Back home I was getting all of my tools and supplies ready when I realized that I would not be able to attach the plenum/support boxes to the adjacent cabinets if they were fully assembled. This was an example of incomplete design; either I have forgotten how I planned to anchor these boxes, changed my thinking about this in the time since I did the design work, or never figured out this detail in the first place.

Ideally I could anchor them in a way that does not destroy the cabinets or the floor. One way to accomplish that would be to attach them to the HVAC plenum at the back and the vertical front support board using angle brackets, and to the top of the wiring chase above the HVAC plenum via the two filler strips on either side of the seat. If I do that I can fully assemble the two plenum/support boxes before installing them.

For now I only assembled half-boxes with one side piece attached to the bottom piece and the other side piece attached to the top piece. I built one of them for the left end and the other one for the right end. What this leaves open as an option is screwing the side/bottom assembly to its adjacent cabinet and then screwing the other assembly to the first one without using any glue. The dry assembly would allow everything to be disassembled later if needed.

Madeline was up by this time and helped Grandma Linda put the new seed block in the bird feeder. They then walked around to the front of the garage to see what Grandpa Bruce was doing. I showed them my tools and the pieces of wood and explained how everything was going to work and fit together.

Two pieces of one of the plenum boxes held at right angles for gluing and screwing.

I aligned the pieces being joined, which are all 3/4″ cabinet grade 13 ply plywood, using two corner clamps. I then scribed a line 3/8″ from the edge of the piece that was sitting on the edge of the other piece. I marked screw locations every two inches with the spacing centered along the line. I drilled pilot holes with countersinking to ensure the screw heads would be below the surface of the wood. I disassembled the two pieces, leaving the piece that the screws would go in first in the clamps, and sanded off any rough edges. I ran screws part way into each hole so the tips protruded just enough to put the two pieces back into alignment when they were rejoined. I applied Titebond II wood glue to the edge piece spread it out, and wiped off my finger with a wet cloth. I inserted the edge piece back into the clamps, used the screws to make sure it was aligned, tightened the clamps, and ran the screws most of the way down. I then loosened the clamps holding the edge piece and drew it up tight by running the screws all the way down. I used a wet towel to wipe off the excess glue that was squeezed from the joint and set it aside to dry. I took a lot of pictures too.

The center portion of the storage space under the seat will have an elevated platform with closed ends to create a plenum for the OTR HVAC return air. I assembled the two end pieces to the ends of the platform using the same method I used for the plenum/support boxes. There is also a support piece for the middle of the platform but I cannot use the clamps to hold it in position relative to the platform so I will have to do something else. I was thinking that I did not feel like tackling that task when Linda and Madeline came back to the garage to let me know it was almost time for dinner. Saved by the food bell, I closed up the garage and went inside to eat.

Linda set out some carrot slivers, diced peaches, and home grown cherry tomatoes. She cooked some mock chicken patties and heated up some vegan gravy to go with them as a main course. For sides she heated black beans, edamame, and vegan Mac-n-cheese. We all enjoyed our meal.

Madeline really enjoys the swings at the Brighton Mill Pond Imagination Station Playscape.

Our son let Linda know that Madeline had not been sleeping through the night recently and had developed a sensitivity to noises. Linda figured Madeline might sleep better if she engaged in some vigorous play after dinner and suggested that we go to the Brighton Mill Pond Imagination Station Playscape. Ms. M liked the idea but wanted to make sure I was coming too. I found a reasonably good parking spot and pushed her over in the stroller because she does not like to walk for the sake of walking. But once we got to the playscape she was in “go mode.” As the sun set and the light faded we strollered her over to Jack’s for a scoop of vanilla ice cream with sprinklers. We then strollered her back to the car and drove home.

Linda had promised Madeline that she could watch a video before she went to bed. She had selected an episode of Daniel Tiger, an animated children’s program based on the Daniel Striped Tiger character from the old Mr. Rogers TV program. We had Shawna’s iPad with access to her Netflix account but the program was downloading slower than molasses poured on a cold day. We had problems with video, then audio, but eventually got it to work after I turned off the Wi-Fi transceiver on my smartphone. Linda got Madeline ready for bed while fiddled with the technology.

After the video Grandma Linda carried Ms. M around to look at all her favorite artwork, a bedtime ritual that goes back to the first time she ever stayed at our house overnight.

2015/09/04 (F) 100 Pounds

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We set our alarm for 6 AM, got up, had granola for breakfast, and then went to The Home Depot to rent a 100 pound floor roller. The roller consists of three steel rollers, each about 4″ wide and 6″ in diameter, on a common axle. A three foot long handle attaches to the axle between the middle and outside rollers. A pair of small wheels attach to the crossbar at the base of the handle for transport and can be swung up out of the way or removed. We rolled the roller out to our car and loaded it into the back. We then went back inside and purchased up a hard edge grout float, a small offset float, sponges, a bucket, and a bottle of Armstrong Once and Done floor cleaning concentrate.

Bruce rolls the floor tiles in the kitchen with the 100 lb. roller.

Once we got home we got right to work on the bus. We had a few pieces of vinyl tile that still needed to be cut and installed at the front of the bus and that took us over an hour. Once that was done it was time to glue the tiles down. I got the Armstrong S-288 adhesive and the trowel. We read the directions on the adhesive bucket and finally figured out that I should probably not spread more adhesive than could apply in about 20 minutes as the product is time sensitive. The adhesive would then have to set until it was tacky but did not transfer to my finger when touched, which would be 10 to 30 minutes, but we would need to have the tiles set within an hour of when I started spreading the adhesive. The tiles then needed to be rolled with the 100 pound roller.

We started in the center of the coach and installed the tiles as follows: 1) Remove selected tiles; 2) Spread adhesive; 3) Clean up tools while adhesive cured; 4) Lay tiles carefully back in place; and 5) Roll the freshly set tiles. It sounds easy and straightforward enough, but each step had its own issues.

For Step 1) we had to agree on how to remove and stack the tiles so they were in the correct order for installation and to remove them so as not to disturb the surrounding tiles. At Step 2) I had to be careful not get adhesive on anything except the area of the floor I was working on. I also had to make sure the working area was completely covered but also completely troweled off correctly. In Step 3) the tools needed to be cleaned before the adhesive set so we could use warm soapy water to clean them. Once set, the adhesive would have to be cleaned off with mineral spirits. Step 4) was the most critical. The tiles get installed once the adhesive has set to the touch, i.e. still pliable but no transfer when touched. The adhesive effectively acts like a contact cement–it is not possible to slide a tile once it is down–so getting each tile correctly positioned on the first try was critical. Step 5) was the easiest, once we got the 100 pound floor roller out of the car and into the bus. The tiles needed to be rolled as soon as they were installed, which was easy except for the limited confines of the bus interior.

We ended up doing this six times in the following order:

Kitchen;
Built-in sofa portion of the living room;
Front passenger side of living room’
Hallway;
Foot and front side of bed;
Rear side of bed; and
Bathroom.

This corresponded roughly to the order in which we had done the dry fit and it was critical that the central tiles get installed in exactly the right locations. We used plastic spacers at all tile intersections and between tile edges where needed. (The spacers were 2-sided. One side was an X for use where four tile corners meet. The other side had three tabs in line for use between the edges of two adjacent tiles.) These spacers were removed when we pulled the tiles out and replaced when we installed them. We also divided the job up to keep the number of tiles being set to a small enough number that we could meet the time requirements of the adhesive and to make sure we did not get trapped in the back of the coach. We finally installed the last piece (for now) at 9 PM. We had short breaks for lunch and dinner but each cycle of this process took about 90 minutes.

Bruce spreads Armstrong vinyl floor adhesive in the hallway.

My knees were sore by the time we quit. They have never done well with kneeling due to the boney lumps that resulted from Osgood-Slaughter’s disease in my late pre-teens. Occasionally kneeling down on one of the spacers, which had pointy centers on one side, did not help. I probably got down and up at least 100 times throughout the day, maybe more, which was hard enough all by itself. Although I am in better health and physical shape than I was in my 30’s and 40’s at 63 I am certainly not in the prime of my youth. At one time Linda and I had a hundred pounds or more to lose between us. Time, use, and the abuse of being overweight have inevitably taken their toll on our joints. At the end of the day I was left thinking that flooring work is a young person’s game. Whether hardwood, carpet, tile, or even continuous sheet vinyl, much of the work is done on your hands and knees, or bent over, and it is tough work.

I took a long, hot shower and then Linda took her shower while I checked e-mail. We had some Coconut Bliss ice cream with fresh strawberries and then turned in. We watched an episode of Joseph Rosendo’s Travelscope, set the alarm for 7 AM, and went to sleep.

2015/09/03 (R) Floored

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I turned the lights out at 11:30 PM last night so I was starting to wake up at 6:30 AM this morning and finally got up at 7 AM. We have had light to moderate fog the last few mornings which always coincides with very still air. It is a calm, quiet time to gaze out over our own personal “misty moors” and appreciate where we are and the lifetime of work that got us here.

Linda was still sound asleep so I closed the bedroom door to shield her from the noise of the coffee grinder. That was probably unnecessary as she was sleeping with her good ear down, but I did want to wake her prematurely. I ground up 8 scoops of the Cafe Europe (reg) / Columbian (decaf) blend which yielded nine scoops of grounds. I have figured out over time that to make 9 cups of coffee takes about 10 cups of water as that quantity of grounds absorbs and holds almost a cup. (These are 6 ounce coffee “cups,” of course, not real 8 ounce cups.) More importantly the strength of the coffee seems to come out right.

Once the coffee was brewing I washed out the grinder reservoir and wiped out the grinder. It seems to hold coffee grounds as if they were magnetic and being relatively fine particles they get into all of the small nooks and crannies. Why a coffee grinder has small nooks and crannies is one of those product design questions that suggest the designer(s) never actually used their product for its intended purpose.

My main reason for getting up early was that it was no longer comfortable to stay in bed. My lower right back has been sore for over a week now and is worse when lying down than when working, much of which has been on my hands and knees. My secondary reason for arising early was that I wanted to get an earlier start working on the bus today. We need to finish the dry layout of the vinyl tile floor today so I can apply the adhesive tomorrow, with Linda’s help, before we have Madeline for the weekend starting Saturday sometime.

I assumed my usual position on one of the living room sofas with our male cat, Jasper, at my right side, and quietly enjoyed my coffee while doing some online research and starting this blog post. Speaking of which, I am now (once again) over six weeks behind in uploading posts to our blog. By the time we are done working in the evening and have had dinner I need what little time and energy I have left to write the draft post for that day. Uploading them is a whole different process that also takes time and thought. I am determined, however, to be caught up before we leave for the winter and to post daily while we are away. Being behind is not fun for me, and posts that are 4 – 8 weeks old are probably not interesting to anyone who might read the blog.

I need a very specific trowel, an Armstrong S-891, to apply the Armstrong S-288 vinyl tile adhesive. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, The Home Depot and Lowe’s do not sell this trowel or one even remotely similar. Lowe’s did, however, have a plastic spreader that has the correct notch size and spacing. Someone in the floor department at one of the stores suggested we try Blakely’s Supply in Wixom so I plan to call them this morning. Don at Lynch Carpet in Howell, where we got the tile and adhesive, mentioned another place so I may have to call them back and get the name of the business.

We’ve had the tile since early July so we could have taken care of this a long time ago but didn’t. As much as I tried to “work ahead” with respect to the design of the project, procurement of materials, and contracting with the cabinet maker we did not attend to everything in a timely manner. Exhibit #1 is the wallpaper, which had a 2-week lead time, and exhibit #2 is this trowel. Overall we have done well keeping things moving along and in retrospect this will look like a well-planned and smoothly executed project, but right now I need something that I don’t have. 🙁

I called Blakely’s at 8:30 AM. They do not carry Armstrong products but they did have a trowel that matched the specifications of the S-891. They had one in stock so I asked them to hold for me. With the Labor Day weekend almost upon us we decided to drive to Wixom and buy the trowel before busying ourselves in the bus.

The round trip would have taken an hour but we went to The Home Depot in Howell before returning to the house and bus. This particular Home Depot has a tool rental operation and we wanted to see if they had a 100 pound floor roller. They did. In fact, they had two of them; $22/day (24 hours). If I call before they close tonight they will hold one for me to pick up in the morning between 6 – 8 AM.

By the time we got home we were finally a little bit hungry and had our usual breakfast of homemade granola with fresh blueberries and banana. Thunderstorms were forecast for today so we brought the saber saw into the bus so we would not have to walk outside to the garage to use it.

We resumed working in the bathroom and got all of the tiles for that space measured, cut, and fitted into place. We then continued from the hallway into the bedroom and up the front side of the bed towards the driver’s side of the coach. It seems that our pace has slowed yesterday and today but that’s not really the case. What has happened is that all of the pieces have to be cut, some of them along four or five lines that cannot all be scored and snapped, and we are working in a much more confined space that makes it difficult to make accurate measurements.

By 3:30 PM we were part way down the foot of the bed and decided to take a lunch break. Linda made sandwiches on toasted rye bread with vegan deli slices, onion, tomato, and lots of power greens. She chatted briefly with our son about arrangements for this weekend and then we got back to work at 4:30 PM.

The rain that had been forecasted for most of the day finally arrived but did not affect our work as we had everything inside that we needed. We worked until 7 PM and finished the floor tiles in the bedroom. That left five or six pieces to be cut at the front where the main floor and cockpit meet. My sister called and I said I would call her back when we were done. We figured it would take at least an hour to finish these pieces. We were tired and hungry and decided to defer this work until first thing tomorrow morning. We shut off the air-conditioners, turned off the lights, and locked the bus.

While Linda prepared dinner I cleaned the cat’s litter tray, checked my e-mail, and replied to one from BCM. Dinner was fresh steamed broccoli, whole grain bread, and mock chicken with orange sauce. Another Gardein product, the “chicken” was very tasty.

I called my sister back after dinner and we had a long chat which wrapped up just before 10 PM. Linda and I went to bed and settled in. I was finishing up this post around 11 PM when it started raining. From the sound it was quite a downpour but it did not last even 15 minutes.

2015/09/02 (W) Dry Fitting

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I turned the lights off at midnight last night so I was awake at 7 AM this morning and got out of bed at 7:15. I fed the cats and then closed the bedroom door while I ground the coffee beans so as not to disturb Linda, who was still sound asleep. I was having my first cup while finishing yesterday’s blog post and enjoying the company of Jasper, our male cat, when Linda emerged at 8:15, got a cup of coffee, and joined me. Juniper, our female cat, was quickly in her lap.

Around 8:25 AM we heard a clap of thunder, which got the cats’ attention, and then it started raining. Linda pulled up the weather radar on her iPad and there was a small but intense cell moving in our direction. More thunder sent the cats scurrying for a safe hiding place but by 8:40 the storm had passed.

Having had a large, late supper last night we decided to skip breakfast and by 9 AM we were ready to get back to work on the bus. Our goal was to finish dry fitting the Armstrong Alterna Luxury Vinyl Tiles by the end of the day. We are at the point where we have placed all of the full 16″ x 16″ tiles so everything that is left has to be cut to fit. In order to help make that possible I turned on all three air-conditioners and set the thermostats for 75 degrees F.

We started by cutting two pieces that had to follow rather intricate profiles, one by the right side of the refrigerator alcove and the other at the forward end of the kitchen cabinets. We then filled in most of the edge pieces in the living room and kitchen, which is actually just one large space. We continued down the hallway as we needed to “lock in” the locations of the tiles before moving into the bedroom.

We were finally a little hungry by noon so we stopped to have lunch. Linda made a yummy fruit salad with strawberries, blueberries, peaches, and bananas blended with vegan blueberry yogurt.

Dry fit floor tiles viewed from the hallway looking towards the kitchen and living room.

After lunch we worked on the area at the rear end of the hallway where the entrances to the bathroom and bedroom are located. Our original plan was to have the tile laid out with continuous grout lines but the reality is that the layout needed to be balanced and we needed to avoid tiny triangular pieces and skinny strips of tile. After much deliberation and measuring we concluded that we would have to offset a tile as we came into the bedroom, placing the forward corner at the center of the adjacent tile edge. We also had to employ a “slight of hand” by having a tile with other tiles on all four edges that was not, in fact, a 16″ x 16″ square. It turned out to be 16″ by 14.75″ but that shape allowed us to maintain the grout lines. The difference is surprisingly subtle and I doubt that anyone will notice it. Hopefully we won’t either after a while.

With those key decisions made we did an approximate fit past the end of the bed and around to the side at the rear of the coach. Once we were satisfied that the tiles would lay out in a reasonable way along both sides of the bed and across the foot we resumed measuring, cutting and fitting the tiles from the hallway into the bedroom.

Cutting and fitting pieces has to be done with careful measuring and cutting and is slow work. By 6:30 PM I no longer had sufficient light to work in the bedroom and it was clear we were not going to achieve our goal of finishing the dry fit today. The lighting in the bathroom, which is mostly artificial, was good enough to keep working in there so we installed two more pieces. One of them required us to remove a long narrow strip from an edge. We used a hair dryer to gently warm the edge of the tile on the back side and then cut it. It wasn’t exactly like cutting butter, but we were able to remove the narrow piece without using the saber saw.

By then it was 7 PM and we were done for the day. We also wanted to have dinner before it got too much later. Linda made a couple of large salads with all kinds of good things. After dinner I started up my computer, checked e-mail, and replied to several. I then drove to The Home Depot in search of an Armstrong S-891 trowel or something equivalent. They did not have anything even close to what I needed so I went to Lowe’s. They did not have what I was looking for either but they did have a 4″ x 6″ plastic adhesive spreader that appeared to have the correct tooth size and spacing on one edge so I bought one. It was $1.36 before sales tax. (I probably spent that much in gasoline for the round trip.)

While I was gone Linda searched online for additional installation information and “how-to” videos. She located the S-891 on Armstrong’s website so we finally knew what it looked like. It’s a serious metal trowel with an open handle design and would be much easier to use than the plastic spreader. If we had taken the time to deal with this on Monday we could have ordered one on Amazon and had it here tomorrow, but we didn’t. I will probably call around in the morning and see if anyone locally has them. If not, the plastic spreader will have to do. I cannot wait until the middle of next week to glue and grout the tiles.

We watched an episode of Rick Steve’s Europe and then an episode of Music Voyager before going to sleep.

2015/09/01 (T) Tiling Kate

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We both slept until 8 AM this morning and even then got up slowly and reluctantly. We probably need a day off to rest, relax, and catch up on some not-so-physical tasks, but now is not the time. There is too much to do and time is slipping by. The fact that hot weather, muggy weather is forecast for the rest of the week probably had some effect on our enthusiasm for getting back to work. We should probably get up at 6 AM and quit working by early afternoon, but I am not on a sleep schedule that accommodates those hours.

We had our usual homemade granola with blueberries, split a banana, and had OJ/GFJ to wash down our vitamins. I made Ethiopian Yirgacheffe half-caff coffee, but not as much as usual. We enjoyed our coffee in the living room with our cats and finally got back to work at 10 AM.

Dry fit of Armstrong Alterna floor tiles. The starting point was where the kitchen was where the kitchen transitions into the hallway.

Today was one of the milestone days we have been working towards all summer; we (finally) started laying out (dry fitting) the new floor tiles. I had done two layouts on 1/4″ grid paper back in early June; one with the sides of the tiles parallel and perpendicular to the centerline of the bus floor, the other with the sides turned 45 degrees. We both liked the turned layout better so I used it to estimate the number of tiles we needed and placed the order back in mid-June. They took a few weeks to arrive but they have been sitting flat in their boxes since early July waiting to be installed.

My original drawing has tiles lined up with opposite corners on the centerline of the floor, although it looks good on paper there was no way I could draw it at a scale that allowed me to accurately account for the 1/8″ grout spacing. The drawing was just a “proof of concept” and a starting point for the actual layout.

We laid tiles out according to the plan from a starting point in front of the refrigerator that would allow one of the grout lines to go down the center of the hallway in front of the pantry. Unfortunately that did not allow the tiles to reach the front edge of the floor by the cockpit or work out well for the toe kick space under the kitchen base cabinets or hallway running back to the bathroom and bedroom.

A famous problem in mathematics is finding convex polygons that can “tile the plane.” What this means is that the polygon can fit together with itself perfectly so that there are no gaps. Some of Escher’s artwork was based on the use of such polygons and that is the context in which most people would be familiar with this concept. Among “regular” polygons, which are equilateral and equiangular, triangles, squares, and pentagons can tile the plane. So can right triangles and parallelograms, which includes the rhombus. Beyond that it gets a bit tricky and someone just recently discovered a previously unknown irregular pentagon using a computer program to systematically examine a very large number of possibilities.

What does that have to do with our bus remodeling project? Not much, really, beyond the obvious fact that the new vinyl floor tiles for our motorcoach are squares with an edge length of 16 inches. Floor tiles are almost universally square in shape because they are easy to manufacture and can be laid out on a floor in several different ways. Finding a way that fits a particular space in a balanced way is the tricky part, however, and more so in this case because the tiles need to form a continuous pattern of grout lines (if possible) while working their way down the hall and into the bathroom and bedroom.

We shifted the string of tiles running down the centerline towards the kitchen cabinets on the driver’s side of the bus so the corners just reached the recessed base. We then shifted them towards the rear of the coach to get reasonable size pieces at the front edge by the cockpit. We filled in some tiles to either side of the main fore-aft string to make sure they would make it to the edges with reasonable size pieces. When it was clear that this positioning was going to provide a balanced installation in the kitchen and living room we started working our way down the hallway and into the bathroom.

The tiles continued to fall into place and fit well in the bathroom but did not flow into the bedroom quite the way we wanted. We may have to offset a grout line as we transition from the hallway to the bedroom but were otherwise satisfied with our dry fitting. We returned to the front of the coach and placed every full tile that we could. We then started trimming tiles to fill in smaller pieces. We limited ourselves to pieces that had one or two straight cuts and no notches or tabs.

It was 4:30 PM by the time we got to the door of the bathroom and bedroom threshold, where a critical decision would need to be made regarding the offsetting of a grout line. We have learned that the end of the work day is not a good time to make critical decisions. With company coming in a couple of hours we quit working and got cleaned up.

I sat in the living room and worked on this post. Kate sent a text message at 5:30 PM that she was leaving Wayne RESA and heading our way. We figured she would get here at 6:30 and that is when she arrived. She brought a dip that she made from cannelloni beans, garlic, and lemon juice, some baby carrots, and some pretzel chips. We enjoyed the appetizers with some Bell’s Oberon beer while we chatted about work, travel, and family. Kate travels every chance she gets, usually with her S.O. Brian but sometimes by herself. Europe is a favorite destination but she frequently visits family members all across the U.S.A. and sometimes overseas.

After catching up a bit we gave Kate a tour of the bus interior. She liked the new floor tiles and our choice of seat fabric but was suitably impressed with the pull-out pantry which pleased us. I turned off the three residential air-conditioners as we exited the bus. Linda then got busy preparing dinner while I showed Kate the pieces of the custom desk and built-in sofa. I turned on the A-C in the library (where the desk and sofa pieces are stored) to cool it off and lower the humidity. It had been off all day since we were running the main house A-C plus the three A-C units in the coach.

Dinner was ready at 8:30 PM, a simple but tasty meal of burgers and fries with a second round of Bell’s Oberon beer. (Linda bought a real beef patty and got a slice of real cheddar cheese for Kate.) We had fresh strawberries and Coconut Bliss non-dairy ice cream for dessert and then continued to chat about photography, cameras, travel, and the low power Radio station, AM 1700, that Brian runs in Ypsilanti. A local blogger does a weekly interview show that Brian then podcasts. The most recent one was an interview with a professor from U of M Ann Arbor who wrote a book that was recently made into a movie (Diary of a Young Girl). The podcast was “liked” by Sarah Vowel, who is sometimes featured on “This American Life.” Very cool.

Kate had to go to work in the morning and left around 10:15 PM. Linda went straight to bed but I had a couple of things to take care of first. I had initiated the download of an updated NVidia GeForce driver for my ASUS laptop computer. I e-mailed several documents to my sister Patty, and then downloaded the final draft of the August/September Bus Conversion Magazine, proofread my two articles, and e-mailed a couple corrections to the publisher. I installed the driver update and then went to bed. I wrote for a while and finally turned out the light at midnight and fell asleep.

2015/08/31 (M) A Major Sub-Project Done

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We both took Advil PM before bed last night as both of us were sore and tired from a long day of work and needed a good night’s sleep. We awoke at 8 AM to dense fog but it was not unexpected as I saw the advisory on the weather forecast before I went to sleep last night. I made a pot of the Costa Rican half-caff coffee while Linda washed blueberries and got our granola ready. We enjoyed our coffee in the living room with the cats on our laps and listened to Dr. Michael Greger’s daily research summary on NutrionFacts.org.

We were still a bit tired and sore but finally got back to work on the bus at 10:30 AM just as Keith showed up to mow the grass. After opening up the bus and the “workshop”(garage), and getting out the air-compressor and hooking it up, we got the piece of underlayment out of the bedroom that we cut last night but still needed to trim. I cut about 1/8″ off of the passenger side end and cut off the front corner on that end so it would clear the piece of vertical trim. With those adjustments it dropped into place and I stapled most of it to the subfloor. I would have stapled the whole piece but we ran out of staples.

We had already measured and drawn the second piece for the bedroom but without staples we were at a standstill. Linda needed to pick up a few things at the grocery store, so we closed up the house and bus and made an errand run. I dropped her at Meijer’s and drove across the street to Lowe’s. I bought another pack of 1,000 #18 staples, 3/4″ with 1/4” crown because that was the smallest quantity they sell. I also picked up a small bottle of pneumatic tool oil. I drove back to Meijer’s and waited in the parking lot for Linda to emerge. When she did she had eight grocery bags. I guess “a few things” is relative. She got a real hamburger patty and one slice of real cheese from the deli to serve to Kate tomorrow night.

Once we had the groceries unloaded and put away we got back to work on the underlayment. I laid out the next piece for the bedroom which had 11 angles. Even though I worked from a consistent reference point the numbers did not quite work out so I took additional measurements and made adjustments accordingly. When I was satisfied that the layout was close to correct we cut the piece out of the partial panel. I then cut it in half crossways to create two pieces each of which could be installed. We started with the half piece closest to the driver side.

Keith finished cutting the grass and came to get his check so we gave him the inside tour of the bus. He had seen the front part before but never been all the way to the back. He recognized that it was an ambitious project.

The other half of the back bedroom piece, towards the passenger side, took some tweaking but we finally got it in and stapled. The last piece for the bedroom should have been the easiest, a 42″ x 18″ rectangle for the aisle at the foot of the bed/storage box. It wasn’t a perfect rectangle, of course, so it also required adjustments. Things that should be at right angles rarely are and the flanges on the bottom of the HVAC chases do not have straight edges as I assumed they would. The adjustments are usually small but necessary to get the pieces to fit. So it was with the last piece for the main floor.

We thought we were done when Linda noticed a small “L” shaped area around the media cabinet behind the driver’s seat. We still had pieces of underlayment left over that were big enough to cut this piece. After measuring carefully and laying it out the numbers were once again not adding up. We still had the piece of art board that I used to create the templates for the base of the refrigerator alcove so I laid out the “L” shape on that but made it larger than needed. We positioned the template in the bus, trimmed the inside corner (not 90 degrees) and then marked where all the edges needed to be by tracing from underneath. I trimmed the template down and checked the fit. It looked good so I transferred it to the underlayment and we cut it.

We were finally done with the main floor underlayment so we cleaned up the bus by moving stuff to the garage/workshop. I disconnected the DeWalt 15 gallon air-compressor, moved it to the driveway by the garage, and opened the drain valve on the bottom, it had a LOT of water inside which reminded me that I really need to set up a water separator and inline oiler for use with this thing. Linda coiled up the power cord while I coiled up the air hose and stored it with the air-compressor in the front corner of the garage.

Somewhere in the middle of all this work we stopped and had lunch around 3 PM. It was now 6 PM, too early for dinner, so we decided to get cleaned up and go to Lowe’s to look for metal tile edging. As long as we were going to be out I thought we might drive over to Chuck’s shop in Novi to look at the air ride seat base. I called Chuck to see if that would work and he was headed that way anyway, so that is what we did. The Lowe’s in New Hudson did not have what we were looking for but the associate suggested that we try Blakely’s on West Road near Beck Road in Wixom. Chuck was still at his shop when we arrived so we had a nice chat, got the air ride base, and then went our separate ways.

It was 8:30 PM by the time we got home. I spent a few minutes checking e-mails and then we sat down to dinner at 9:15, a simple meal of mock fish fillets with vegan tartar sauce and fresh steamed Brussels sprouts.

I continued checking and responding to e-mails after dinner and then checked into RVillage. I posted a comment on a new topic in the Friends of Curtis YAY! group and a few minutes later got a call from Curtis. After catching up on each other’s activities and whereabouts he e-mailed me a couple of things to read and react to. When we concluded our chat I watched the 3rd installment of the video update series from Technomadia about the renovation of their vintage GM4106 bus conversion at MasterTech in Elkhart, Indiana. I sent them an e-mail regarding a pet friendly hotel that we used years ago when our Golden Retriever (Einstein) was still alive and went with us on a week-long visit to Elkhart to tour motorhome factories. (Einstein’s AKC name was Karie Jame Ricky Ricardo. We got him from the Karie Jame breeders and he was from the Latin Lovers litter.) It was then off to bed to write for a while before going to sleep.

2015/08/30 (N) A Day of Rest (NOT)

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We had closed up the house and turned on the air-conditioning before going to bed last night and had it set at 72 degrees F to make sure it ran long enough to pull some of the humidity out of the air. I awoke at 7:30 AM on this penultimate day of August hoping to be able to open up the house, which Linda prefers in almost any weather, but was greeted with fog and temperatures in the mid-60’s so I turned the A-C back to 70 to make it run for a while and move the air around.

Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest but not for us, at least not today. I gathered up the laundry and started a load in the washing machine and was just starting to prepare our morning coffee, Kenya AA (not decaf), when Linda emerged. She washed off some fresh blueberries and got our granola ready. We were both dressed to work but enjoyed our coffee in the living room from 8:30 until 9 AM.

Our first bus project task was to trim the passenger side front piece of underlayment that we cut last night. With that done I rolled the air-compressor out by the entrance door, uncoiled the air hose and connected it, unrolled the extension cord and plugged it in, oiled the air stapler, and connected it to the air hose. I loaded the staples and, with Linda standing on the pieces to hold them flat, stapled them down.

The next piece of underlayment, which would finish the hallway, was a very tricky piece with lots of angles. The problem in measuring a piece like this, in which sides may not be exactly parallel and angles not exactly 45 degrees, is finding a reference corner with two factory edges from which to measure everything. I take the time to make and check the measurements by making a small, approximately to scale, drawing.

The cutting of these pieces involved a 7-1/4″ circular saw and a saber saw. When using the circular saw we usually clamp a saw guide to the panel, allowing us to get a clean, straight cut that is almost as good as a table saw. For shorter cuts on edges that will not abut other panels I use the saber saw without a guide and just follow the pencil line as carefully as my skill and eyesight allow. I also have to use the saber saw for blind stop cuts, such as notches and tabs.

We took a break to have PB&J on whole grain bread and fresh apple slices for lunch. As we were finishing lunch I exchanged TXT messages with Chuck. He wanted to chat and called about 5 minutes later. It turns out that he has an air suspension seat base and thought I might want it. After getting a better understanding of what it is, and isn’t, I agreed that I wanted to see it. It would be very cool if I could use it to replace the driver seat pedestal in the bus as part of putting in the new Flexsteel seat but I will have to check with Josh to see if that is possible.

The bathroom underlayment was next. We considered various ways to install it and came to the conclusion that it would take three separate pieces for this small space. The reason was deep toe kick spaces on opposing walls, angles and notches, and a drain pipe and water supply pipe for the toilet that project out at least eight inches from a third wall just an inch above the floor. Those features made it impossible to get a single piece installed. We might have done it in two pieces but I did not like the way I would have had to cut them. These three pieces took quite a while to lay out, cut, trim, and staple down.

The bedroom was the next/last piece of the main floor jigsaw puzzle. It was after 6 PM by this point. We knew we would not get the bedroom done today but decided to try and get one more piece installed. Most of the bedroom floor is taken up by the storage box that serves as the base for the plywood bed platform. This box goes all the way to the driver side wall and has small Isles on the other three sides. If not for end cabinets by the head of the bed and deep toe kick spaces in the cabinetry to the rear of the coach the underlayment would be a simple “U” shape. The actuality it will take four pieces to complete this space.

The first piece was a simple shape, a rectangle with a large piece of one corner cut out. As I have for every other piece I took the initial measurements but noted them on a freehand sketch rather than a scale drawing. When I laid out the actual panel the numbers were not quite working out so I rechecked my measurements. They appeared to be correct, which meant some of the right angles must be off slightly. I modified the layout to make the panel a little longer than I thought it needed to be and made the cuts. Inside the coach we were not able to get the panel positioned because of interference from a 4″ round HVAC duct and a door and handle on a lower cabinet (the end table). I removed the HVAC register, which helped and then discovered a piece of vertical trim in the passenger side front corner. The bedroom has less natural and artificial lighting than the rest of the coach and I had not noticed it before now.

Tired and a bit frustrated by this latest turn of events we decided to wrap up our work for the day and have dinner. We accomplished a lot today but I had hoped (expected) to have all of the main floor underlayment done. We will finish the bedroom first thing tomorrow. That will leave only the entryway/cockpit to do and we will defer that work so I can start laying the new tile floor.

While Linda prepared dinner I checked my e-mail and then checked in to the South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club information net at 8 PM. I was just completing my second turn when Linda called me to dinner. She made her own version of red beans and rice and served it with a glass of Cupcake Black Forest Decadent Red wine and a large piece of honeydew melon on the side. The main dish was excellent, the wine was OK (a little dry for me), and the melon was not as ripe as we would have liked it to be. Still, it was a nice meal.

We watched an episode (rerun) of Sherlock at 9 PM and then went to bed. Linda played Scrabble while I worked on this post before falling asleep.

2015/08/29 (S) Up and Down

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When we arrived at the South Lyon Senate Coney Island just before 8 AM there were only five other SLAARC members there but we had 16 by the time the last two people showed up. Linda (K8LMF) got to sit next to Linda (NF8C) for the first time in quite a while and they had a long chat. All but one person stayed until 9:45 when we got up to leave and everyone else followed suit.

We were back home by 10:15 AM, changed into our work clothes, and got back to work on the bus remodeling project. It was a very overcast and cloudy day with a high probability of rain that was forecast to be an all-day event. That altered our plans a little in that we did not want the pieces of underlayment to get wet and our air-compressor could not be out in the rain as it has an electric motor.

Yesterday we marked and cut the underlayment panels in the driveway, laying them across 2x4s to create space for the circular saw blade. In order to keep the project moving forward we decided to use the temporary “workbench” in the garage for this work. Since the workbench was covered with drawer fronts that had to be moved we decided to take a little time to put the new handles on them and reattach them to the drawer boxes. Sometimes it’s true that “there’s no time like the present” to get something done.

Linda has worked hard on cleaning and waxing the walnut drawer fronts and fixed cabinetry in our motorcoach. The results so far are amazing and we are feeling like all of our work will be worthwhile as the interior of the coach is going to look very nice when we are done with this project.

We had cut the piece of underlayment for part of the hallway last night but needed to trim it to get it to fit correctly. I think we took it out of, and back into, the bus at least four times, each trip requiring us to go up and down the seven steps in the entryway/cockpit plus the stool outside the door. I do not know how many times we went up and down those steps today but it was a quite a few. To add to our enjoyment and bus conversion physical fitness program we were usually carrying something and it was often heavy and/or large.

The next pieces of underlayment to be cut would fill out most of the living room. I had planned to cut them a certain way but changed my mind after talking it through with Linda. We took measurements and I made drawings that were close to scale. We ended up using the full 48″ width of a 4’x8′ sheet and about 86″ of its length for the piece that fills the alcove where the built-in sofa and storage base will go. It had two large corner cutouts, one to make it fit with two other installed pieces and the other to go around the base of the media cabinet that doubles as an end table for the forward end of the sofa. After test fitting it we had to trim a couple inches off of a back corner because of a wire bundle and create a notch for several wires that ran through the floor just in front of the driver’s side HVAC chase. We waited for a lull in the rain and took it back into the coach.

It fit just right but unfortunately there were defects in the subfloor, such as small gouges and depressed screw heads, that needed to be repaired. Since we could not use the air-stapler today I did not have a good excuse for not patching the floor correctly so I worked on that while Linda resumed working on the woodwork. The quart of “ready to use” floor patch was not as ready to use as I would have liked. The directions said to stir thoroughly and when I opened the container there was a half inch of milky white liquid on top of somewhat drier and stiffer material with the consistency of fine wet sand. The directions also said the open (working) time was about 15 minutes.

I set the timer on the microwave for 20 minutes, spent five of those trying to stir and mix the floor patch ingredients, and then tried to patch everything that really needed it in the allotted time. I did not care for this material and wish I had used the Universal Patch and Skimcoat that I used everywhere else. It was gritty and did not feather out or finish as smoothly as I wanted, but there was nothing to do now but wait for it to dry which would take three hours.

Linda decided to work in the house and eventually fix dinner while I worked in the bedroom (of the bus) trying to remove very old masking tape from the subfloor using a 1.25″ putty knife. After an hour I had about half of it off but called it quits as my hands were sore.

For dinner Linda cooked a couple of ears of corn-on-the-cob, heated some vegetarian (vegan) baked beans, and cooked two vegan “burgers” topped with vegan cheese. Mustard, ketchup, pickle relish, and four large leaves of romaine lettuce made for a tasty sandwich. We each had a glass of the Cupcake Black Forest Decadent Red wine with the meal. Dessert was fresh sliced strawberries with non-dairy (vegan) peach mango “yogurt.” It was a tasty summertime meal.

After dinner I tried sanding the floor patches even though the directions said not to sand the dried material. I used a very old piece of 120 grit sandpaper in my orbital sander and went over the entire area. I vacuumed the whole area but I could still feel a residual grit on the floor. I got Linda’s vacuum from the house and tried that. I then got the Revel wet/dry mop and tried wet moping the area, but it was still gritty. I was preparing to go over the entire area with the new 80 grit sandpaper but Linda managed to get it clean using the brush attachment on the house vacuum cleaner.

With the area cleaned up we put the piece of underlayment for the sofa nook in place and it fit very nicely but we did not staple it. We redid our measurements for the passenger side front piece and made some minor adjustments to the dimensions on the drawing. What I have tried to do wherever possible is to keep at least two factory edges with a common vertex (corner) and use that point and those sides as the basis for my measurements.

It looked like heavy rain was going to hit us from the west but must have tracked north of us. We continued to get rain, off and on, but nothing heavy every materialized. Working in the garage we measured and cut the last piece for today. We made extensive use of the circular saw running it along a saw guide. By the time we had the sheet cut there was a lull in the rain so we took it to the bus to test fit it. The fit was close but needed minor trimming in the front outside corner. By now it was 8:30 PM and we did not want to haul the sheet back out of the bus and into the garage to work on it. That will be our first task tomorrow followed by stapling the three pieces that we cut today, weather permitting.

We turned in at 10 PM. There wasn’t anything on TV that interested us, so Linda read for few minutes before falling asleep and I wrote until 11:30.

2015/08/28 (F) Bye Bye Fridge

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The DTE Energy appliance recycling program called yesterday and left a message indicating that they would pick up our old refrigerator between 8 AM and noon today so we got up at 7:30 AM to make sure we were ready if they arrived early. I was cold last night so I put on my sweats when I got up. For breakfast we had our usual granola with fresh blueberries and split a banana, had a little glass of juice to wash down the vitamins, and then had coffee in the living room. I turned on the gas fireplace to chase away the morning chill while I put the finishing touches on yesterday’s post and Linda did her morning check-in with the world beyond our immediate boundaries (and concerns).

The DTE Energy pickup truck called at 9 AM to let us know they would be here around 9:30. We finished our coffee, got dressed, and awaited their arrival. Ever since a delivery truck almost took out the telephone trunk line over our driveway last August I try to be in the driveway anytime a truck is headed our way.

Two guys showed up in an Enterprise truck. Our new refrigerator for the bus was delivered by two guys in an Enterprise truck. It must make more sense than buying one. When they opened the back it already had used appliances in it. The guy handling the paperwork said they usually pick up 30 appliances a day but were scheduled for 32 today. I signed the acknowledgments and releases on his cell phone and they then unplugged it, cut off the power cord, stuck a hand truck under it, rolled it onto their lift, raised it up and rolled it in next to another side-by-side fridge that was very similar to ours. They closed the rear cover and were on their way. I don’t think they were here more than 15 minutes. It’s nice to have it out of the garage and to know that it will be recycled. We will also receive a check for $50 in 4 to 6 weeks which beats having to pay someone to haul it away.

Linda picked up where she left off on Wednesday with the woodwork in the bedroom of the bus while I got the tools and supplies ready that we needed to install the Patriot Lumber SurePly underlayment on the floor. That included getting out the 15 gallon air-compressor, 60 foot air hose, Butch’s Central Pneumatic air stapler/nailer (that I borrowed on our most recent visit to Indiana), and a package of #18 1/4″ crown 3/4″ long staples

Linda finished wiping off the residual Touch of Beeswax from the bedroom woodwork and then helped me get the 4’x8′ sheet of underlayment out of the bus and over to the driveway. We put this sheet in the bus yesterday so I could determine where to make needed cuts. I had marked several places where I needed to make notches or take some material off of part of an edge. I did not want to do the cutting in the bus, however, because we need to keep the floors clean and avoid airborne dust. I made the cuts and then we moved the sheet back into the bus.

Bruce positions the second piece of underlayment.

Per the instructions, we positioned the sheet of underlayment in the corner across from the kitchen sink with the long dimension running fore and aft across the floor joists. It fit nicely so I connected the air hose to the air stapler and inserted a set of 3/4″ staples. The instructions for the pneumatic stapler indicated a working pressure range of 70 – 100 PSI, with the pressure controlling the depth of drive, and suggested adjusting it on some scrap material. It turned out that I had to set the regulator on the air compressor to 100 PSI to get the right depth of drive.

The instructions for the underlayment were very clear about the order in which the sheet should be stapled so that’s what we did. Linda stood on the sheet to keep it flat while I stapled and we both wore proper safety glasses, of course. From the corner I put a staple every two inches along the edge by the HVAC duct. Working out from the same starting corner I then put one every two inches along the short edge. Working out from the same starting corner I stapled it along the diagonal to the opposite corner. Again working from the starting corner I stapled the “field” on either side of the diagonal. The last staples were 2″ apart along the other short edge and up the other long edge.

A week and a half ago we had this same sheet of underlayment in the bus and I screwed it down temporarily with a dozen screws to see how it felt. I counted the number of fasteners needed for one full sheet and I think it was 352. That’s when I decided I would staple them. After installing the first sheet I think it was the right choice.

Bruce staples the second piece of underlayment.

I got a phone call from my sister so we took a break and while I talked to her Linda started preparing lunch. She made grilled cheese, with mock turkey, onions, and greens on rye, all vegan of course. We each had a deliciously ripe fresh pear. Yum.

The next piece of underlayment to go in filled in the space between the first sheet and the base of the kitchen cabinets. But first we had to remove the painter’s tape we had put on the base to protect it. It turned out to be cemented on from the floor leveling compound so I had to chisel it loose. Linda vacuumed up the debris and then I went over the area with 120 grit sandpaper on the oscillating sander. Things like this are what cause project timelines to stretch out; when we put the painter’s tape on we assumed we would be able just peel it off.

This second piece was less than half the width of a full sheet and involved a tricky angle cut and a notch so I measured carefully, made a drawing (not to scale), and rechecked the dimensions with Linda verifying them. We cut the piece outside and brought it in. It was a very good fit so we stapled it down.

A detailed view of the bottom front end of the pantry and refrigerator showing the aluminum angle that keeps the fridge from shifting to the left into the pantry.

The third piece was much more difficult to figure out and will probably prove to be the trickiest piece overall once we are done. It was essentially a big triangle with two corners cut off and complex notches along the hypotenuse. I took a lot of measurements with Linda’s help and made a diagram. When I laid it out on the underlayment things did not quite line up. I figured out and corrected one problem but had to go back in the coach and make two more measurements.

At the point where it was close, but not close enough, I decided to cut along the hypotenuse, trim off the two corners, and take it back in the bus to mark the locations of two notches. With the notches marked we took it back outside and I finished cutting it. We took it back inside and set it in place. It was as good a fit as could have hoped for so we stapled it. Although we had worked for most of the day and only gotten three pieces installed our careful work had paid off and we were very satisfied with what we had accomplished. It was 5 PM, we were tired, and we were getting hungry so we decided to quit while we were ahead.

I took a shower while Linda prepared dinner. She made a very tasty whole grain rotini pasta dish with garlic, onion, olive oil, broccoli, sun-dried tomatoes, carrots, mushrooms, and greens. Now that, Alton Brown, is “good eats.” We had nice big wedges of fresh watermelon for dessert.

After dinner we went to Lowe’s to buy three more sheets of underlayment and some wallpaper stripping spray. By the time we got home it was after 8 PM and we settled into the living room to read and write, much the way our day began, minus the coffee.

2015/08/27 (R) In and Out

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Linda was up at 5:45 AM and on her way to the bakery at 6:15. I got up an hour later and also got an early start to my day; early is relative, after all. After a bowl of granola I brewed some Cafe Europe / Columbian decaf coffee, turned on the gas fireplace, and continued reading Number Theory and its History. A week ago Jim (N8KUE) e-mailed some questions to us regarding RVing and bus conversions. I felt that too much time had passed without a response so I settled in at my computer to answer his questions as best I could. I sent my reply at 9:30 and turned my attention to our bus project.

I got the pull-out pantry (mostly) installed yesterday. Before we could place the refrigerator in the alcove, however, I needed to do four things:

Install a piece of aluminum angle to prevent the fridge from sliding to the left;
Secure the water line that went to the old refrigerator;
Plug up openings in the cabinet with steel wool; and
Install the 10th drawer slide on top of the pantry to reduce lateral movement at full extension.

I decided to tackle these tasks in that order, which meant a trip to Lowe’s to get the aluminum angle. I chatted briefly with Mike (W8XH) on the drive and stopped at The Home Depot first but did not find what I wanted. Lowe’s had a 3 foot length of 1/8″ thick 1.5″X1.5″ angle. I wanted aluminum because it is light, easy for me to work, and won’t rust or need to be painted, but I wanted the 1/8″ thickness for strength. While I was there I picked up another foam brush, a bottle of Mineral Spirits, and a package of #8-1.75″ stainless steel self-drilling exterior wood screws.

The road graders were out today in our part of the county and I passed the one working on Golf Club Road going to, and returning from, Lowe’s. There was also one working on our road that I could not get around, so I followed it slowly until it reached our driveway and I could turn in.

Back home I cut the aluminum angle to a length of 26.5 inches, the same as the depth of the refrigerator base section and the top piece of plywood in the base of the alcove. I selected a drill bit that was just barely larger in diameter than the stainless steel screws. Starting with the midpoint I drilled holes every three inches along the centerline of one side of the angle. I then countersunk each hole, checking with a screw until the head was just slightly recessed. A light back bore with the countersink bit removed any rough edges.

With the pantry pulled all the way out I placed the side of the angle with the holes on the 2nd piece of plywood in the alcove base with the other side of the angle against the edge of the 3rd piece of the base. Since these pieces of plywood are all 3/4″ thick the vertical side of the angle extended above the plywood by 3/4 of an inch, more than enough to catch the left side of the refrigerator. I held the angle tight against the edge of the 3rd piece of plywood, with the front edge back about 1/2″, and used the #8 VIX self-centering drill bit to drill a pilot hole in the back hole. I then secured it with one of the stainless steel screws, penetrating both the 2nd and 1st layers of plywood and probably a heavy 1/8″ of the subfloor. I held the front of the angle tight and secured the 2nd hole from the front in the same way, as I could not access the first hole due to the pantry. I drilled all the remaining holes except the first and put in the screws. I then pushed the pantry all the way in so I could access the front hole and secured it. The angle was now held in place by nine strong screws fastened into a lot of wood.

The pantry and refrigerator installed in the alcove.

The old refrigerator had an ice maker and cold water dispenser in the freezer door so there is a flexible copper water line at the back of the alcove. The line runs through an inaccessible area and into the cabinet under the kitchen sink so removing it would be difficult and impractical. It was easier to secure the water line, and besides, we might want to use it again someday. I found some used screws with broad #2 SR heads and used them to secure cable ties with mounting tabs to the back wall of the alcove. I re-shaped the copper tube as best I could so it would lie relatively flat against the back of the alcove and used the cable ties to hold it in place.

I noticed when I moved the tube that a little water came out of the end. That struck me as odd as I had it in my head that the line was out of service. After a little investigation I remembered that the shutoff valve for this line was still attached to the water inlet tube on the back of the old refrigerator. If we had pressurized the fresh water system this would have been an open line. Yikes!

I now had another, unexpected, task that had to be done before I could do anything else. I gathered up a few tools, parts, and materials, got my head and arms into the under sink cabinet (which is never comfortable), shut off the supply line valves (just to be safe), and disconnected the copper tube to the refrigerator alcove. I wrapped the threads of the open end of the T-fitting with several turns of Teflon tape, threaded a cap into the fitting, and snugged it up tight. I did not, however, pressure test it as I did not want to take the time and I did not want to pressurize the fresh water system with the toilet disconnected.

With the water line secured I got one of the old packages of steel wool and used it to stuff the openings in the lower rear corners of the alcove where lots of wires, the water line, and two air lines pass in and out. I meant to use the #1 steel wool but grabbed the 4/0 by mistake. It will work just as well but the 4/0 is what Linda is using to clean all of the walnut woodwork, so it was a bit of a waste.

The pull-out pantry is very stable vertically and horizontally except when it is all the way out where it can move side-to-side about 1/2″. I decided to install the last of the 10 slides on the flat between the top of the pantry box and the ceiling of the alcove, which is also the base of the upper cabinet. The ceiling of the alcove is not parallel to the floor and so it was not parallel to the top of the pantry box. I was able to slide a piece of 3/4″ oak veneered plywood between the ceiling and the upper edge of the top slide. With the 10th slide on top of the pantry I had about a 1/8″ gap between the slide and the plywood at the front, opening to about a 1/4″ gap at the rear.

My first attempt at a solution was to try cutting blocks from the end of a 2×4 to be just the right thickness for the front, middle, and rear. That quickly proved to not be a workable solution without some form of stationary saw. After further pondering I decided to cut a 4.5″ wide piece of the oak veneered plywood from one of the leftover pieces that happened to be 26.5″ long.

The new refrigerator in the alcove with the doors open.

I set the piece of plywood in place on top of the two slides, one mounted to the alcove side panel and the other resting on top of the pantry box, and shimmed it with wood shims between the plywood and the ceiling to remove the gap between the plywood and the slide without making it tight. I pulled the pantry out slightly so I could drill and screw the rear hole of the stationary part of the slide. I then pulled the pantry all the way out, pushed the center section of the slide part way back in, and secured the front hole of the moveable part of the slide to the top of the pantry. I used a slot that allowed side-to-side adjustment, just in case. I also secured the center slot on the moveable slide to the top of the pantry box.

I fiddled with the slide until it went in and out smoothly. It is tight enough that I don’t think it will come open when driving, but it pulls out easily enough and will be easier once we get a handle on it. Linda called at 4 PM as I was finishing this task to let me know she was on her way home from the bakery. It would be 60 to 90 minutes before she got home so I moved on to the next task.

The first piece of underlayment to go in will be a full 4’x8′ sheet minus a notch for the middle air-conditioner drain line and part of one short side that has to fit around the built-in pantry. I measured for those cuts and then laid the sheet out in the driveway on top of 2x4s (on the flat). I tried plunge cutting most of the 21″ long by 1″ wide strip off the end with my circular saw without using a guide and finished the cut with my saber saw. My plunge cut wasn’t very good so I trimmed it with the saber saw. That edge will go under the mirror tiles against the back of the built-in pantry so it will be OK.

Linda got home around 5:30 PM. After unloading her car and changing clothes she examined my work for the day and was pleased with the way the pull-out pantry worked. She helped me carry the 4’x8′ sheet of underlayment into the bus at which point I decided that we needed to get the refrigerator into the alcove before doing anything else.

We set the underlayment aside and uncovered the fridge which we had previously wrapped in painter’s plastic to keep it clean while grinding and sanding. Linda cleaned off packing tape adhesive with Goo Gone, wiped it off with a wet rag, and then I wiped it off with a dry towel. We rolled it over to the alcove, shut off the circuit breaker, plugged it in, and secured the cord to the back. It rolls very easily but to get it into the alcove we had to tilt it forward to get the bottom back edge of the unit onto the 2.25″ high plywood base. Oops; the left edge of the fridge space overlapped the built-in pantry opposite and prevented the unit from tilting enough to get the back edge up high enough.

The pantry pulled out with the refrigerator installed.

We have learned not to panic, and after a moment’s thought we turned it slightly to the right, got the right rear bottom corner up onto the plywood and slid it into the alcove a couple inches. We were then able to turn it to the left and get the left rear bottom corner onto the plywood base, making sure it was inside the aluminum angle. Fortunately we had enough clearance above the unit to do that. (If not we would have used the leftover 3/4″ plywood in front of the alcove, gotten the fridge onto those pieces, and then rolled it straight into its space.). We lifted the front bottom of the unit and rolled it back into its cubby. It was a perfect fit; snug to the aluminum angle on the left, tight to the right side of the alcove at the rear with a small (3/16″) gap at the right front, and far enough into the alcove that we can open the three drawers to the left of the sink. High five! Good job team.

I turned on the breaker to make sure the refrigerator still worked. It did, and we were both pleased with how much quieter it is than the old one. We did not need it running at the moment, however, so I turned the breaker off. Linda got a towel and propped the doors open.

We got the underlayment flat on the floor and slid it into position. It needed to be trimmed in three spots and I did not want to get into that at this hour so Linda started preparing diner while I put tools and materials away, locked the bus, and closed up the garage/shop. I plugged in the old refrigerator (in the garage) to let it cool down overnight as DTE Energy’s recycling program is picking it up tomorrow between 8 AM and noon.

Dinner was mock riblets in BBQ sauce, green beans with onions and carrots, and fresh peaches, all very tasty. After dinner I worked at my desk. I replied to several e-mails from Gary at Bus Conversion Magazine, and looked at my Habitat For Humanity article to see if I could split it into two or three parts. It looked like that was possible so I let Gary know. I chatted briefly with Steve (N8AR) on the Novi 440 repeater and with Jim (N8KUE) on the South Lyon 2m repeater. I processed three photos of the finished pantry/fridge installation showing that everything goes in and out and e-mailed it to a dozen people.

I came to bed just before 10 PM. We watched TV for a while until Linda drifted off to sleep. I stayed up a bit longer to finish this post.

2015/08/26 (W) Delux Delay

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We were a bit sore last night, and needed a good night’s sleep, so we both took some Advil PM right before going to bed. As a result we did not wake up until almost 8 AM this morning. The Advil, combined with the very cool temperatures, made for good sleeping.

Our son had called yesterday to see if Linda could watch Madeline today while he did some work on the rental property that he and Shawna own. It was Shawna’s house before they got married, and is a nice little place, but with Madeline on the way they wanted a slightly larger place. They also wanted to be on the other side of Stadium Boulevard in the attendance area for Burns Park Elementary School and walking distance to both the school and adjacent Burns Park without having to cross any major streets.

Ann Arbor is a major rental housing market because of the University of Michigan and the local government is very involved in this market. Rental properties must be inspected at least every 30 months and meet code requirements. The rental house was scheduled for inspection on Friday and needed some minor repairs, so Brendan set aside today to take care of things. What I find interesting about this inspection requirement is that most of the rental houses our son and daughter lived in while at U of M looked to me like they had not been inspected in over a decade.

Linda was due at Brendan and Shawna’s house around 10:30 AM so she left our house at 9:15. She took the three books of wallpaper samples with her and went directly to Delux Drapery and Shades in Ann Arbor to return them and placed the order for four bolts (double roll packs) of Sellers and Josephson Just Textures Lamar paper. Not long after she left Delux I got a call at home from the store. They were looking for Linda to let her know the wallpaper was back ordered until September 11. (I’m not the least bit superstitious but September 11. Really.) To cancel the order we would have to let them know today but I told them to let it ride. I then texted Linda to let her know and she agreed with my decision.

I had a feeling this might happen and it’s what we get for waiting so long to look for, select, and finally order a wall covering. But it is what it is and we were not going to settle for something that wasn’t “right” for our interior just because it was available more quickly. If the paper actually comes in on the 11th we will have the 12th and 13th to at least install it in a few critical areas before the new seating goes in. If it doesn’t arrive by then we will deal with it when it does. Either way the only big issue is that we wanted to paper the wall behind where the desk will go before the desk is installed. As things stand we will either uninstall/reinstall the desk or paper around it.

The pantry supported by plywood and 2x4s.

There were several small tasks that I could have worked today but the thing that needed to be done was the installation of the pull-out pantry, so that is what I did. The pantry was already in the coach, which was a good start. I got two of the small leftover pieces of 3/4″ oak veneered plywood and set them in front of the alcove base. I then set a 5′ length of 2×4 on the flat in the space where the pantry goes and extending out beyond the alcove by more than the depth of the pantry. I then set the pantry on the 2×4, pushed it snug to the side of the alcove, and slid it towards the back of the alcove until the front was approximately one inch behind the vertical front edge of the left side panel.

There were two main reasons for using the 2×4. First, the lowest slide attached to the pantry box extends below the box so the bottom of the box needed to sit on something that was thicker than the amount by which the slide hung down. Second, a 2×4 on the flat is 1.5″ thick and that turned out to be a good thickness for positioning the pantry vertically in the alcove.

The reveal between the front of the pantry and the front edge of the alcove side panel was wider at the top than the bottom so I placed two wood shims side-by-side under the back end of the 2×4 to raise it slightly and tilt the top of the front out. I fussed with this for quite a while and each time I adjusted the shims I had to pick the pantry up, set it aside, and put it back. I eventually got the reveal to be the same along the entire length (height) of the front.

Once I knew where I wanted the pantry to be when it was closed I had to figure out how to mount the slides to the side panel of the alcove. I pondered this for quite a while. If nothing else, I have learned that when it is not clear how to proceed the best course of action is to do nothing. I have also learned that if I ponder long enough I will eventually see a way forward. Sometimes that takes days or weeks of conscious and subconscious thinking, but luckily the solution came to me relatively quickly.

The pantry box is 27″ deep. The full extension slides are 26″ deep and they are mounted so they are flush with the front of the pantry box when they are fully closed. I wanted a 1″ reveal along the front, so I needed to place the back edge of the slides 27″ back from the front edge of the alcove side panel. With the pantry box out of the alcove I used a metal ruler to measure back at three points and make very fine scratch marks. I then used the metal ruler to draw a fine pencil line through the three scratch marks.

I returned the pantry to the alcove, pushed it tight to the alcove side panel, and then pulled it out about three inches. Measuring on the back side outside the alcove I made final adjustments to the shims to get a consistent reveal. I then pulled each of the nine slides back, carefully aligned the back edge of the slide to the reference line, drilled a hole with a self-centering VIX bit, and secured it with a #6-3/4″ SR (square recessed) screw. (I was not able to initially secure the bottom slide as the 2×4 was in the way.) I pulled the pantry out a little farther until the next mounting hole in the top slide was visible and then drilled that hole on all eight slides and secured it with a screw. I proceeded in this way until all but the bottom slide were attached to the alcove side panel through every available mounting hole; 88 screws in all (11 screws for each slide x 8 slides).

The pantry with the installation boards removed from underneath it.

To secure the bottom slide I needed to get the 2×4 out from under the pantry. I slid the pantry all the way in, slid the two pieces of 3/4″ plywood out from under the 2×4, and tried to slide the 2×4 out. Unfortunately I used a 2×4 that was too long to just slide out as part of the original pantry cabinet is directly across from the pull-out pantry. So I got my circular saw and cut about 4″ off the end of the 2×4. Close, but not quite, so I cut off another 2″ and was finally able to slide it out.

With the pantry all the way out I was able to drill and secure the mounting holes for the back half of the bottom slide. The holes for the front half were a bit tedious as I had to move the box to reveal each one. To avoid going back and forth between the drill and the screw driver bit I drilled all of the holes first and then put in the screws. I should also mention that I used the Shop Vac to vacuum up any debris that got in the slides as a result of the drilling. I also wiped the slides out (carefully, they have sharp edges) with a paper towel.

The pantry slides all the way in and out but is a little tight the closer it gets to being fully closed. I know that Jarel was very meticulous in attaching the slides to the pantry box so they were all parallel. My working hypothesis is that either I did not get them attached to the alcove exactly parallel (entirely likely) and/or there is more drag on them because of the one-sided installation (probably, but no way for me to quantify) than there would be if they were installed on both sides of a drawer.

All of the slides are on the same side, which is not how they are normally used. A pair of these slides is rated to support 100 pounds when used on both sides of a drawer, so four and a half pairs would, conservatively, support 400 to 450 pounds in a normal application. Even if they will only support 1/3 that much weight in a single-sided application that is still 133 to 150 pounds for our nine slides. I think the box weighs about 30 pounds so that leaves at least 100 pounds for stored items and I doubt that we could get 100 pounds of stuff in the pantry even if we loaded it with canned goods. Because the pantry is narrow and tall with lots of slides I suspect most of the load on the slides is vertical, which is what they are designed for, rather than sideways, which would tend to pull them apart, so I suspect that it can safely carry considerably more than 100 pounds of staples.

The piece of aluminum angle that will prevent the refrigerator from sliding sideways into the pantry. It is not installed yet as the plywood refrigerator base is not stained yet.

I had just finished installing the pantry and was cleaning up my tools and materials when Linda got home around 3 PM. I had skipped lunch and she had a PB&J sandwich while she was out so we agreed to have dinner at 5:30 PM. Linda picked up where she left off yesterday cleaning and waxing the drawer fronts and the woodwork in the bedroom. I decided that the oak veneered plywood base in the alcove needed to be painted or stained and then sealed so I went to Lowe’s and got a small can of Rustoleum American Walnut stain, a small can of Rustoleum satin finish polyurethane, and two foam brushes.

I brushed the stain on liberally, working in sections, let it sit for two minutes per the instructions, and then wiped it off with a lint-free cloth. The stain required mineral spirits for cleanup so I threw the brush and cloth away. The instructions said to wait one hour before applying a finish. It was 5 O’clock by then so I went to my office to check e-mail while Linda prepared dinner.

She made a nice salad and grilled a couple of vegan burgers and added some vegan cheese. Mustard, ketchup, pickles, onions, and lettuce on a nice bun made for a tasty sandwich. Two deer, a doe and her young fawn, came to our deer block while we were eating and a ruby-throated hummingbird stopped at our plants and feeders. For dessert we had half of a small, very sweet watermelon.

By the time we were done with dinner it was 6:30 PM so I went back out to the bus and applied the polyurethane. The directions said to apply it sparingly so that is what I tried to do. They also said that it could take 48 hours to be usably dry and seven days for a full cure. Drying time was dependent, however, on temperature and humidity, with higher temps and lower relative humidity promoting quicker drying.

I had run the Aqua-Hot earlier in the day and determined that there was still a little too much coolant in the system as the expansion reservoir overflowed into my catch bottle. I closed the three windows that were open, leaving them just slightly ajar, turned on the Aqua-Hot, turned on all three thermostats, and set them for about 72 degrees Fahrenheit. I will not be applying a second coat of polyurethane and cannot spare 48 hours for this one to dry.

I had thought that we might get the first sheet of underlayment installed this evening but decided we had done enough for one day. It will be the only full 4’x8′ sheet we install but it needs a notch cut out of it before it goes in. I thought it would require several cuts but then realized I had some floor leveling compound that I had not removed. I got my chisel and mini-sledgehammer and knocked off the big chunks. I then used the oscillating sander with 50 grit sandpaper to smooth everything out. It was 7:45 PM and I was done working on the bus for today.

I went to my office and spent a couple of hours dealing with e-mails. Linda was still up when I turned in at 10 PM but drifted off to sleep as I finished up this post. She has to go to the bakery tomorrow which means she will be up very early.

2015/08/25 (T) Turning The Corner

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It got pleasantly cool overnight and with the bedroom doorwall open it made for nice sleeping conditions. Between being up a bit late last night and not wanting to get out from under the warm covers we slept in a few minutes longer than usual. I put on my sweats, which I find very comfortable on a cool (or cold) morning, and made a pot of Costa Rican decaf coffee. We had our usual granola for breakfast, took a few minutes to enjoy our coffee in the living room without our cats, who were off somewhere and probably up to no good, and then got to work.

In order to install the new seats in September we need to have the desk installed and in order to install the desk we need to have the floor installed and in order to install the floor we need to have the underlayment installed and in order to install the underlayment we need to have several things done. First and foremost was finishing the patching and leveling of the subfloor, so that was my first task today. While I pursued that Linda continued working on cleaning and waxing the walnut drawer fronts. Given the limited work surface in the garage Linda can only work on three to six drawer fronts at a time depending on their size. When she reached a stopping point with those and started working on the woodwork in the bedroom.

I have spent the last week patching, skimcoating, and sanding the entire area where the old tile was installed which I estimate to be about 80 square feet. I went over it one more time this morning with 80 grit sandpaper on the orbital sander. The sander has an integral dust collection bag so it did not get the coach too dusty. I was satisfied with most of the job but still had some unevenness along the edges by the walls and especially in the toe kick spaces extending out about three inches from the cabinet bases. That is because I did not get the last skimcoat as smooth as I needed to in those areas and the orbital sander cannot reach them.

I figured I would need to do one more application of floor leveling compound but did not want to open the second bag of mix for such a small job. I decided to go the Lowe’s and buy a small pail of pre-mixed floor patching compound and the 3/4″ #8-32 machine screws we needed to install the new handles. While I was there I noticed that they had 50 grit hook and loop sandpaper triangles designed to fit our Porter-Cable oscillating saw. I was aware that we had a sanding pad attachment for the tool but had not considered using it until I saw the 50 grit paper. I bought a pack and picked up some 120 grit as well. I would also have bought 80 grit but they were out. I had to go to The Home Depot for the machine screws as I wanted the same brass ones we had already purchased.

Back at the bus I decided to try sanding out the imperfections rather than filling them in with another round of patching and sanding. I was, admittedly, tired of this phase of the work and anxious to be done with it so I could move on to next step. August is slipping away and I am very aware of the date. I was also not keen on creating more sanding dust inside the coach.

I don’t know why I did not try this tool sooner. The design of the tool and shape of the sanding pad allowed me to work in the all of the areas the orbital sander could not reach and it worked very well with the 50 grit sandpaper. The circular air sander can also reach these areas, and was the right tool for grinding down the old thinset and mastic, but the oscillating tool was the right one for this final smoothing.

When I thought I was done I vacuumed the floor and used the Revel Damp Mop to pick up any residual dust. We then went inside to have lunch while the floor dried. Linda heated up a can of Amy’s vegetable soup, made roll-up sandwiches, and served fresh black grapes and plums. It beats fast food hands down.

After lunch I inspected the floor carefully and decided that the patching and leveling was done. Although it was one task out of many, and there was no fanfare attached to the moment, I was very much aware that we had finally turned the corner. We still have some minor disassembly to do, but from this point forward most of our tasks will involve putting the interior back together and installing new things. All things being equal (which they never are) the building work should be more fun than the deconstruction work.

The major exception is the wallpaper. We still need to remove the old paper, much of which is stained from old water leaks, and install the new paper, which Linda will be ordering tomorrow from Delux Drapery and Shades in Ann Arbor. The critical pieces are the ones that go behind the desk and the built-in sofa. Most of the rest of it can be finished later but we would prefer to have it all done by September 12th if possible. The more stuff that gets installed the more awkward it will be to work on the walls.

With the floor leveling done the next impediment to installing the underlayment was getting the refrigerator out of the living room and into its alcove. That, however, required three other things to be done. First I needed to replace the electrical outlet with a recessed one. Second, we needed to build up the base of the alcove and finally, we needed to install the pantry as we cannot get to the slides to mount them to the side of the alcove with the refrigerator in place.

The electrical outlet only took a few minutes to change. With Linda’s help I used the template I made last Thursday to cut the base pieces from the 4′ x 8′ sheet of 3/4″ plywood we bought on Tuesday. The bottom piece was the full width of the refrigerator alcove (34″ wide at the front and 33.75″ wide at the back) and 25.75″ deep. We set it in place, checked the front setback, and screwed it to the subfloor. The next piece was the same width as the first but 1/2″ deeper (26.25″). We set it in place on top of the first piece and made sure the front edges were flush with the back edge extending 1/2″ farther back. I used longer screws to go all the way through both pieces into the subfloor.

I was not happy with the way my circular saw blade was cutting and a few raindrops gave us an excuse to take a break. We were working just outside the small garage bay and moved everything into the garage to keep it from getting wet. I went to Lowe’s and bought a new 7.25″ blade with 60 teeth, which should give a very clean cut through plywood but still work on 2x4s and trim boards. While I was there I checked their selection of driver bits again. I was looking for a 3″ long No. 1 SR (square recessed) bit but they did not have any that long. I found a 2″ bit for $2.48 but then I spotted a pack of seven 2″ long bits for under $4. It had two #1, three #2 (the most common size), and two #3 bits from the same manufacturer as the single bit. Can someone explain that pricing structure to me? Apparently most of the cost is retail packaging.

Linda prepared large, wonderful salads for dinner. She made her own dressing using balsamic vinegar, walnuts, raisins, garlic, and seasonings, and it was very good. We finished the Pinot Grigio with the meal and then resumed our work.

I changed the blade on my saw and then we moved the wood and 2×4 supports back out into the driveway. The new blade made very clean cuts confirming that changing it was long overdue. The third piece of the alcove base was not as wide as the first two, measuring 28.25″ across the front and 28″ across the back. (The alcove tapers in 1/4″ from front to rear along the right side.) The depth was 26.75″ to match the refrigerator base depth, and a half inch deeper than the second piece. I set it in place, snug to the right side of the alcove and flush with the front edge of the other two pieces, and checked for an even reveal along the left side of 5.75″. Everything looked good so I screwed it down.

There are several reasons for this design/construction. First, there is a large bundle of wires and two air lines that run across the floor of the alcove at the rear wall. Using three layers of plywood allowed the top layer to be high enough for the base of the refrigerator to extend over the wire bundle and have its back about 1″ from the back wall (thus the reason for the recessed electrical outlet). It will also leave about 1″ of clearance above the fridge, which is enough. The second reason is that the 5.75″ width at the left, with only two pieces of plywood under it, is where the pull-out pantry will go. But third, I will install a 24″ long 2″ x 2″ angle (steel or aluminum) on the middle sheet against the left edge of the top sheet to prevent the refrigerator from shifting to the left. The front edges of the plywood base pieces will be covered (eventually) by a something, probably a piece of 3/4″ thick walnut hardwood, that will stick up above the top surface of the top piece just enough to keep the fridge from rolling out. That piece, however, will have to be removable so I am still thinking about just how I want to secure the refrigerator case in the alcove.

Linda does her Vanna White impersonation, highlighting how the new pull-out pantry will look when it is installed. The pantry is in its extended position revealing the slides sections that will mount on the cabinet wall. The refrigerator is out so we can work in the alcove.

We still had some light but with the heavy cloud cover it was darker than usual in the coach for this time of day (6:30 PM). We rigged up a piece of twine to hang the work light and turned on as many interior lights as we could. We then carried the pull-out pantry from the library (in the house) to the bus. We brought all of the slides in as well, along with two pieces of 3/4″ plywood and a 4′ length of 2×4.

We set the two pieces of 3/4″ plywood in front of the left edge of the alcove flush with the two bottom base pieces. We then set the 2×4 on flat (3.5″ side down) spanning the plywood inside and outside the alcove. We installed the cabinet halves of the nine slides onto the pieces attached to the pantry and then set the unit in place with the bottom resting on the 2×4. We moved the pantry in and out checking its position and considering where the slides needed to be attached to the alcove wall and exactly how we would do that so the front has an even reveal relative to the vertical front trim of the left alcove wall.

By this point it was after 8 PM, it was getting dark, and we were too tired to start something as critical as attaching the slides to the alcove wall. We are behind schedule, but had enough sense to not push beyond our limits. We closed up the bus, relaxed on the couch for a bit with our kitty cats, took some Advil PM, and went to bed at 9 PM.

2015/08/24 (M) Skimcoating

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For a change of pace we had granola with vegan yogurt for breakfast. I made seven cups of the Cafe Europe / Columbian decaf blend but Linda only had one mug as she was meeting Diane at Kensington Metropark at 9 AM to walk. After she left I gathered up the laundry, sorted it, and started the first load. I then turned my attention to the bus.

My first task was to cut one of the 8″x8″ sheets of #80 sandpaper in half, put it on the orbital pad sander, and go over all of the Universal Patch and Skimcoat (UPS) that I applied yesterday. The 80 grit worked well and I only needed the one half sheet. I swept the floor clean of loose debris and then assembled my tools and materials to patch a few gouges I missed yesterday and then skimcoat the entire portion of the floor that used to have ceramic tile on it. I mixed 24 ounces (by volume) with 12 ounces of water (by volume), half as much UPS as I did yesterday. I tried to work more quickly and got most of it applied. I cleaned up my tools and let them dry while the compound cured. That also gave me an opportunity to move laundry from the washer to the dryer and start another load in the washing machine.

I had a call from Chuck so I took a break to chat with him. He and Barbara spent the weekend racing at the old Air Force base in Oscoda, Michigan. Their bus and race car both ran well and he turned in some very good times. He had installed a new turbo boost gauge in the bus and based on my experience had selected a 0 to 15, PSI VDO unit. Apparently 15 PSI is not high enough for his engine. I have seen the boost on my gauge, which is a 0 to 30 PSI model, go as high as 17, but not often. For most of our trip to Arizona and back this past winter it did not go over 15 PSI.

The only issue they have with their coach at the moment is their old Amana residential refrigerator. The freezer is apparently not keeping things as cold as it should and the ice maker is not working. They use a lot of ice and generally have the freezer stocked, so those are problems. They bought a bag of ice for the weekend but it appeared to get warm enough to develop surface moisture and then refroze into large chunks, inconvenient at best. I think they have decided to replace it and want to do so before they leave for the winter and while they still have the shop and the forklift.

Chuck is also going to contact the glass installer and see if he would be willing to install bus windshields. Both of his lower windshields need to be replaced as do both of ours. We have five replacements at his shop, two for him and three for me. I also have new gaskets but he needs to get two sets. We discussed late September as the best time for me and he will see if the windshield guy will do all four of them on the same day.

I mixed the remaining USP, about 12 ounces (by volume) with 6 ounces of water (by volume) and finished the skimcoating of the bus floor. I used the last little bit of compound to patch some screw holes and small gouges in the living room floor where carpet had been installed. There may be a few more but instead of opening another bag of UPS I will probably return it and buy a quart of the premixed compound. I then cleaned up my tools again and left them in the sun to dry.

Linda got home about this time. It was just after noon, so we had a light lunch of vegan deli slices with lettuce, onion, and Daiya non-dairy cheese, on thin buns. A pluot provided a nice, sweet finish to lunch.

We measured for wallpaper the other day so I took the notes and created an Excel spreadsheet to figure out how many rolls of wallpaper to order. While I did that Linda worked on cleaning and reconditioning drawer fronts with Touch of Oranges and Touch of Beeswax. After examining the wallpaper in the bathroom (of the bus) I think we need to replace it too. We took a few minutes to get those measurements and I added them to the spreadsheet.

The wallpaper we have selected is the Lamar (#699-3377R) from the Just Textures collection of Sellars and Josephson. It is an off-white color with a small texture pattern designed for reverse hang, random match installation. It is only sold in 2-roll bolts 27″ wide and 4.5 yards long. We will need more than six rolls to replace all of the wallpaper so we will have to order eight rolls even though we may defer doing part of the hallway and the bathroom for a while. Fortunately it is not too expensive (as wallpapers go) and is scrubable, which was one of our requirements for use in the bus. Linda will return the sample books to Delux Drapery and Shade Company in Ann Arbor on Wednesday morning and place the order.

Linda reheated the leftover fajita veggies from last night and fixed some white rice to go with them. We had fresh strawberries and a little Coconut Bliss non-dairy ice cream for dessert. Coconut Bliss ice creams are not too coconuty, and are appropriately named. They are as good as I remember Hagan-Daas being.

I took a little time to add lines to my floor tile layout drawing showing the location of the underlayment sheets. It looks like I may need at least eight sheets. I have four sheets in the garage and will install those before buying more. I spent the rest of the evening working on the article for Bus Conversion Magazine about Larry and Carol Hall’s GM4106 bus conversion and finished it around 10 PM. I spent another 1.5 hours catching up on e-mail and checking in on the status of Technomadia’s bus renovation project at MasterTech in Elkhart, Indiana. The weather has turned cool and should be perfect for working on the bus tomorrow. We need to have long, productive days, so I had a snack and got to bed at midnight, played a few games, and went to sleep.

2015/08/23 The West Side

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Today was not an ordinary day for us in the sense of our usual routines of chores and projects. We were up at 7:45 AM, got dressed up more than usual, and had our usual granola breakfast but I did not make coffee. We left at 8:45 AM and drove to our daughter’s house near Dexter. We arrived at 9:30 and Brendan, Shawna, and Madeline pulled in right behind us. We visited for about 20 minutes which gave Madeline time to get into the flow of being at Aunt Meghan and Uncle Chris’s house. She was sitting on the couch with Meghan watching an animated video on Shawna’s iPad when we left.

We rode with Brendan and Shawna in their Subaru Outback. Our destination was the Waldorf Pub Ballroom in Hastings, Michigan. The reason for our trip was a Celebration of Life for Shawna’s father, Michael (Mick) James Lee, who passed away a little over a week ago from a non-cancerous but malignant brain tumor.

The quickest route to Hastings from Dexter is south to I-94 and then west to M-37, which runs northwest up to Hastings. We stopped at the Panera in Jackson where Linda and I both got coffee and I got an “everything” bagel to go. We arrived at the Waldorf at noon.

The gathering did not start until 2 PM but Shawna had agreed to come early to help with setup. That left us with some time so we went for a walk up and down the main street before returning to the ballroom. Shawna’s sister, Tracy, brother Rob, their mom, Carol, and Mick’s wife, Carol were there and we had a chance to visit briefly with them before everyone else started showing up. I did not try to do a head count but there were at least 100 people there, and possibly 150. Mick was a teamster and a lot of his social life involved his fellow truck drivers and was centered on their union local. I think a lot of them were there.

Tracy had assembled a slide show with 180 images and put together a mix of Mick and Carol’s favorite tunes. At 2 PM she read an honest, heartfelt, and warm remembrance of Mick. Mick’s lifelong friend gave a similar reflection, followed by Mary Kay, the sister of Mick’s wife Carol. A nice buffet was set out that included fresh fruit, vegetables, and small slices of toasted bread, so we had plenty to eat. There was a full bar available but hot coffee (regular and decaf) and cold lemonade met our needs.

Heavy rains moved in just after 2 PM but moved through before we left at 4:30. We went back down M-37 to I-94 and headed east. Shawna and Linda were following our progress using the GPS feature of their phones. There was an accident at the interchange with US-127 so Brendan exited at Airport Road and Linda navigated him through Jackson and back on to I-94 at Copper Road. Shawna noticed a rainbow ahead of us and then Linda spotted a second, fainter one, with a larger diameter than the first. We were able to see at least the main one, and usually both of them, all the way to the Dexter Road exit and part of the way to Dexter. It was quite a sight.

We got back to Meghan and Chris’s house around 6:30 PM. Madeline had a great day with her buddy Aunt Meghan but was keeping watch for our return and was excited to see her mom and dad and her Grandma Linda and Grandpa Bruce. We left at 6:50 and on the way home decided to go the Los Tres Amigos restaurant on Grand River Avenue just east of Latson Road, arriving at 7:30 PM. We had the vegetarian fajitas, and they were OK, but dining out allowed us to eat a little sooner without Linda having to cook.

After dinner we drove to the Shell station in Brighton and topped off the tank in Linda’s Honda Civic so she would not have to stop in the morning on her way to walk with Diane. At home we watched an episode of Sherlock on PBS and then an episode of Rick Steve’s Europe.

2015/08/22 (S) Clean and Level

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We arrived at the SLAARC breakfast just before 8 AM. We took the last two seats at the end of the long row of tables, but had to add another one as six more people came in after us. We had a lively chat that lasted until almost 9:30. After breakfast we stopped at the Tractor Supply Company store in New Hudson to get a couple more deer blocks and then headed for home.

We took a few minutes to put away tools and straighten up the garage enough that we could set up a work surface for Linda to use for cleaning the walnut drawer fronts for all of the bus drawers. We set up the two sawhorses we got at Lowe’s yesterday, set two 8-foot 2x4s in the provided grooves, and set a 4’x8′ piece of 2″ rigid foam insulation across them to use as the work surface. I found an old package of 4/0 steel wool and Linda found some old terry cloth towels.

Foam insulation work surface in garage with walnut drawer fronts laid out for cleaning with Touch of Oranges.

Linda removed the drawer fronts from seven of the drawer boxes and tagged them so they could be reunited later as each front is uniquely paired with its box. She then removed the handles from the drawer fronts and set them aside as they will be replaced with new ones once the cleaning is done. She started with the back sides of the drawer fronts. Following the directions she sprayed them liberally with Touch of Oranges wood cleaner, let them sit for 10 minutes, sprayed them again lightly, and rubbed them with the 4/0 steel wool. She then wiped them off with a terry cloth towel and applied Touch of Beeswax using 4/0 steel wool, always working with the grain, of course. The wax will have at least 24 hours to soak in before being wiped off. Once that is done she will flip them over and repeat the process on the front side.

While Linda was doing all of that I hauled the 15 gallon DeWalt portable air compressor out by the bus, plugged it in, and connected the air hose. I used the 4″ circular pneumatic sander on a few remaining high spots and decided I was done with it. I had found some old packs of 80 grit half sheets and tried using them on my orbital sander but the grit disappeared very quickly and the sheets snagged and tore on splinters in the plywood. I spent more time changing sheets than I did sanding with them so I abandoned this approach after the fifth sheet. I did, however, find a half dozen splintered areas and prepared those by making stop cuts with a utility knife and then peeling the splinter free with a putty knife, creating voids that will be filled with leveling compound.

I was tired of sanding and was clearly not going to get the floor back down to bare wood. I decided that the floor was as sanded and smooth as it was going to get and it was time to move to the next process; patching and leveling. Before I could do that, however, I needed to clean the coach. I vacuumed the floor three times and vacuumed all of the woodwork and wallpaper. As I worked from the bedroom forward Linda followed behind with a microfiber cloth wiping down all of the woodwork.

I assembled the tools I needed to apply the Universal Patch and Skimcoat; a 3″ putty knife, a 5″ putty knife, a combination smooth and toothed rectangular trowel, a mixing bucket, and a 2 foot long wooden stir stick and a mixing paddle designed to go in a drill. Each bag of UPS weighs 7 pounds and gets mixed with 1.75 quarts of water, which works out to 1 part water to 2 parts UPS.

The directions on the bag indicated that a full bag of UPS, properly mixed, would cover 20 to 25 square feet 1/8″ thick. That’s only a 5’x5′ area, but I only had a few gouges that were 1/8″ deep, so an entire bag was going to cover a lot more than 25 square feet when applied as a skim coat. Not having worked with this material before I had no idea how much working time I would have so I decided to mix half a bag. The recommended mixing method using a paddle in an electric drill turned out to be a bad idea so used the 2-foot long wooden stir stick to mix the compound.

TEC Universal Patch and Skimcoat applied to the floor in that hallway.

I started in the bathroom patching small depressions and then working out from the baseboards. By the time I got out into the hallway I had not even used half the compound and it was starting to set up. I hurried to use as much of it as I could, and tried adding a little extra water to extend its workability, but was only able to use about 60% of it before it was too stiff to spread and trowel off smoothly. I could have waited 1 hour and then mixed and applied more compound but I did not want to risk disturbing what I had already done and it has to set for 24 hours before I can sand it, which I will have to do.

Cleanup required warm soapy water for the tools. I then poured it into the 5 gallon compound bucket, topped it up with water, stirred it to dissolve the compound as much as possible, and let it sit.

For dinner Linda made Farro with mushrooms, onions garlic, glazed snow peas, and grated carrots. She needed some dry white wine for the Farro dish and opened a bottle of Pinot Grigio, so we had a glass with the meal. As rule if a wine is used in a dish it is also a good choice to drink with that meal.

After dinner I went to Lowe’s and got some more 4/0 steel wool and some 80 grit sandpaper sheets. I stopped at O’Reilly’s for a battery disconnect switch for the lawn tractor but they did not have one. I tried the Howell Tractor Supply Company but they did not have one either. I drove to the Brighton Shell station, topped off the fuel in the Element, and went home. We turned in at 9 PM and watched a 007 movie before going to sleep.

2015/08/21 (F) Have Fridge Will Travel

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I was up at 7:40 AM and made a pot of Costa Rican half-caff coffee. Linda was up just before 8 AM and washed off some fresh blueberries to put on our breakfast granola. The Costa Rican is definitely not our favorite coffee and I brewed it with a little too much water which did not improve matters. But we bought a pound of beans and are not going to throw them out so the sooner we use them up the sooner we can get something that we like.

Harvey Carter (AC8NO), the current President of our South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club, agreed to help us move the old bus refrigerator from Chuck’s shop in Novi to our house this morning using his cargo van. He pulled into the parking lot of the shop right behind us at 10 AM. Chuck and Barb had already left for Oscoda in their bus with their race car trailer in tow.

After opening the shop we had Harvey back his van up to the overhead door. We brought several lengths of 2x4s planning to use them under the back of the refrigerator but Harvey had two ramps made from 2x12s with a cross piece that spanned the rear bumper. That looked like a much better alternative to us. He also had a good hand truck and a ratchet strap.

We decided to truck the unit from the left side because the refrigerant and water lines protrude beyond the back of the case. We removed all of the trays from the doors and cabinet but left the shelves in place. We slid the hand truck under the left side of the cabinet and secured it with the ratchet strap. With Harvey on the hand truck we tilted it back and rolled it out to the ramps. We adjusted the ramps so the hand truck wheels would be centered on them. Harvey then pulled the hand truck up the ramp backwards as Linda and I pushed from the bottom, eventually lowering it all the way down as we slid it fully into the van. I then closed up the shop.

I rode with Harvey in the van and Linda followed us in the car for the trip back to our house where I had Harvey back his van up to the small garage door. Reversing our procedure from earlier we unloaded the fridge by rolling the hand truck down the pair of ramps and put it just inside the small garage bay near the door. We plugged it in and it started running so at least we did not break it.

We wanted to put the drawers and door bins back in but could not get the fresh food compartment door open more than a few inches. I was able to open it just enough to see inside and determine that at least two shelves had come loose and wedged into positions that prevented the door from opening. The solution was to remove the door. I undid the three screws that attach the top hinge to the cabinet and removed it, allowing Harvey to lift the door off of the bottom hinge. I reattached the two shelves to the mounting rails at the rear of the cabinet. Harvey then set the bottom door hinge pin back in the lower bracket and held the door while I reinstalled the top hinge. We will plug it in later next week and let it cool off as it has to be running and cold when DTE Energy comes on Friday to pick it up.

While Linda unloaded the drawers and bins from the car and put them back in the refrigerator I gave Harvey the ham radio tour. We looked at the antennas on the tower, the cable entry box, and the ham shack with the multiple monitor wall mounted track system we installed. I then gave him a tour of the bus interior. Linda was getting ready to go for a walk but I suggested we take Harvey to lunch and agreed to go. He lives in Green Oak Township southeast of Brighton so we went to the Panera on Grand River Avenue at I-96 as it was in the direction of his house and we all like their food.

After lunch we drove to the frame shop in Howell and picked up the last of four paintings we had framed. We were pleased with our choice of framing material and the owner, Rick, did a nice job assembling it. We headed back to Lowe’s and looked at thin paneling materials. Linda got a shield for the bird feeder that is supposed to keep the squirrels from getting to the seed block and I got a recessed outlet that I am considering using for the refrigerator in the bus. We stopped at the Walmart adjacent to the Lowe’s but did not find the peanut butter filled pretzels we were looking far. I needed a battery disconnect for the lawn tractor battery but we did not feel like doing anymore shopping today and returned home.

It was late enough in the afternoon that I did not feel like getting the air compressor out and working on the floor of the bus so I went to my office while Linda went for a walk. I was going to upload a few blog posts but decided to work on an article for Bus Conversion Magazine instead.

I took photographs of two buses at a pair of converted bus gatherings in Quartzite back in January of this year. Larry and Carol Hall had a very nice GM4106 at the FMCA Western G.M. Coach rally while Byron and Betty Pigg had a gorgeous Model 15 Eagle at the Eagle International converted bus rally. Larry and Byron are the presidents of their respective groups and the rallies took place at the same time in adjacent sections of the Quartzsite Marketplace dry camp area. This campground is near the epicenter of RV vendor activities and only a mile from where we were camped. Gary Hatt, the owner/publisher of BCM, brought his newly acquired Eagle conversion and had his mobile mechanic drive his MC-9 Moose Creek Motor Cabin, which was for sale. He invited me over so we could finally meet in person, I could meet a few folks, and photograph the buses. He knew, in particular, that Larry and Byron were interested in having their buses featured in the magazine and figured I could help make that happen.

I had started articles on both buses right after I photographed them and worked on them a bit back in February but I did not get them finished before we had to leave Quartzsite in early March. Once we pulled up stakes we were on the move and very busy and I did not get back to them before we got home. Of course, we got even busier once we got home so new articles for BCM were on the back burner with the gas turned off. But magazines have lead times with deadlines for each issue, and Gary very much wanted to feature both of these buses before 2016 arrived, so I dusted them off and decided to work on the article about the Hall’s GM4106.

Larry had sent me a brief narrative some months ago and I had started filling in the detailed specifications about the bus and conversion. I had already selected possible photos for the cover and centerfold as well as the article and post processed some, but not all, of them. I massaged Larry’s narrative, added an introduction of my own, extracted some additional specifications, and then focused my efforts on completing the post-processing of the photos.

I took a break for dinner and afterwards completed the photo processing. I then started inserting the thumbnail versions of the images into the Word document and writing captions. There isn’t really any magic to writing an article; it’s just a specific kind of work. You string words together into sentences, organized by paragraphs, that tell a short story about something interesting and you illustrate it with captioned photos that are hopefully relevant and technically adequate. It takes time and energy to do this well, however, and I ran out of both around 10 PM.

2015/08/20 (R) On The Level

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We awoke around 7 AM and noticed that it had rained overnight. We had Linda’s homemade granola with fresh blueberries for breakfast, followed by a pot of coffee brewed from the Cafe Europe / Columbian Decaf blend I got from Teeko’s on Tuesday. As we do most mornings we enjoyed our coffee while using our iPads to check in on the world (Linda) and write about our day yesterday (me).

While Linda went for a walk I checked e-mail and responded to several from Gary Hatt at Bus Conversion Magazine. I then unloaded all of the boards, slides, battery terminal covers, and the pneumatic disc sander and discs from the car. I set up our 15 gallon portable air compressor by the entrance door of the bus, got the long air hose out of its storage bay, and connected the air sander.

When Linda got back from her walk we unloaded the pull-out pantry from the car and stored it on top of some of the bookcases in the library. We had a light lunch after which Linda settled in to work at her desk and I busied myself with sanding the floor in the bus with the air sander.

Floor prep tools: 4” belt sander, hammer and chisel, 4” rotary pneumatic body sander.

I was eager (anxious) to get the initial sanding done so I could apply the floor leveling compound. Like drywall compound it will be a multi-day process. I needed to fill any deep gouges and voids, let the compound dry, and then lightly sand it with an orbital pad sander and finer grit sandpaper to make sure it is smooth. I then needed to fill the shallow grooves that exist between the ridges of thinset and mastic that I could not sand off completely. Once that dried I would again sand it off lightly and then apply a final, very thin, skim coat to the entire area, feathering it into the areas where tile was never installed. Finally I would go over the entire area gently with the pad sander one last time to make sure the surface is as smooth and flat as possible before installing the 1/4″ underlayment. The tile will be installed directly on the underlayment.

I considered using self-leveling instead of troweled-on floor leveling compounded but decided against it. Self-leveling is thin, like water, and flows. As such it seeks its on level and forms a smooth flat surface that is “level” as determined by gravity. Although it offers the possibility of a single step process with no sanding, it also offers the potential to go wrong and not be repairable. The bus subfloor would have to be dead level side-to-side and front-to-rear. There would also have to be a border to contain the liquid and there could not be any holes or cracks that it could leak through. In particular it seemed I’ll-suited for feathering into the adjacent areas of the subfloor that were never tiled. And so I decided to fill in and “level” the floor the slower and more labor intensive, but more controlled, way.

For dinner we had the other half of the gluten free pizza Linda made on Tuesday. We had peaches, strawberries, bananas, and an orange melon that were all ripe so she made a fruit salad. We finished the bottle of Cupcake Black Forest Decadent Red Wine.

We decided to turn in early and watch a little TV. Part 2 of The Mystery of Matter: The Search for the Elements was on PBS at 8 PM. We saw Part 3 last night and did not realize until 7:45 PM that Part 1 was on this evening at 7 PM, so we still have not seen it.

2015/08/19 (W) If It’s Wednesday This Must Be Indiana

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As we did last Wednesday we were up earlier than usual to drive to Indiana. We wanted to be at Bontrager’s Surplus when they opened at 9 AM to pick up some battery terminal covers for Butch, and possibly ourselves, so we pulled out of our driveway at 6:16 AM.

We took our usual route west on M-59 to I-96W to Lansing Road south. Rather than get on I-69S we stayed on Lansing Road all the way to Charlotte where we stopped at the Biggby’s Coffee to use the restroom and get coffee and bagels. From there we then took I-69S to Coldwater and headed west on US-12 since Bontrager’s Surplus is located on US-12 in White Pigeon, Michigan.

We arrived at Bontrager’s Surplus just after 9 AM. We looked around briefly but did not spot the battery terminal covers so we asked one of the employees where they might be and he took us directly to them. We bought 36 (18 red and 18 black), 10 of each for Butch and 8 of each for us. Bontrager’s is probably the best stocked of the surplus and salvage stores in this area and I could have spent hours here, but we had other places to be and a long day ahead of us.

Our shopping done we continued on to Coach Supply Direct in Edwardsburg, Michigan where we found Josh Leach hard at work on some interior remodeling of a Fleetwood Revolution. He removed the Notion Linen sample from his Lambright Comfort Chairs book and we chatted for a while.

I reflected on fact that one of the nicest Class A motorhomes we ever saw was a Fleetwood Revolution. The interior was a (faux) cherry wood with satin finish nickel hardware. It had modern, clean cabinetry and light grey wall treatments and a light tile floor with nickel colored inserts, as best I can recall. We eventually toured the American Coach factory in Decatur, Indiana where the Revolution was made and after seeing some of the construction methods we were less enamored with it. Like all of the American Coach products it was out of our price range as a new unit but it was very much to our taste.

Before continuing our Journey Linda pulled up Jarel’s address in our GPS. I then texted Jarel to give him a revised, and more accurate ETA. We headed southwest out of Edwardsburg on M-62 which becomes IN-23 through Granger. We turned onto IN-331 which bypasses most of Mishawaka east of town and delivered us to US-20 where we headed west. We stopped at the Meijer’s, which has a filling station, fueled the car, and switched drivers. We exited US-20 just south of South Bend, Indiana and headed south on US-31. We exited US-31 at Rochester and took IN-25 south to Logansport. I texted Jarel an updated ETA enroute.

We arrived at Jarel Beatty Cabinetry at 11:45 AM and pulled around back. I texted Jarel to let him know we were there and he came out of the shop to meet us. We chatted for a while, loaded up the pantry, the slides, the three pieces for the built-in sofa that we forgot last week, a piece of walnut trim for the pantry face, and a leftover piece of 1/4″ Baltic birch plywood. Linda wrote a check for the balance we owed. The only thing left for Jarel to build is the HVAC/wiring chase cover but he cannot do that until I give him the length, which I cannot do him until the desk is installed in the bus.

We left the cabinet shop at 1 PM and stopped at the Martin’s supermarket in Logansport for lunch. This particular Martin’s did not have a salad bar but they did have pre-made salads. We each had one along with a bread roll. I called Butch to let them know we were on our way, and headed for Twelve Mile, Indiana.

I gave Butch the battery terminal covers. He and I figured their cost ($1.25 each) covered the cost of the 12 fiberglass pole mast sections ($2.00 each) we took last week and called it even.

I brought the small window frame stop block from our bus to see if Butch could make one. He had some aluminum bar stock that looked like it would work. We decided to make it longer than the original to accommodate three machine screws and cut it to size using a band saw. Butch then marked three points to drill holes using the old block as a template. Two holes were drilled through and one end hike was blind. The blind hole will fit over the shaft of the old screw that would not come out in case any of it is still protruding above the surface. The middle hole will line up with other existing hole and I will have to drill and tap a hole in the frame to match the third hole. But first I need to get some brown spray paint, put some sacrificial screws in the holes, and paint the piece.

While we were working on the stop block I noticed that Butch had a torque multiplier sitting out. He commented that it was available to a good home for a good price; hint, hint. These torque multipliers are used to break the lug nuts loose on bus and truck wheels and I have had one on my mental wish list since I first became aware of them five years ago. I had not pursued getting one as they tend to be expensive even used on Ebay. Butch wanted $75 for it so I wrote a check and put it in the car. It has three different lug nut sockets so I hope one of them first the ones on our bus. I also hoped they would fit the very large torque wrench I bought from Butch last fall but they are 1″ square drive sockets and the torque wrench has a 3/4″ square stud. I’m not sure I have a correct socket for the torque wrench so that’s another thing I still need to get.

Butch and Fonda bought a compact stacked clothes washer/dryer for their bus and asked if we would help them get it into their rig. Of course we said yes. We got it on a dolly and wheeled it out to the entrance door and then pondered the situation. We have some recent experience getting things out of and into a bus entrance door and this did not look promising. Butch handed me a tape measure and I determined that the maximum width that would fit through the step well was 23.5 inches due to the door hinges. The washer/dryer is 24″ wide and 28″ deep with a recessed back on the washer (lower unit). It is also tall, being a stacked unit, and we all agreed that the only way it was going in was on its back, through a window, using a forklift. It was Deja vu all over again; been there, done that, didn’t even get a T-shirt. That approach required more preparation than Butch cared to tackle today, and more time than we had to spare, so we moved the unit back under the overhang and left it covered with a blanket.

We all went back in the house and visited for a while longer. Butch had found his 4″ pneumatic body sander and loaned it to me along with three boxes of AA50 sanding discs. While not quite as aggressive as the #36 ceramic grit belts I have been using on the 4″ portable belt sander, this tool will allow me to get under the cabinet toe kicks where the belt sander won’t reach.

As much as we would have liked to stay and go out to dinner again, we did not want to be getting home at midnight. We wished them a safe journey, again, but this time it really is unlikely that we will see them again before they leave for Arizona. We left for home at 4:45 PM with Linda at the wheel. From SR-16W (CR-700N) we took CR-700 (Meridian) north to its northernmost point and headed west into Fulton on W750S where we picked up IN-25 and headed north. At Rochester we left IN-25 and took US-31N to US-20W. We exited US-20 at SR-19 and drove north through Elkhart, finally arriving at the Martin’s supermarket at CR-4 around 6:15 PM. This Martin’s has an excellent salad bar and a nice dining area with an upstairs, which is where we chose to sit and eat our dinner.

Linda continued to drive after dinner. There is an entrance to the Indiana Toll Road (I-80/90) on SR-19 just south of CR-4 so we got on going east. The toll road is a few extra miles compared to US-12 through Michigan, but it is posted 70 MPH (max) with no stops, compared to 55 MPH with six towns that have reduced speed limits and stops.

We exited the toll road, paid our $2.90 toll, and headed north on I-69. A few miles later we were back in Michigan. We left the Interstate at M-60 (exit 25) to refuel at the Shell station, use the restrooms, and switch drivers. It was about 8 PM and still light, but it was cloudy to the west and the light was fading. I find night driving easier than Linda does and I had been able rest while she drove so I was good to go.

I followed our usual route, leaving I-69N and using the Lansing Road cutoff to get to I-96E. We passed mile marker 100 on the south side of Lansing, which meant we had 33 miles to the M-59 exit. From there it was 11 miles to Hacker Road and then the final 2.5 miles to our house.

We arrived home at 10 PM, five hours and 15 minutes after we left Twelve Mile and just over 16 hours from when we left home this morning. The trip odometer indicated 534.8 miles traveled today. We unloaded the camera, phones, wallets, etc. from the car but decided to wait until tomorrow to unload the cabinetry, tools, and parts. We headed off to bed and watched part 3 of a PBS program The Mystery of Matter: The Search for the Elements. Interesting stuff. We both find programs that inform and educate to be entertaining.

2015/08/18 (T) Walking Grind

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We were up at 8 AM and I made a pot of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe half-caff coffee while Linda got breakfast ready. She made a batch of granola yesterday so we had some with fresh blueberries and unsweetened soy milk. It’s our standard breakfast, but that’s because we like it so much. She had an e-mail from Robin at the bakery and had to deal with some issues related to the bakery’s new account, The University of Michigan Ann Arbor. As I do most mornings I sat in the living room working on my iPad, drinking my coffee, and paying attention to our two cats.

Being Tuesday Linda had a date with Diane to walk at 10 AM and left at 9:30 for Kensington Metropark. I continued working on my iPad for a while and enjoying my coffee. At 10:15 AM I called the Livingston County Sheriff and reported the mailbox incident from late Friday evening /early Saturday morning. Shelby took the call, was very nice, said she was not aware of any other mailbox reports, but would pass the info along to the Desk Sargent. I checked my e-mail and confirmed with Harvey for Friday at 10 AM to move the old bus refrigerator. I finally went out to work on the floor of the bus at 11 AM, by which time the outside air temperature was already in the 80’s.

I leave three of the awning style windows in the bus open a few inches so it doesn’t get too hot inside. I opened all three roof vents, turned on their ceiling fans, and set them to exhaust air rather than draw it in. I also left the entrance door open to allow more air to flow through the inside of the coach. I then sanded and vacuumed until about 1 PM. When I came back in the house I had two missed calls from Michele Henry of Phoenix Paint so I called her back. I was on the phone with her when Linda got back from her walk.

Once I wrapped up the call with Michele we had a light lunch of hummus with pita chips and both black and red grapes. While we were eating we were entertained by a gray squirrel who had gotten onto the bird feeder and was hanging upside down by its hind legs. It would curl its body to bring its mouth up to the bottom of the feeder, emancipate some seed, and then uncurl to the more relaxed stretched out position and eat it. All of this was also being watched with both interest and considerable skepticism by three crows who were hanging around on the ground under the feeder. They grabbed seeds that the squirrel dropped but seemed very wary of it, which surprised us. I speculated that perhaps they had never seen a squirrel behave in this way and were, therefore, understandably and appropriately cautious; crows are very smart, after all.

After lunch we took the three wallpaper sample books to the bus to look at them with the woodwork. Before we could do that, however, we discovered a small bird trapped in the coach and had to deal with it. I say “trapped” because it was up on the dashboard and obviously confused by the windshields as it kept trying to fly out through them. It did not realize it could get out the same way it came in, through the open door.

The bird seemed small and I think it was an immature sparrow but I’m not sure. It was seeking safe shelter in the space between the dashboard cover and the lower driver side windshield. I used a broom to try to gently encourage it to fly towards the door but it was understandably suspicious of my good intentions. I put on a pair of canvas work gloves and it allowed me to gently pick it up. I tried to release it at the door opening and it flew into the door causing Linda to make a comment about why we use the phrase “bird-brained.” I caught it again, got outside the bus clear of the door, and tossed it gently away from the bus. It immediately took flight and flew off to the southwest, apparently none the worse for its ordeal. I can only image the story it told the other birds.

I got a piece of the Armstrong Alterna Luxury Vinyl floor tile from the garage. Many of the wallpapers that we thought would look good with the floor tile turned out to be too yellow, and most of the ones with good color tone were too dark, but we found a few that we liked. Those tended to be lighter without a lot of pattern and a neutral, off-white color. We are, however, far from a final choice as we do not currently have a sample of the Lambright Notion Linen upholstery fabric or the MCD night shade material and the wallpaper has to work with all of these simultaneously.

We measured the areas that need to be repapered and in the process decided that we would leave the old wallpaper on the inner wall of the hallway, at least for now. (The paper in the bathroom, which is different from the rest of the coach, is generally in good condition and we are not currently planning on replacing it as part of this project.) The existing wallpaper in most of the coach is a string cloth with a beige base but distinct vertical threads that contain a noticeable amount of grey and a more subtle herringbone pattern. It looks good with the walnut woodwork and worked well with the old white carpet, black ceramic floor tile, and bone leather upholstery, so we think it will continue to look good with the new floor tile.

If Josh is at his shop tomorrow we will try to stop and pick up the Lambright Notion Linen sample as whatever wallpaper we choose has to work well with the furniture fabric. On Thursday we will revisit the papers in the three books we currently have with an eye towards something that has some grey in it.

It was another warm, humid day and I was done sanding so I closed up the roof vents, locked up the coach, and went inside. Linda prepared a pizza using the gluten-free crust recipe she got from Mara. Yum.

After dinner I went to Lowe’s and bought two bags of TEC Skill Set Universal Floor Patch and Skim Coat, a mixing bucket, two bags of tile spacers, and three 4’x8′ sheets of 1/4″ SurePly underlayment. I meant to buy a folding metal sawhorse but left it somewhere in the store. I was going to buy premixed floor leveling compound but they only had 1-quart containers for $10 each and the directions said it would only cover 1.5 square feet. I have about 80 square feet of floor to patch and level, so that clearly was not a good solution.

The Universal Floor Patch is a powder that has to be mixed with water, but each bag will cover 20 – 25 square feet at 1/8″ thickness and costs $13; much better than the premixed stuff. I have a few areas to patch that are deeper than 1/8″ but the material can be applied up to 1/2″ thick per coat, and most of the area just needs a much thinner skimcoat. It can also be sanded within 24 hours which will allow me to make it very smooth and keep the work moving along. My goal is to have the floor leveled and sanded smooth by bedtime on Saturday so I can install the 1/4″ underlayment on Sunday and start laying tile on Monday or Tuesday next week.

I stopped at Teeko’s Coffee and Teas to get some more of the Cafe Europe half-caff blend. They had the regular blend but not the decaf blend so I had Roger use the Columbian decaf instead. He roasted the beans for me while I waited and Jeff showed up along with his wife as I was leaving. They were married last September and are expecting their first child late next month. Jeff was wearing his Pepsi delivery shirt, confirming what the woman at the Kahuna Coffee Shop told us last Friday.

We turned in early as we will be getting up very early tomorrow to drive to Indiana again. Linda watched an episode of NCIS after which I watched a PBS special on the origins and evolution of the Navy Seals.

2015/08/17 (M) Wallpaper Search

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We awoke this morning to find wild turkeys in the yard behind our bedroom. The deer feed block and natural mineral rock initially attracted a doe and her faun but has been a much stronger attraction for the wild turkeys and crows. Both the turkeys and crows also like to clean up the bird seed that falls to the ground under the seed block that Linda hung from a branch on one of our White Pine trees. The turkeys eventually moved on and we sat down to a breakfast of fresh mixed berries, juice, and coffee, which we took to the living room while we used our iPads to read, write, or play a few games, as is our morning habit.

I had a text message exchange with Chuck regarding the moving of our old bus refrigerator out of his shop. He and Barbara are headed off to Oscoda on Friday with their race car so I e-mailed Harvey (AC8NO) from our SLAARC ham radio club to see if he could help us move the refrigerator on Friday.

We had quite a few downed branches, and a couple of downed trees, scattered about the property as a result of winter snows, spring/summer storms, poor drainage, and age. With Keith coming this morning to mow the grass I decided I should pick up as many of them as I could. When I started at 9:30 AM it was already warm and muggy. Keith showed up at 10 AM and got right to work but I managed to stay ahead of him and got everything of any size picked up except for one tree. It was at least 8″ in diameter at the base and at least 30′ long so I will have to de-limb it, cut up the trunk with a chain saw, and haul the pieces away using the lawn tractor and utility dump trailer. That, however, won’t happen anytime soon.

We skipped last week’s mowing because it had been dry and the grass had not grown noticeably, but we got rain during the past week and the grass responded accordingly. The yard looked good when Keith was done and the timing of his visit was fortuitous as there is rain in the forecast for the next few days with slightly cooler temperatures.

We had a light lunch and then Linda settled in to work at her desk while I worked in the bus. I spent a couple of hours using the belt sander to grind down the residual thinset and mastic on the floor. I wear a dust mask, hearing protector, and safety glasses when sanding, which is even less comfortable than normal when the temperature and humidity are elevated. But I needed to have the floor prep finished by the end of this week, and the new floor installed by the end of next week, or I risked not being ready for the installation of the new seating on September 14 and 15.

I suggested to Linda that we go to Ann Arbor to look at wallpaper, visit Brendan, Shawna, and Madeline and then pick up some things at the Whole Foods Market that we cannot get locally. Linda researched wallpaper stores and made arrangements with our son while I took a shower and got dressed for visiting.

We left around 3:30 PM and drove down US-23 to the Washtenaw Road exit. If we had put the address in the GPS sooner we would have taken M-14 west instead of staying on US-23 as the Delux Drapery and Shade Co. is on West Stadium Boulevard. Still, we got there in a reasonable amount of time. We told the sales associate that we were looking for something that would stand up to use in a motorhome, preferably something that could be wiped, washed, or scrubbed. We wanted something light and neutral (off white) without a pattern that had to be matched, but with some texture. She pulled out several sample books and we looked through them. We ended up signing out three books each of which had one or two papers that we liked and thought might work well with our woodwork, floor tiles, and upholstery.

We drove back across town to our son and daughter-in-law’s house. Our daughter’s car was also there but no one was around so Linda called Brendan. As we suspected they were at Burns Park so we walked over there and found them. Madeline was very excited to see her Grandma Linda and ran over to give her a hug. As we were heading towards the park exit that most directly leads back to their house we spotted Madeline’s friend Maya and her dad Jason. That unplanned encounter resulted in 20 minutes of child play and adult socializing before we finally resumed our homeward trek.

Back at the house we continued to visit until dinner time. Meghan left to go fix dinner for herself and Chris. Madeline had her dinner and then let her dad read a Curious George story. Brendan and Shawna had packing to do for their flight tomorrow so we took our leave. The three of them are flying to Denver to visit Shawna’s mom (Carol) and her husband (Cliff), who live nearby in Golden, Colorado. Madeline is well-traveled for a 30 month old child.

We stopped at the Whole Foods Market on Washtenaw Avenue, which is close to their house and conveniently located on our route out of town. The main item on our list was plain soy creamer. We used to be able to get this at both the Meijer’s and Kroger stores near our house but they are only carrying the vanilla flavored version which I do not like. We picked up a bag of sauerkraut to go with the vegan beer brats, six bottles of wine, because you get a 10% discount on six or more bottles (mix and match), two pieces of vegan cake, and some other stuff. It’s probably a good thing that we do not have a Whole Foods closer to our house.

By the time we got home it was 7:45 PM. Linda heated the sauerkraut and the vegan beer brats and served them open-faced on hot dog buns with mustard, of course. Black grapes provided a sweet contrast to the savory main dish. We sat for a while in the living room, playing iPad games and writing blog posts while we had some of the vegan cakes, before turning in. I continued to write while we watched a TV program and then went to sleep.

2015/08/16 (N) A Send Off For Katie

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We had a light breakfast and enjoyed our morning coffee. With company due at noon we were not inclined to do any overly physical work this morning. Linda made a quick run to the supermarket and then spent the late morning finishing food preparations. I worked in my office installing operating system updates, updating the BCM page on our website, and editing/uploading blog posts.

Our step-granddaughter, Katie Bortz, is leaving for college in a few days so Linda arranged to have her over for lunch along with our daughter, Meghan, and son-in-law, Chris (Katie’s dad). They arrived around noon and stayed until almost 5 PM, a longer visit than usual. For lunch we had chickpea salad, corn-on-the-cob, collard greens cole slaw, and potato salad. Meghan made two desserts at home and brought them: cheesecake and vegan oatmeal bars.

Grand-daughter Katie (L) waiting for a slice of cake baked by her step-mom (our daughter, Meghan, on right).

Katie got a head start on college while still in high school and took several AP classes. She also tested out of some basic classes so she will hit the ground running with at least some courses that are directly related to her interests (biology, specifically animals), and major (wildlife and fisheries). She will be moving into one of the dorms and paired up with another freshman girl during orientation. They have the room arrangement worked out, at least on paper, and I expect that everything will fall into place.

For dinner we had leftovers from yesterday’s meal after which I chatted with Chuck for a while on the phone about refrigerators in buses. I worked on blog posts after that and was going to participate in the SLAARC info net at 8 PM. Linda noticed that there was a program about the Real Scotland Yard on Lansing PBS at that time, followed by an episode (rerun) of Sherlock. Harvey (AC8NO) was the net control operator for the info net and as soon as he called for check-ins I did an “in and out.” Once he acknowledged that he had received my check-in I settled in to watch the programs. After that it was off to bed to play a few iPad games before going to sleep.

2015/08/15 (S) Steve and Karen

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As we were backing out of the driveway to go to our weekly ham radio breakfast we noticed a large mailbox sitting on the ground next to ours. It was still attached to the upper half of its wood support structure. The number was 593, which is not an address that occurs on our street. We left it there and went to breakfast.

We had a mid-sized group of 15 people at our SLAARC breakfast this morning. On the drive into breakfast we lost power to our GPS every time I transmitted on the 2m ham band. The GPS and cellular booster worked fine all day yesterday with the new 12VDC extension splitter, but I did not use the mobile ham radio.

After breakfast we went directly to Chuck’s shop in Novi to see if we could retrieve the old refrigerator using our car. A measuring tape quickly revealed that the fridge would not fit without removing the seats. Even then it would be too long to close the rear gate and hatch on the Element. At breakfast Harvey (AC8NO) offered the use of his van and labor to help move the fridge and I will probably take him up on it.

On the drive home I chatted with John (NU8M) on the South Lyon 2m repeater and we were joined by Mike (W8XH). After John signed and dropped off Linda tried different combinations of power connections while I talked with Mike. Based on that test the splitter appears to be the problem but we could not determine if it was a voltage drop issue or some form of RFI.

I stopped on the way home to fill the gas tank in my car. When we got home I put the mailbox in the back of my car and we drove to the end of the street but it clearly did not come from one of our neighbor’s yards. When we got back to the house we also noticed that there was a footprint on the side of our mailbox. Closer inspection revealed that the post was slightly loose in the ground and the box was leaning (bent) slightly to one side. Clearly someone had tried to kick it over (and failed) and there was a very high probability that it was the same person(s) who probably broke the other mailbox and left it on the ground next to ours. We discussed whether we should report it to the Livingston County Sheriff Department but did not take the time right then to do so.

Linda needed to make a grocery store run and then prep the food for dinner and pick up the house. With company coming later I did not want to get all sweaty working in the bus and garage so I worked in my office editing and uploading blog posts. I quit around 3:30 and was writing blog posts when Steve and Karen Limkemann arrived at 4 PM.

We always have a nice visit with Steve and Karen and they are good sports about eating the vegan food that Linda prepares. Linda made a sweet and sour collard greens cole slaw and vegan potato salad ahead of time. She cooked corn-on-the-cob on the stovetop and heated vegan beer brats on the grill along with onions and green peppers. Steve and Karen brought a Malbec wine which we enjoyed before, during and after the meal. Dessert was fresh strawberries with cashew milk snickerdoodle ice cream. Really, what’s not to like?

Steve and Karen have rented a house trailer in a trailer park near Venice, Florida for the last few winters. I think they rented it for January, February, and March and split the time with another couple, but I may not have my facts completely straight. The owners of the trailer are from England and decided after this last winter that they want to start using it during the winter so Steve and Karen lost the use of it. They really liked the park and its location so they bought a trailer that was for sale and already set up. We visited them two winters ago, but we were several hours north of them. This coming winter we will be much closer to them while we are in Arcadia during January and February and plan to see them more often. Venice is a very upscale place and there is an excellent vegan restaurant within easy walking distance (a mile) from their trailer park.

We talked about trying to catch the tail end of the Perseids Meteor Shower but the peak was earlier in the week, they would not be visible at our location until midnight, and then only low in the northeast sky, which is not an ideal viewing direction from our yard. Steve and Karen had a 45 minute drive to get home and left around 10:30 PM. By that point it had been a long but very satisfying day for us and we were straight away to bed once they were safely on their way.

2015/08/14 (F) Back-to-the-Bricks (Again)

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I was up late last night and thought I would sleep in this morning but the alarm on Linda’s iPad had other ideas and woke me up at 7:15 AM. I got dressed and while Linda was getting ready I started downloading an update for Photoshop CC 2015 on my ASUS laptop. These Adobe downloads are very large and very slow so I left it to run.

We did not have breakfast or coffee at home. Linda made PB&J sandwiches and packed a bag of pretzel crackers, some fresh fruit, and some water in a cooler bag with some freezer packs. The forecast was for very warm, very humid conditions so we closed up the house and turned on the air-conditioning. We loaded the camera, raincoats, hats, folding camp chairs, an iPad, and some GLCC T-shirts and flags into the car and left around 8 AM for the GLCC/CCO Back-to-the-Bricks rally at the Fireman’s Park in Clio, Michigan.

We took Hacker Road to M-59 east to Old US-23 and stopped at the Kahuna Coffee shop. We had seen the sign for this place but had never been there. The owner was there and she was very nice. She has a smaller version of the JavaMaster hot air coffee bean roaster that Jeff has at Teeko’s. Her selection of green beans, however, was very different from Teeko’s with lots of flavored beans but none of the ones we usually buy. Knowing that she gets her beans from the same place as Jeff, however, means we could probably order the ones we like if Teeko’s disappears. She is friends with Jeff and is well aware of the probable impact of the Panera opening up across the intersection from Teeko’s. But I digress.

This morning we were interested in coffee and bagels to go. Kahuna had a better selection of bagels than Teeko’s but we got our usual choices; “everything” for Linda and cinnamon raisin for me, toasted with nothing on them. They had Swiss Chocolate Almond coffee brewed so we tasted a sample. It was very smooth, with no bitterness and just a hint of the named flavors, so we got two large ones to go.

We got back on M-59 eastbound and 100 yards later took the entrance ramp to northbound US-23. US-23 merges with I-75 at the southwest corner of Flint and we continued north on the combined road until we exited at M-57 and headed east through Clio to M-54 and turned south. A few miles later we turned into the Fireman’s Park on the east side of the highway. It was 9:15 AM as I parked the car.

When I talked to rally co-host Marty Caverly last week only 14 rigs had RSVP’d for the rally. There were over 20 rigs there when we arrived and five more showed up during the day. A guy also brought a Country Coach Prevost XL conversion down from Saginaw for the afternoon. He is trying to sell it and wanted to let the rally attendees check it out.

We made the rounds and said our “hello”s to everyone. As has happened at past rallies where we have dropped in for a day many of the ladies took off to check out local garage sales. Bill and Karen Gerrie were just pulling out but stopped to chat briefly. Frank and Sandy Griswold’s Featherlite H3-45 conversion has windows that slide open rather than swing out like our awning windows so I asked Frank and several other people about screens for these. Everyone had the same suggestion; that any local window and door business should be able to make them. I was trying to get useful information for someone who had e-mailed me as a result of an article in BCM.

The roundtable discussion started at 2 PM and most of the rally attendees were back by then. Pat Lintner, our GLCC national director, gave a pitch for the FMCAssist program, which is included as part of the annual FMCA membership and more than worth the annual cost of $40. I announced that we had GLCC T-shirts and a few flags with us if anyone wanted to buy them. I also announced that the Arcadia Rally website had disappeared but that Bill and Brenda Phelan are working to fix the problem and the rally is still on for December 26-31, 2015 with departure on January 1, 2016.

Ed Roelle had two topics for the roundtable: 1) “towing insurance” for our bus conversions, and; 2) causes and cures for hard water deposit buildup in the fresh water plumbing associated with an Aqua-Hot (Webasto diesel burner) heating and domestic hot water systems. Most of us use, or have used, Coach-Net for our “emergency roadside assistance” coverage. The plan includes towing but many of our members have switched to one of the three Good Sam ERS plans. The top (platinum) plan is ~$140/year.

A couple of years ago Coach-Net decided they would not cover bus conversions more than 40 years old and alienated quite a few folks in the converted coach community. They eventually reversed that position but the damage was done. Others who stayed with them have had issues getting service or being charged ridiculous sums of money for simple things. Coach-Net was officially endorsed by FMCA until recently, and is still endorsed by The Escapees RV Club, but FMCA has found a different provider for this important service.

We stuck around after the roundtable and continued chatting with folks in constantly shifting groupings. The dinner meal was planned for 6 PM, and by 5:30 preparations were well under way, so we started saying our “goodbyes.” We finally got our chairs back in the car at 5:50 PM and pulled out at 5:55. There were very ominous clouds moving towards the rally site from the north as we started for home and a severe weather watch had been posted.

To get home we reversed our route taking M-54 north to M-57 west through Clio to I-75/US-23 south. We stayed on southbound US-23 at the split with I-75 southwest of Flint and eventually exited onto M-59. Instead of going west towards home we headed east and pulled into the Hartland Meijer’s to pick up something for dinner and get fresh ingredients for tomorrow’s dinner with Steve and Karen.

The weather we saw approaching Clio from the north was just moving into Hartland as we left the Meijer’s, so it was a rapidly moving system. The storm clouds were very dramatic but we got back to the house and got the car unloaded before the rain came. The wind gusted strongly for a while but in the end we did not get as much precipitation as we needed or thought we would.

For dinner we had vegan burgers with all the fixin’s, oven-baked French fries, and fresh strawberries. It was 9 PM by the time we were done eating. We were both tired from our long, but very enjoyable, day so we went to bed earlier than usual.

2015/08/13 (R) Sanding Success

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Linda was scheduled to go into the bakery today but knew before we went to bed last night that the visit was postponed. That was just as well; we were very tired from our long day yesterday and slept in this morning.

Before I even had a chance to make coffee I spotted wild turkeys by the road in our easternmost driveway entrance. They walked past the east end of the house into our backyard. They hung around by the deer block for quite a while so we had a good long look at them and I took a few pictures. There was a big tom, a younger/smaller tom, and a half-dozen hens, one with a surprisingly small chick for this late in the season. The turkeys eventually moved on and we got back to our normal routine. While I made the coffee Linda made her own version of raisin, date, walnut oatmeal with some quick oats that she had in the pantry. It was very good.

We read for a bit but I needed to finish the blog posts for the last several days and Linda needed to return some items to the Howell Library and run a couple other errands. While working on the blog post for yesterday I realized that we had not loaded all of the pieces for the built-in sofa. I checked the pieces we had against the drawings, which we should have done yesterday, and confirmed that we were missing the two top pieces (E) for the support boxes (HVAC plenums) and the top piece (H) for the return air plenum. I texted Jarel and he replied quickly that he would try to take care of it in time for me to drive back down on Wednesday to pick up them up. It’s a 12-17 hour, 550 mile day, for me and costs about $60 in gasoline, so hopefully he will have the pantry done by then as well.

Linda got word from our son via TXT message that Shawna’s father, Mick, had passed away. He had an aggressive but non-cancerous brain tumor that did respond to two separate surgeries and was moved to hospice care about two weeks ago. Brendan, Shawna, and Madeline are cutting their vacation short by a day to head to the Grand Rapids area but are still leaving Tuesday to fly to Denver to visit Shawna’s mother, Carol, and her husband, Cliff. It appears that a memorial service may be in the works for the weekend of the 22nd and 23rd, in which case we will probably drive over.

My sister tried to call me today. Linda was on the house phone quite a bit today with bakery-related business so Patty tried my cell phone but did not leave a message. I was working in the bus at the time, did not have it with me, and Linda could not find it in time when it was ringing. Being deaf in one ear she cannot locate where sounds are coming from. She does a little better when she uses her BAHA, but rarely wears it around the house. I called my sister back and left a message and she eventually called me back and we got to talk.

Our father, who is 90, had been admitted to a hospital near where he lives. The staff said he appeared to have severe dementia, but he was fine (for his age) just a couple of weeks ago, so I suspected a stroke or some other sudden change. Patty sent me a text latter that the CAT scan of his brain revealed two recent lesions (last few weeks), the telltale sign of two strokes. She also said he was being transferred to Missouri Baptist Hospital, which is much closer to where she lives, for further care.

Those two pieces of news certainly put a damper on the day, and may cause an adjustment in my plans if I have to travel to St. Louis. In the meantime there is stuff that has to get done, so even though it was warm today and I wasn’t really in the humor, I kept working in the bus, off and on. I vacuumed up loose material, including inside the bases of cabinets, and then cleaned the wiring in the refrigerator alcove with Lysol. I decided to make a template for the refrigerator alcove plywood base filler panels so I could cut them the right size/shape on the first try. I then used one of the new ceramic sanding belts on the residual thin-set and mastic, and it worked! My sense of hope was renewed that I will be able to install the new floor correctly.

By 7 PM I was feeling drained so I wrapped up my work and took a shower. For dinner Linda made pan-grilled BBQ tofu with caramelized onions and served it open faced on a hamburger bun with a side of fresh steamed asparagus. It was delicious.

After dinner I went to Lowe’s and The Home Depot in search of several items but only ended up buying another 36 grit sanding belt. I needed floor leveling compound but was not prepared to choose between their limited options. I also needed a self-centering drill bit but neither store had them. Lowe’s and THD really are focused on the tools and materials one needs to work on a house and its surrounding property. Things like self-centering drill bits, though useful for things like drilling holes for door hinges, are really cabinet-making tools. As big as these stores are they can’t, and don’t, sell everything.

I talked to Butch on the drive home. The self-centering drill bit that Jarel recommended for installing the pull-out pantry slides is a Vix and Butch suggested four places where I could buy it: Rockler, Custom Service Hardware, McFeeley’s, and Grizzly’s. Before ordering one I need to e-mail or text Jarel and ask him what size screw I need to mount the pull-out pantry extension slides.

Back home I thought of four other things I could have bought while I was out so I added them to my list. I then went to my office and worked on blog posts, updated the BCM Group page on RVillage, e-mailed Gary Hatt at BCM, responded to an e-mail from Howard (PlayaDog) re: screens for sliding bus windows, and started downloading Adobe Creative Cloud 2015 updates. Jack Conrad had responded to my earlier e-mail asking if he knew what was going on with the Arcadia rally and I sent him a reply. By the time I dealt with all that I was ready to recline and rest.

2015/08/12 (W) Back to Indiana (Again)

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Today was early arrival day for the annual Back-to-the-Bricks converted bus rally in Clio, Michigan. This joint rally of the Converted Coach Owners (CCO) and the FMCA Great Lakes Converted Coaches (GLCC) chapter has become an annual event that typically draws 20 to 30 rigs. Most of them are converted highway buses and many of those were converted or re-modeled by the owners. Many of them are works in progress but such is the nature of the bus conversion hobby and the true bus nut. But that is not where we were headed today. Our bus is unusable at the moment as the toilet is disconnected, the bed platform has been removed, and all of the cabinet drawers have been taken out. But the main reason was that we had multiple commitments in Indiana today.

Our first appointment was with Josh Leach of Coach Supply Direct. Although CSD is located in Edwardsburg, Michigan we had arranged to meet him in the parking lot of the Martin’s Supermarket at SR-19 (IN) and CR-4 on the north side of Elkhart, Indiana at 9:30 AM to take delivery of 15 yards of upholstery fabric. We picked that location, rather than his shop in Edwardsburg, for several reasons. He had to be at the Forest River Owners Group (FROG) rally at the Elkhart County 4-H Fairgrounds at 10 AM so that location got him half way to his destination at a good time of day. For us, Elkhart is a 3-1/2 hour drive. That meant we had to be up at 5:00 AM and on the road not later than 5:45 AM to be there on time, allowing for coffee, fuel, and bathroom stops. Had we met him at his shop we would have had to be there by 9 AM requiring us to get up even earlier. You have to draw a line somewhere.

I took the wheel for the start of the trip. It was still dark but the faint glow of the impending sunrise was visible as we pulled out onto Hacker Road facing a rising crescent moon. At M-59 we headed west to I-96. I reset one of the trip odometers before we left and verified that it was 13 miles from our driveway to the end of the entrance ramp from M-59 onto I-96W. We skirted the southern edge of Lansing on I-96 and took Lansing Road to I-69 south.

Nineteen miles south of Lansing, and about an hour into our trip, we stopped at the Biggby’s Coffee in Charlotte for coffee and bagels. Biggby’s is not my favorite coffee but this particular store is in just the right location. Linda checked the M-DOT website and it appeared that the bridge work on M-60 in Mendon was completed, so we exited I-69S and headed west on M-60. Unfortunately the bridge was still closed so we had to follow the detour to the south toward Sturgis. Unlike our previous trip in early July, when we continued on to Sturgis, we followed the complete detour through Nottawa and Centreville and back to M-60 in Three Rivers. We had never driven through Nottawa or Centreville before so that provided some new scenery for the trip.

As we have done many times before we continued our trip on M-60 as far as Jones where we stopped at the Shell station for fuel. We then took M-40 south to US-12. This seven mile stretch of M-40 traverses steeply rolling hills and is both beautiful and fun to drive. We took US-12, running west just north of the Michigan-Indiana border, and eventually exited onto Old 205 (M-205?) which turns 90 degrees to the left a mile later and drops straight south into Indiana where it becomes SR-19. A few miles later we arrived at the Martin’s Supermarket at CR-4 just after 9 AM.

Josh was not there yet so we went inside to use the restrooms and get some coffee. This particular Martin’s has a nice salad bar with a beverage station, a Starbucks Coffee outlet, and a seating area with Wi-Fi. Josh showed up right on time and parked next to us. I met him outside and we transferred the roll of upholstery fabric from his car to ours and then went inside to visit for a few minutes before he had to leave for Goshen.

When we left Linda took over the driving. Our next planned stop was A1-Upholstery in Elkhart to order the cushions for our built-in sofa. Continuing south on SR-19 we stopped at Factory RV Surplus to look for battery cable end covers but the ones they had were too expensive. I think they now sell more retail-packaged merchandise than they do true surplus material, and even less salvaged parts.

Lou (mom) and Terry (daughter) own and operate A-1 Upholstery and were recommended to us by Josh. We discussed the project with Terry, who I had previously spoken to on the phone. We reviewed my dimensioned scale drawings, which were on one sheet of 11″x17″ 1/4″ grid-square paper, and agreed on how the cushions would be made. Terry thought she would have them done by the end of the month but noted on the order form that we needed them by September 14th. We noticed that she had a lot of sample books from which we could have selected a fabric but we like the Lambright Notion Linen, and Terry thought it was a very good fabric that should look good and wear well in our application. We left the fabric and drawing with her and wrote a check for the deposit.

All of our stops were important today, but our primary reason for the trip was to pick up the pieces of the custom desk and built-in sofa for our bus from Jarel Beatty Cabinetry in Logansport, Indiana. We continued our trip south on SR-19 to US-20, took that west to US-31, and went south, exiting at Rochester onto IN-25 for the final 22 miles to Logansport. This is a route I have driven many times but Linda had the wheel this time so I provided some occasional guidance. I called Jarel to let him know we were making better time than we had anticipated and would be there between noon and 12:25 PM. I then called Butch to give him a status update.

This was the first time Linda and Jarel had met and so it was also the first time Linda had met Mya, Jarel and Georgette’s sweet little dog. Mya came up to me, sat, stared up at me like we were long lost friends, and waited patiently for me to give her the attention she was seeking. I was happy to oblige.

Jarel Beatty Cabinetry, Logansport, IN. Panorama taken from the entrance door.

Jarel Beatty Cabinetry, Logansport, IN. Panorama from the center of the shop. Entrance door is far left.

As I have previously described in this blog, the desk consists of nine pieces (if you count the four drawers as separate parts): two pedestals with separate bases, a cover that goes between them, and four drawers. The left pedestal has a fold up work surface with two support wings, and a fold down fake drawer front, so technically those are four more pieces, but they are attached to the pedestal with hinges so I am not counting them as separate parts. The bottoms of each pedestal have been cut out to provide access to the fan-coil heat exchangers that will be installed in the bases, so those are really two separate pieces now, put I am not counting them as such. I am also ignoring screws, drawer slides, blocking, and other assembly items in my parts count as they are all “installed components.” With the drawers installed we only had five major pieces to load plus the two access plates. Jarel also had the pieces ready for the built-in sofa so we loaded those as well. I took pictures of his shop and the pull-out pantry, which was mostly assembled but not quite finished.

The installed desk will have more pieces than just described but these are the pieces that Jarel made. The finished desk will have five grills that we have to cut and install, at least four drawer pulls that we have to install, a plywood top that will span the two pedestals and leg space, and a Sandstone Corian countertop that will go on top of the plywood. While not actually part of the desk there will also be a large cover for the passenger-side living room HVAC duct and wiring chase and a small hose cover at the desk end both of which align with the left end of the desk and will look like they are part of it. Jarel will make the chase cover later after the desk is installed and we can get a final, accurate measurement for its length.

As long as we were in the neighborhood we naturally stopped to visit with our friends, Butch and Fonda, in Twelve Mile, Indiana. While we were at their house we loaded a dozen 4-foot army surplus fiberglass mast sections in the car. Butch had bought these at a swap for me some time ago. We will use them for ham radio antenna projects. Butch gave me his old, non-functioning, Vanner battery equalizer to see if I can figure out how it does what it does. He also lent me his air-powered brad nailer which can also drive 1/4″ crown staples and gave me a box of 5,000 staples to go with it. Fonda found a scrap piece of resilient underlayment designed for free-floating wood floors. Butch though it might work well under the 1/4″ plywood underlayment to fill in the gaps and irregularities so we took it with us.

When we were done loading stuff into our car we went to see their new property on SR-25. They have already had a new roof put on the barn and new doors put in the house. They have bought themselves a BIG project, but it will be a much more appropriate and manageable place for them going forward than the building complex in Twelve Mile that has housed their business operations for the last 20 years. It’s an old GM dealership from the 1940s and they have approximately 11,000 feet under roof including a 2-bay service garage with a functioning in-ground lift.

We drove to Rochester and had dinner at Pizza Hut. Linda and I split a medium specialty veggie pizza and had the salad bar with it. We might have had a few more restaurant choices in Logansport, but Rochester was 22 miles closer to home. With the 19 hours we were gone today, and over 525 miles we had to travel, 22 miles and 30 minutes was significant for us.

We got back on the road at 6:30 PM with Linda at the wheel and headed back up US-31N to US-20 and headed east. We decided to stay on US-20 all the way to I-69, stopping in Lagrange to use the restroom at the Marathon complex. We stopped again at the Shell station on M-60 in Michigan for fuel. It was getting dark and I had been able to rest while Linda drove, so I took over the driving duties. From this point on we were just reversing our route from this morning. We got home at 10:30 PM, unloaded everything from the car, and then went straight to bed.

2015/08/11 (T) Sanding Prep

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Our day started with our usual morning routine. We were out of Linda’s homemade granola, so she made Quaker brand Raisins, Dates, and Walnuts instant oatmeal. This has long been my favorite oatmeal and I still like the taste and texture.

After breakfast we removed the containers of water from the bus fridge, rolled it out of the alcove, and unplugged it. We then moved it farther up into the coach, behind the front passenger seat, so I could work in the alcove and on the floor. We then got the Shop Vac up into the coach.

Linda left around 9:30 AM to meet Diane at Kensington Metropark. They decided they want to get together and walk once a week and the Metropark, which is about half way between their houses, has as an extensive trail system.

While Linda was away I went to the FedEx Office store in Brighton and got a copy of the 11″ x 17″ sheet with the drawings of the seat and back cushions for the built-in sofa. I stopped at the Shell station and filled the tank as we would be leaving very early in the morning for Indiana.

Back at the house I vacuumed up as much loose debris as I could inside the coach. After checking my pantry drawings I decided I could stack at least two pieces of 3/4″ plywood, one atop the other, to get the base of the refrigerator high enough to allow the back to go over the bundle of wires that run along the junction of the floor and back wall without interfering with the pull-out pantry. This will allow the refrigerator to go into the alcove far enough that we can open the kitchen cabinet drawers under the counter to the left of the sink.

Linda got back around 12:30 PM. After lunch we were going to mask off the inside of the coach with painter’s plastic and tape. Our goal was to upkeep the dust that resulted from sanding the thinset and mastic out of cabinets and off of counters and woodwork. We planned to run the Shop Vac while sanding but knew, a priori, that it won’t suck up all of the dust.

After considering what would be involved in masking off the inside of the coach we decided instead to wrap the refrigerator in plastic to protect it and then tried using the belt sander on the residual thin-set from the old ceramic tiles. The old aluminum oxide belts failed fairly quickly, which was discouraging, but the sanding did generate a lot of airborne dust, which was encouraging as it indicated the sanding was actually removing material. Our Craftsman belt sander has a built-in dust collection bag and Linda was running the vacuum so both of those things helped.

Late afternoon we went to Lowe’s and bought a 4′ x 8′ sheet of 3/4″ (nominal) maple veneered plywood and a 4′ x 8′ sheet of 1/4″ SurePly underlayment plywood. We also got two #36 (very coarse) 4″ x 24″ ceramic particle sanding belts and a box of 200 3/4″ self-drilling screws.

Back home we unloaded everything and I then called Josh to confirm that he could still meet us at the Martin’s supermarket in Elkhart in the morning. I also called Butch to remind him that we were still coming down. The rest of the evening is lost to me, as I did not record our activities soon enough, but they probably involved e-mails, computer updates, and iPads.

2015/08/10 (M) Keep on Buss’in

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We have a doe and her spotted faun that have been coming in the early morning to the deer block we set in our back yard the other day. They were there again this morning and the block is close enough to the house that we got a good look at them through the bedroom doorwall. They must be comfortable with the setting as the faun wandered off towards the western part of our property and the doe let it go while she continued to lick the block. Eventually, however, the faun was out of sight and the doe headed off in that direction to find it.

We had cinnamon raisin toast and soy yogurt for breakfast, with orange-grapefruit juice to wash down the vitamins. I used up the last of the Sweet Seattle Dreams half-caff coffee beans for our pot of morning coffee. Keith usually mows our grass on Mondays and he came to the front door around 9:30 AM to ask if we wanted it cut this week. That’s the first time he has done that this summer but it was an appropriate and timely question. We have had very little rain the last couple of weeks so the grass had not gown much since last Monday and was a little brown in places. We agreed to skip this week, which I think was what Keith was hoping I would say. There was a high probability of rain starting around noon and I suspect he had another yard he wanted to cut before it started.

We have been very busy the last few days and I have not had time to do more than outline my blog posts. Linda needed to work on an analysis for the bakery so I spent much of the day filling in the details of my recent posts. Our days are very full and if I wait too long I cannot capture them accurately.

Linda looked up the information on the DTE Energy “Energy Efficiency” appliance recycling program. I called the 866 number and was assisted by Reginald. The earliest available pickup date was Friday, August 28 so I took that. It took quite a while to arrange the pickup but Reginald appeared to get all the pertinent information and give me a confirmation code and a phone number to reach the truck on pickup day.

Once the refrigerator pickup was arranged I texted Chuck to let him know the details. That prompted a return phone call and a conversation about refrigerators. Having seen how our swap went on Saturday he and Barb are also thinking very seriously about replacing the refrigerator in their bus. The rationale is the same as ours; the fridge is old, so it is noisier and less efficient than newer ones, and having it break on the road would be more than inconvenient.

Replacing a refrigerator in an RV, especially a residential unit in a bus conversion, is not like replacing one in a home. Access is a major problem and there is not a lot of space to maneuver it or get more than two pairs of hands on it. If they replace theirs here (in Michigan) their bus will be inside their garage/shop, the forklift will be available to do the heavy lifting, and trusted friends and family will be available to help. And, most importantly, they won’t be living in it and dependent on the fridge for preserving their food.

Before the day got away from me I pulled up the PDF of the manual for the wireless keypad for the large garage door. When I installed the new opener for the small garage door and reprogrammed the wireless remotes for our cars I inadvertently rendered the keypad inoperable. Reprogramming it was simple enough once I had the procedure. It’s the small, simple tasks like this one that become big burdens if not taken care of in a timely manner.

The predicted rain started around noon and was steady until 3 PM. It was just the kind of rain we needed; gentle enough to give it a chance to soak in but hard enough to provide a useful quantity of moisture to the ground. Six to 10 hours of this would have been even better but we were glad for what we got.

I had thought that we might mask off the inside of the coach today with painter’s plastic but with the rain and humidity, and plenty of other things to do, I decided to defer that until tomorrow. During the afternoon Jarel texted me a couple of pictures and a brief status update on our custom woodworking projects. Not surprisingly he is already well along on the construction of the pull-out pantry and has spray lacquered the pieces for the built-in sofa.

One of the photos showed one of the 1/8″ thick aluminum plates that will form the side rails for each shelf in the pantry. He applied a brushed finish to the plate and countersunk the screw holes so the heads would not protrude beyond the surface. Jarel did metal work at one time before he became a cabinet maker so he knows how to do this kind of stuff. He is also meticulous and takes great pride in his work. Given a choice I would always prefer to hire a craftsman who cares as much, or more, about the quality of their work as I do.

When I know I am going to have a long full day, such as this coming Wednesday, I will try to “write ahead” on my blog, basically outlining the plan for the day but obviously not filling in the details of things that have not yet happened. Along the same lines, I often use future blog posts as a planning tool. As things occur to me that I need to do I will note them in the draft of a future post. If the thing actually gets done on that date I flesh out the details, and if not, I move it to a new date.

I think I did several loads of laundry today and spent some time editing and uploading blog posts during the evening, but as I am finishing this post later in the week I have lost the details and will just end here.

2015/08/09 (N) Sounds of Silence

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Sunday usually means a trip to the Howell Farmers Market if the weather is nice. The weather was OK but Linda did some major grocery shopping last night and did not need anything from the market so we did not go. We were both tired from yesterday’s refrigerator swap, physically and emotionally, and wanted to take it easy today. I brewed a pot of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe half-caff coffee and we enjoyed that while reading in the living room. We eventually ate breakfast and then got ready for the rest of our day. For me that meant doing three loads of laundry.

I put the first load of laundry in the washer and then drove to The Home Depot to get two more drawer pulls. We also wanted to look at wall paper but they do not stock any. Lowe’s had a very limited selection of wallpapers, but we thought a couple of them might work if we could not find anything else. One, in particular, was scrubable and another was paintable. We also found one that we liked in a book of Allen-Roth samples. This was not something we needed to decide on the spot but it is something we need to get settled sooner rather than later.

When we got home we pulled the new refrigerator out of its alcove and plugged it in. I set the freezer and fresh food compartment controls to the “normal” mark. Linda filled containers with water and placed them in both compartments. I found the remote thermometer for the unit that is still mounted on the wall next to the alcove and set it in the fresh food compartment. The two thermometers are off by a couple of degrees in opposite directions, but close enough for what I needed to do as it will allow me to monitor the temperature without opening the door. The new refrigerator was much quieter than the old one, which was one of the improvements we were looking for in a new unit.

New fridge in alcove. Kitchen drawers removed. Floor being prepped.

When we got home we had a phone message from Jim, N8KUE, regarding motorhomes. Jim plans to retire from the Ford Research Labs in March. He and Pam are seriously considering getting a motorhome and are starting to research the market. We’ve said for a while that we would be glad to meet for coffee and talk motorhomes, bus conversions, and the RV lifestyle. I called Jim back, suggested that we meet them at the Biggby’s Coffee in South Lyon at 4:30 PM, and they agreed.

Linda tried to pull up the Arcadia Bus Rally website to get the registration form but the domain name appeared to be for sale. I e-mailed Brenda Phelan to find out what is going on. She and her husband, Bill, operate the rally. I then worked on the drawings for the built-in sofa cushions.

We had an early dinner at 3:30 PM and left for South Lyon at 4 PM and got to Biggby’s Coffee just after 4:30 PM. Jim, Pam, and their son Adam, were already there. We talked until after 6:30 PM and then drove the short distance to the Witch’s Hat Depot in the South Lyon Historic Village where our South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club (SLAARC) holds its monthly business meeting and program. One of the members, John (NU8M), a materials science engineer who works for Bosch, gave a very interesting presentation on the various processes that affect electronics as they age and can ultimately cause them to fail. It was a pleasant evening, weather-wise, and some of us lingered in conversation for a while after the meeting before heading home.

We arrived home hungry and had some hummus with sourdough pretzel nibblers and pita chips and a small piece of watermelon. I checked the bus refrigerator and the fresh food compartment was down to 34.4 degrees F indicated. The remote thermometer is off by about 2 degrees F but I don’t recall in which direction. I turned the thermostat to a warmer setting and will check it again tomorrow. We turned in for the night and Linda read while I wrote for a while before turning off the lights.

The Phase Place

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Author Archives: BRF

2015/09/08 (T) Polyurethane

2015/09/07 (M) Grouted

2015/09/06 (N) Grouting

2015/09/05 (S) Building the Built-in

2015/09/04 (F) 100 Pounds

2015/09/03 (R) Floored

2015/09/02 (W) Dry Fitting

2015/09/01 (T) Tiling Kate

2015/08/31 (M) A Major Sub-Project Done

2015/08/30 (N) A Day of Rest (NOT)

2015/08/29 (S) Up and Down

2015/08/28 (F) Bye Bye Fridge

2015/08/27 (R) In and Out

2015/08/26 (W) Delux Delay

2015/08/25 (T) Turning The Corner

2015/08/24 (M) Skimcoating

2015/08/23 The West Side

2015/08/22 (S) Clean and Level

2015/08/21 (F) Have Fridge Will Travel

2015/08/20 (R) On The Level

2015/08/19 (W) If It’s Wednesday This Must Be Indiana

2015/08/18 (T) Walking Grind

2015/08/17 (M) Wallpaper Search

2015/08/16 (N) A Send Off For Katie

2015/08/15 (S) Steve and Karen

2015/08/14 (F) Back-to-the-Bricks (Again)

2015/08/13 (R) Sanding Success

2015/08/12 (W) Back to Indiana (Again)

2015/08/11 (T) Sanding Prep

2015/08/10 (M) Keep on Buss’in

2015/08/09 (N) Sounds of Silence