Tag Archives: plenum/support boxes (built-in sofa)

2015/10/17 (S) First Snow

Last night we removed the dining table from the back of my car and put it on the bed in the bus. We then removed the two rear seats and put them in the garage. We wanted the back of the Honda Element empty when we got up this morning as we do not usually have time to spare in the morning before driving to South Lyon for breakfast with the South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club.

It’s always good to see our fellow hams and today was no exception. We arrived just before 8 AM and stayed for over an hour. We left around 9:15 and drove to Chuck’s shop in Novi to get the box with the two remaining lower windshields for our bus. Chuck was already there and helped us load the box into the car. The box was sized to hold five windshields but only had two in it so it was light enough for us to move by hand. I knew it would fit in my car as we had measured it on a previous visit and I had checked the dimensions against the car. We set one end on the tailgate, lifted the other end, and slid it in. We chatted for a while, and looked at a project Chuck is working in for new front window shades, before heading home.

Phil was not at our house when we got home but he had obviously been there. All of the concrete, and many of the rocks and boulders, were gone from the driveway extension area so I presumed he had loaded them in his truck and hauled them away.

The Converted Coach Owners (CCO) Halloween Rally was going on this weekend and today was the main day for activities. We had intended/hoped to go to the rally but the progress on our bus remodeling has slowed over the last couple of weeks for various reasons, all legitimate, and it was not in a condition to travel or be used. It’s not that things are not getting done; they are, just not as fast as we would like or need them to. Among other things I have not yet secured the refrigerator and pantry. We thought about driving over in the car but it was over two hours one way and we needed to spend what time we had available working on the bus and could not justify being gone. Thanksgiving does not look/feel that far away anymore. It also seemed ill-advised to be gone while Phil is here digging up the yard.

My main bus focus for today was completing the installation of the built-in sofa. We had already set the plywood seat board on a blanket on the bus kitchen floor so I had access to the inside of the base/storage box. I did not need Linda’s assistance for a while so she worked on her counted cross-stitch project. Before starting on the sofa, however, I took care of a few other minor things.

First I replaced the alkaline batteries in the TempMinder thermometers with Lithium ones. I then reset the minimum and maximum temperatures for the two remote sensors. Sensor #1 monitors the freezer and sensor #2 monitors the fresh food compartment of the bus refrigerator. The directions for the TempMinder suggest using Lithium batteries if the remote sensors will be in cold environments.

Next I got a piece of scrap SurePly underlayment to see how it would fit in the rabbited wood trim on the lower outside wall of the hallway. I inserted it fully into a corner and marked the edges with a pencil. It is approximately 3/16″ thick and fit nicely without being too tight. With a layer of veneer it should be just right. When I removed it the depth of the rabbits appeared to be 5/16″ to 3/8″. I think the underlayment will make a nice base for hardwood veneer. I will cut the panels 1/2″ wider (22-1/2″) and 1/2″ longer (28″) than the 22″ X 27-1/2″ dimensions of the framed opening and allow them to “float” just like a frame and panel door.

My last mini-task was locating the 1/4″ walnut veneered plywood we removed from the old refrigerator and measuring it to see if we had pieces big enough to panel the damaged area on the wall by the co-pilot seat. I was pleased to find that the remaining pieces are large enough for this application.

By now it was 12:30 PM and my phone reminded me that we had an RVillage Ambassadors webinar/meeting at 1 PM. Linda heated up some Amy’s Vegetable Bean Soup and made hot lentil loaf sandwiches with ketchup. Yum. We got our first snow flurries of the 2015-16 winter season during lunch and they continued off and on through the afternoon. We moved to Michigan in May 1976. It snowed on October 15th that year and we had snow on the ground every day until early April 1977. While that has not held up over the years as a “typical” southeast Michigan winter it was very different from what we grew up with in Missouri and formed our first and most lasting impression of our adopted state.

I retrieved the link for the Go To Meeting from the RVillage website and put it in my web browser. 1 PM came and went with no meeting. The meeting notice said “Saturday, October 17 at 10 AM PST” but they had clarified that was actually 10 AM PDT, which is 1 PM EDT. We decided that perhaps they really meant PST, which would be 2 PM our time. We tried again an hour later, but no meeting ever commenced.

When I finally got to work in the bus on the sofa I removed six screws, three each from two angle brackets, and pulled the entire base assembly out from the wall, giving me complete access to the HVAC duct and wiring chase. Much of the final installation of the sofa involved this duct.

Powered and manual sheet metal nibblers with the opening Bruce just cut in the OTR HVAC duct and the piece of sheet metal that was removed.

The ends of the plywood seat rest on two boxes with open ends that also serve as plenums for air from the OTR HVAC system ducts. I needed to cut out rectangular openings in the vertical face of the duct to allow air into the back end of these boxes. I used a 1/2″ drill to create starter holes at the corners of the openings and then used a manual sheet metal nibbler and a drill-powered reciprocating nibbler, both of which I borrowed from Chuck a few weeks ago, to cut out the sheet metal. The two tools work differently but they both worked well and I was glad I had both of them for this task. The powered nibbler created a lot of small metal debris so I vacuumed the whole work area very thoroughly when I was done nibbling.

The right (forward) end of the duct also had an extra hole in it where I did not need or want one. I removed an old sheet metal patch plate and cut a new one to cover the area I needed to close off. I ended up having to pre-drill holes as I spun the heads off two of my cheap sheet metal screws. I had a heck of a time getting the shafts out, but I got it done. This was just one more example of why seemingly simple projects always take longer than they should.

Phil returned while I was working on the sofa and continued trenching in the French drain. I stopped to chat with him briefly and Linda came out to let me know she was headed to the grocery store. I then got back to my own tasks and let Phil get back to his.

The left support/plenum box with the circular register hole cut in the face plate.

The open fronts of the two plenum boxes are attached to the inside of the vertical front support, which is 3/4″ walnut veneered plywood. To get the air out of the boxes and into the coach my design called for brown plastic 4″ round louvered diffusers. They are considered “four inch” because the two inch long cylindrical pipe on the back will just fit through a 4″ diameter circular hole. (A 4″ flexible duct, like dryer duct, will also just fit over the pipe.) The visible part of the diffuser is actually 5-1/2″ in diameter.

The inside width of the plenum boxes is 4-1/4″ by design. I needed to center a 4″ hole within that space so I had to locate the center point for my 4″ hole saw very accurately side-to-side. I also wanted the hole centered vertically. Using my small square I marked the vertical midpoint on the edge of the front plywood at each end. I then measured in 2-13/16″ from the midpoint mark and used my spring-loaded center punch to mark the center of the hole. [The 2-13/16″ dimension came from half the inside width, or 2-1/8″, plus the thickness of the plywood used to make the plenums, or 11/16″.]

A close up view of the nylon mesh screen material used to cover the opening in the HVAC duct to keep critters that might get into the duct from getting into the support/plenum box.

I stood the boxes on their back ends so the front board was horizontal. I straddled the front board with my legs to hold it and drilled starter holes with a #6 countersink bit. I then drilled the 4″ holes with a 4″ hole saw using my 1/2″ Craftsman corded drill, being careful to have the pilot bit in the starter holes and drill perpendicular to the face of the plywood. I have had this drill for 37 years. It is very powerful and has several ways it can be gripped quite securely. It is large, heavy, and lacks the convenience of a cordless drill but when I need to use a bit with a 1/2″ shaft and/or need the torque, this is still the drill for the job. The hole saw created some sawdust so I vacuumed the whole area thoroughly when I was done drilling.

I was just finishing this work when Linda got back from the grocery store. She put the groceries away and came out to see if I needed any assistance. I already had the roll of plastic screen in the bus and she got the Gorilla Tape from the garage. I cut pieces of the screen large enough to cover the two rectangular openings in the HVAC duct and used lengths of Gorilla Tape to secure them. We then slid the base/storage assembly back into position, pushed it tight to the HVAC duct, and reattached it to the wood wire chase on top of the duct. The two support boxes and the return air box have foam weather stripping on the back edges to seal against the duct.

We picked the plywood seat up off of the kitchen floor and set it back in place but did not secure it. We left it out several inches from its original position and got a seat and back cushion from the bedroom. We experimented with different spacings and finally agreed that we need to have the seat out 4-3/4″ farther than originally designed. The current hinge board is 11/16″ plywood, 2-3/4″ wide by just under 78″ long. This board is screwed to the top of the wiring chase and to one side of the 72″ piano hinge. I will replace it with a piece that is 7-1/2″ wide by the same length. I will also have to provide some additional support for the seat side of the piano hinge as in the original design had both sides of the hinge resting on top of the wiring chase on top of the HVAC duct.

The Tulip Tree behind our house in its full fall glory. This is the first photo to be posted in this blog taken with the new Sony a99v DSLT camera.

That was the end of the interior bus work for today. By the time we were done Phil had driven his front-loader onto his flat-bed trailer and secured it so it appeared he was wrapping up for the day. I chatted with him about the project for 30 minutes before he left. Earlier in the afternoon I had found my site plan drawings for the bus barn and agreed to stake out the driveway tomorrow so we could review it first thing Monday morning.

Linda had invited Meghan and Chris for brunch tomorrow but it was not a good weekend for them as the Michigan vs Michigan State football game was taking place in Ann Arbor. Chris manages the Pizza House restaurant, and being away on football Saturday is not an option. They will come next Sunday (31st) instead.

For dinner Linda made a nice salad of mixed greens with dried cranberries, sliced almonds, and diced onions dressed with raspberry vinaigrette. The main course was pan-fried polenta with vegan puttanesca sauce. It held its heat to the last bite and was very satisfying on a cold evening. I opened a bottle of Cupcake Black Forest red wine. We have had it before and, although drier than I prefer, it went well with the meal.

After dinner I got my flashlight and checked the bus for axle/hub seal leaks by looking under the bus from the opposite side to see the inside of the wheels. I did not see anything to suggest a problem on any of the six positions and will text that information to Joe tomorrow for planning purposes as he would require a second day to work on the seals if that was needed.

We spent the last couple of hours of the day in the living room, with the fireplace turned on, reading, writing, and playing games while enjoying some red grapes for dessert. Linda got a text from her sister-in-law, Mary, with a photo of her and Ron “standing on ‘the’ corner in Winslow, Arizona.” Ron has been retired for many years but Mary only recently retired and they are on their first extended camping trip in their A-liner trailer and their first trip to the southwest U.S.

We went to bed around 10 PM. Linda fell asleep quickly while I divided my attention between cooking shows on the Detroit PBS Create channel, a concert by Eric Clapton on PBS, and working on this post.

2015/09/12 (S) Making It Usable

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In spite of all that we still have to get done on the bus we got up at 7:15 AM and went to our SLAARC breakfast. We did not get to go last week because our grand-daughter (Madeline) was here and we won’t get to go next week because we will be at an RV rally. We did not hang around like we sometimes do and left at 9 AM, but at least we got to go.

When I quit working on the toilet in the bus at 10 PM last night I had come to the conclusion that I had spent six hours trying to fix the wrong thing. I assumed that the leak was due to a faulty O-ring or a misalignment of two pieces with the slip fit, presumably caused by the 9″ piece of Qest pipe with 1/2″ NPT lavatory fittings on each end. After hours of effort and numerous attempts it occurred to me that the problem could be the threaded fitting in the first piece. The fitting is unusual in that it is hollow and has an inside hex shape. I got my SAE and metric Allen wrench sets but the largest wrenches, 3/8″ and 10mm, were too small and would not engage the fitting.

After dropping Linda at home I went in search of a 7/16″ and 1/2″ Allen wrenches. I stopped at our bank for a little cash and then went to The Home Depot as they are next door to one another. No luck there, but I did buy a 20″ flexible supply line with 1/2″ FIP threads. I tried Lowe’s next but that was another strike out. I tried O’Reilly’s auto parts store, the Tractor Supply store, and the Sears store across the street. Nope, nada, nothing. The guy at Sears suggested ACE hardware back in Howell so I headed that way but pulled into an Advance Auto Parts. They had a set of Allen wrench (hex key) stubs, with 1/2″ drive sockets. It included sizes smaller and larger than what I was looking for, in addition to the ones I was looking for, so I bought it.

Back home we installed the three large drawers in the rear of the bedroom. I then spent several more hours working on the toilet while Linda changed out the handles on all of the cabinet doors. She even figured out how to remove the handle on the built-in laundry hamper in the bathroom. As I have said here before, she is a clever girl. I unscrewed the insert with a 7/16″ hex key, cleaned off the old thread compound, wrapped the threads with Teflon tape, and screwed it back in. I mated the air/water sequence valve with the vacuum breaker and got them mounted to the support bracket, getting them aligned and snug in the process.

The last step was to attach the 20″ flexible supply line to the air/water sequence valve and water supply line. I attached it to the air/water sequence valve first, looped it around, and attached it to the incoming water supply fitting. Easy to say but tough to do. There is a lot of stuff crammed into the back portion of this toilet and there is barely room to get one hand in there to work, never mind two. To make matters worse (for me) the only hand I could get in there was my left one. Being right-handed that made a difficult task even more so.

I turned on the water and checked for connection leaks. I did not see any so I applied air pressure and initiated the flush cycle but it did not work. Nothing, nada, zilch, no movement of the valve, drain flapper opening, and no flow of water. The air-water sequence valve is mounted to a horizontal plate. It installs from underneath and is held in place by a large nut that threads over the top. I thought perhaps this nut was too tight and causing the valve to bind so I loosened it and the valve started working. I flushed it several times looking for leaks and did not see any. We made tiny adjustments to the location and decided to screw it down. It was 3 PM.

I found the four screws that were originally used to mount the toilet to the floor. They are very large and quite unusual. They are 2.25″ long with coarse threads and hex heads with large Philips screwdriver slots. The center of the heads, where the screwdriver slots cross, are drilled and tapped and there are four black caps with screws built into them that screw into them to conceal them and give the toilet a finished look. I was concerned, however, about their length. The underlayment and tile are somewhere between 5/16″ and 7/16″ thick, slightly thinner than the ceramic tile I removed, and the bus subfloor is (presumably) 3/4″ thick. Anything that penetrates the tile by more than 1″ risks coming through the bottom side of the plywood and potentially screwing into something it should not. I measured the base of the toilet and it was an honest one inch thick so I decided I would reuse the screws when we got to that point.

At this point we took about 45 minutes to clean up tools and put things away in the garage. We then turned our attention to getting the built-in sofa installed. I removed a piece of expanded metal mesh and cut a piece of aluminum sheet metal to cover a hole and used heavy duty double sided 3M tape to attach it to the HVAC duct. While Linda cut pieces of felt to go under any pieces of the sofa that touched the floor I cut and attached foam weatherstripping to the back edges of the two plenum/support boxes and the return air duct/shelf.

We put the two plenum/support boxes in place against the end cabinets and HVAC duct but did not take the time to cut and screen openings into the duct. We set the return air duct/shelf in place and put in the vertical front panel but the shelf held it out so I removed the weatherstripping from the back edge. We also did not take the time to drill the 4″ holes at either end of the vertical panel for the round diffusers as there was no point doing this until the HVAC duct was modified.

We secured each of the plenum/support boxes to the wiring chase with a single angle bracket and to the front panel with a pair of brackets. I drilled and countersunk a three foot length of 1/8″ aluminum angle and we installed it against the inside of the vertical panel and the top of the shelf. The shelf is 45″ wide (side-to-side) and there is a 3″ high by 44″ long piece of the vertical panel missing at the floor and centered side-to-side. The aluminum angle will transfer vertical loads on the central portion of the vertical panel to the shelf, which is 3/4″ plywood with full depth pieces along each edge and a slightly shorter central support piece.

We had been making a list throughout the day of parts that we needed. When we got to a point with the sofa where we did not have the screws we needed we took a break. We went to Qdoba in Howell for dinner, our first visit to this particular eatery since we moved to the Brighton/Hartland/Howell area, and both had vegan taco salads. The salads were good enough although the taco shell bowels were not the best we have had. The servers seemed a bit stingy with the various ingredients but in the end the salad was substantial and tasty. It was also a convenient and efficient location being on an out lot of the Meijer’s supermarket property and right across the street from Lowe’s.

After dinner we went to Lowe’s and bought felt drawer/door bumper pads, screws, and two more angle brackets. Back home we worked on the built-in sofa until 9 PM and called it quits for the night. I spent two hours at my desk and finalized a featured bus article for Bus Conversion Magazine on Larry and Carol Hall’s GM4106. I uploaded the article and photo files it to my Dropbox BCM folder, and then e-mailed the publisher, editor, layout person, and Larry to let them know it was there.

I try to finish these posts each night before I go to sleep or first thing the next morning. If I fail to do that I quickly lose the sequence of events and details. I tend to be up too late as a result, but if I fall behind by even one day it is very difficult to catch up while also trying to keep up. As much as I have enjoyed the remodeling project I will be glad to not be so busy this winter and be able to write shorter posts about the interesting people, places, and things we experience.

2015/09/08 (T) Polyurethane

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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.

2015/09/06 (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.

The Phase Place

Welcome to the next phase (hosted by QTH.com)

Tag Archives: plenum/support boxes (built-in sofa)

2015/09/12 (S) Making It Usable

2015/09/08 (T) Polyurethane

2015/09/06 (N) Grouting

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