Tag Archives: Rockler Hardware

2015/10/31 (S) Boo!

We overslept a bit this morning and did not get up until 7:20 AM. We dressed quickly and drove to breakfast separately as we had to go to separate places afterwards. We got there at 8 AM and had a nice chat with the folks at our end of the table. It was a big group this week, at least 24 people, maybe more.

Linda left breakfast at 9:15 AM to meet Diane at Kensington Metropark at 9:30 and go walking. I lingered at the restaurant until after 9:30. I drove back to I-96 and Grand River Avenue in Brighton, where I filled my fuel tank at the Shell station, and had a nice QSO with Mike (W8XH) while driving. I then drove across the street to Brighton Ford to pick up the four spin-on coolant filter/conditioners I ordered yesterday.

Brighton Ford’s parts department is a NAPA outlet but they do not have any signs to that effect as Ford Motor Company won’t allow it. My next stop was up Grand River Avenue towards Howell at the O’Reilly’s Auto Parts store where I picked up the nine (9) gallons of Chevron Delo 100 SAE 40 engine oil I ordered yesterday morning. I drove home and chatted a bit more with Mike on the way. I found out that he gets his Lawn tractor serviced at/by Sloan’s in Linden and is very pleased with them. He has a trailer for transporting his lawn tractor and is willing to let me borrow it to transport ours when I am ready.

When I got home I unloaded the oil and filters and then emptied the dishwasher, refilled it, and started it. I then went to my office to work. I had an e-mail reply from Byron Pigg with information I needed to finish the article for Bus Conversion Magazine (BCM) about his 1985 Model 15 Eagle bus conversion. I incorporated the new info into the Word docx and then called Byron on the phone. We spent at least an hour going over the article and chatting about bus conversions. After we wrapped up our conversation I worked a bit longer on the article making the last few edits and removing blemishes from two of photos. I uploaded the article (Word docs) and all of the photo files (jpgs) to my BCM Dropbox folder at 2:15 PM and then e-mailed Gary (publisher), Mike (editor), and Jorge (layout).

Shawna (back to camera) gets Madeline into her Bumblebee costume for Halloween Trick-or-Treat in their neighborhood.

While I was doing all of that Linda firmed up our Halloween plans with our son. We left the house at 2:45 PM and drove to Ann Arbor, arriving at their house around 3:30. Shawna got Madeline into her bumblebee costume and Linda gave her a Halloween gift bag with a rag doll, some candy, and a card. At 4:15 we walked over to a neighbor’s house for a gathering that included snacks/dinner. We talked to host Laurel’s parents, Tom and Kendra, who were there from San Diego, California. All of the kids and most of the adults left at 5:15 to go door-to-door trick-or-treating on Granger Street. Granger was closed off to vehicles for several blocks with policeman at each barricade and there were hundreds of people out and about. Many of the adults were in costume, some quite elaborate, and it was quite a sight.

Madeline caught on very quickly to her role in all of this and would often walk past other, larger children right to the front of the line to get her treat. She is just shy of three years old so it was cute. One of the houses had two large pumpkins out front, appropriately carved. They were real pumpkins and each weighed about 1,500 pounds when they were delivered by a truck. Madeline is above average height for her age but these pumpkins towered over her. The homeowners are well known in the neighborhood for having these giant pumpkins each year and bring in mind-boggling large quantities of candy in crates. You gotta love neighbors like that.

The rain held off for most of the prime trick-or-treat window from 5 – 6 PM but I was cold and went back to the house a little ahead of everyone else. It started to drizzle around the same time Madeline’s endurance was waning and they got back to the house at 6:30 with the umbrella deployed. Madeline was eager to take stock of her Halloween “loot”. We enjoyed watching her excitement at having different items to choose from and then “negotiating” with her parents over having to select just one item for this evening. Halloween trick-or-treat is perhaps best appreciated while watching a three year old experience it.

We left around 7 PM and stopped at the nearby Whole Foods Market for soy creamer. We picked up two bottles of Frey brand wine, a white and a red, and two pieces of vegan cake. Frey makes organic wines without the use of animal products and are a sponsor of “Cooking School” with Christina Perillo on the PBS Create channel.

I got a call from Joe as we were getting ready to leave Whole Foods. He was packed and ready to hit the road first thing in the morning. He wasn’t sure if he would make it all the way to our house on Sunday or finish the trip early Monday morning.

It rained on the drive home and I took the wheel as Linda has a hard time with dark/wet roads. We were reminded, once again, of the poor condition of Michigan’s roads, many of which need to be repainted and have reflectors installed such as the ones we saw in Florida the winter before last. (I suspect that the reason Michigan does not use them is because of snow plows, but they really make it safer to drive dark roads at night.) We got home sometime after 8 PM and had dessert. I checked the bus for leaks buy did not find any new water. I texted Joe our address, checked e-mail, and then opened the package from Rockler Woodworking that our postal carrier had delivered earlier in the day.

The maple veneer from Rockler was a bit darker than I had hoped, but it will still be a nice contrast to the walnut trim when suitably finished. The two shelf brackets were certainly substantial enough but it remains to be seen if the wall of our coach is adequate to support the table without a leg to the floor. The main issue will be the fasteners near the top which will be in tension and trying to pull out of the wall. Of secondary concern will be the lower tip of the brackets, which will be in compression, trying to push through the wall and possibly puncturing it. I may have to use expanding bolts or toggles rather than screws for the upper (tension) fasteners.

We had some hot tea and went to bed. Although I did not get to work on the bus today I got a lot accomplished and we had a great time watching our younger grand-daughter experience Halloween.

2015/10/28 (W) Inside Flash

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Linda’s iPad alarm went off at 5:45 AM but she did not get up until after 6. I got up at the same time she did but she was dressed and out the door by 6:15 while I was still stumbling around. I put on my warm robe, fed the cats, made coffee, and had a banana nut muffin. After enjoying my coffee by the fireplace I had my orange juice and granola with blueberries.

It started raining overnight and was still raining this morning as the remnants of hurricane Patricia pulled up from the lower Mississippi River and moved north between the river and the western side of the Appalachian Mountains towards the Great Lakes. The forecast was for the rain to continue through the day and then off and on into tomorrow. It was a good day to work in the house so that is mostly what I did. But first I gathered up the trash from the house and rolled the large container to the street for pickup.

The first thing on my self-imposed to-do list was finalizing an order with DX Engineering. I had already placed multi-packs of two different sized snap-on ferrite beads in my cart but needed to spend slightly more money to get free shipping. I am not, however, one of those people who is drawn into buying something I do not need just because it is a BOGO item.

I have been planning for quite some time to install a multi-outlet fused DC distribution panel in the front of the bus to provide Anderson PowerPole connections for the various 12V DC accessories such as the GPS. I had just never made it a priority, which is to say, never taken the time to figure out exactly which product to buy. I had to go out to the bus to assess the size and feasibility of available areas for mounting. After looking at all of the options I selected an 8-port unit from West Mountain Radio. I really wanted a unit with USB charging ports but the only such model they make only has four PowerPole connections, which is not enough.

My next task was to order a couple of items from the Rockler Woodworking and Hardware website. I have been considering their black, powder-coated shelf brackets for a while. I made another trip to the bus to determine how much space I had on the wall where the table will go. It looked like I will have 14 inches of wall space for mounting brackets so I selected the middle of three sizes, which is 12″ high by 18″ deep. The brackets will support 1,000 pounds each so a pair of them will certainly support the weight of the Corian-topped dining table. The table is 38″ long and fully supported by 3/4″ plywood underneath, but it remains to be seen if the wall is strong enough to support the table in a cantilevered installation. If not, we will have to add a leg or an angled support.

The other thing I needed was hardwood veneer to build the three panels that will replace the strip mirrors that were on the lower portion of the outside hallway wall. I decided to go with the Allwood 2-ply maple and put a 24″ wide by 96″ long roll in the cart. The three panels will have a finished size of about 22-1/2″ by 28″ so the 8′ long piece should work out just right. I placed the order and moved on the next thing which was entering account information into our password program.

Our password app is wonderful but frustrating at times as it tries to synchronize via the cloud every time you open it, edit an entry, or create a new one. By design it keeps our passwords up-to-date on multiple devices, which is why we have it, but it is slow to sync and sometimes appears to hang up. When it is trying to sync it won’t let me do anything else, so I sit and wait (or make another cup of tea).

Phil called around 12:15 PM, returning my phone message from yesterday, and we chatted for 20 minutes or so. With any luck he will have stone delivered here on Friday or Saturday and get the driveway put in before Joe gets here next week with his trailer. Phil, however, is at the mercy of Wayne County inspectors on another job and was not able to work anywhere today due to the rain. Most of his work is weather and bureaucrat dependent.

I had the leftover squash and quinoa/lentil pilaf for lunch at 12:45 PM. While I was eating a lone buck wandered through the back yard with what appeared to be a 6-point rack. It is the first buck (with antlers) that I have seen this year.

I worked on this post for a while and then went to my office. As much as I needed to work on getting posts uploaded to my blog there were other unfinished tasks weighing more heavily on my mind. At the top of the list was an article for Bus Conversion Magazine on a 1985 Model 15 Eagle bus conversion that I saw and photographed at the Eagles International converted coach rally in Quartzsite, Arizona back in January of this year. I met the owners at that time and subsequently interacted with them a bit but then got really busy with my own projects and had to set the article on the back burner.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that the article was farther along than I remembered. I also had a short narrative and eight photos from the owners that I had not yet incorporated into the article so that gave me additional material to work with. With only a few short breaks to interrupt my work I pulled together a first complete draft by 6 PM and e-mailed it to the owners and the publisher of the magazine. Gary (at BCM) wants to run this article as the feature/cover story in the January 2016 issue so the editor needs it before the end of November. Personally, I need to be done with it at least a week before Thanksgiving.

While working on the article I had quite a few e-mails back and forth with Gary, one of which inquired about my article on The Desert Bar / Nellie E. Saloon outside of Parker, Arizona. A draft of that article also exists but it is not even a full page of text and I have not yet selected and processed any photos. I wrote a little bit on The Desert Bar in a March 2016 overview article about our time in Quartzsite. For a standalone article I will need to say something more/different than I said there. If the weather continues to be crummy tomorrow I may use that as an excuse to sequester myself in my office, hunker down at my computer, and crank this article out.

One of my afternoon breaks was in response to the doorbell. It was UPS delivering my order from B&H Photo. I did not open it right away as I wanted to stay on my BCM article task. Linda texted me at 3:30 PM to let me know she was leaving the bakery and arrived home about an hour later. Even though she left the house at 6:15 AM this morning it took her 90 minutes to get to the bakery in Hamtramck. Wet roads with poor lane markings in marginal early morning light will do that. Michigan does not do a good job of maintaining its roads.

For dinner Linda made a simple salad of power greens with Ken’s Sweet Vidalia Onion dressing, roasted the white asparagus we bought the other day, and reheated the leftover risotto. The risotto held up well to being served as leftovers but the white asparagus, which was fresh, was disappointing. It was tough and we ended up microwaving it. Linda thought it was bitter, and did not like it, but I think that is a characteristic of asparagus. We both agreed, however, that it did not taste like much of anything.

While we were relaxing in the living room after dinner I did a search on white asparagus. Asparagus is a spring vegetable so the stuff we bought probably came from a long way south of the border. It is grown “underground” by keeping dirt around the stalks; a process known as etiolation, or light deprivation. It is supposed to be milder than regular (green) asparagus but with a tough, bitter outer skin than needs to be removed before cooking. The classic German method of preparation is immersion in simmering water with salt and butter until tender. Now we know. Eating things out of season may be one of the “benefits” of being globally interconnected but there is a lot to be said for eating local in-season whenever possible.

The power flickered once during dinner and several more times during the evening. Winds were forecast at 15 – 25 MPH out of the SW gusting to 40 and strengthening into the morning hours as the wind shifted out of the W in advance of a second cold front. I shut off the color laser printer, the two NAS units, and the Linux box as a precaution but left my laptop on since it runs on its own internal battery.

2015/10/16 (F) Desk Installation

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We were up at 8 AM, fed the cats, made coffee, and had breakfast. Phil showed up around 8:30 AM, unloaded his front loader, dropped his flatbed trailer, and left in his dump truck. I turned on the fireplace and we enjoyed our coffee while iPading until 10:15 AM.

Our first task today was to cut up several large limbs that I pulled out of the woods last evening to get them out of Phil’s way. I cut them up with the chain saw and then we stacked them on the disposal pile for Phil to haul away.

Phil returned at 10:30 and moved his Caterpillar 305C excavator into the woods across the street by the culvert. I went down to chat with him briefly to make sure I understood what he was going to work on. There were a lot of small trees (3″ diameter), saplings, and bushes scattered around the site. Some of them had been dead for years and some had just been knocked over by Phil. I decided to work in that area with my chain saw cutting everything up into five foot lengths so Phil could use his front loader to get them into his dump truck. I worked at this until 11:30 AM and then turned my attention to the bus. Linda worked on her needlepoint while I cut wood.

Before getting started on construction tasks I took two pieces of filter material and set them on the wire shelf in the freezer compartment of the new refrigerator, one on top of the other. I then set the two remote thermometer sensors on the filter material. Butch had suggested the other night that I set the sensor on a sponge to get it off of the floor of the freezer compartment as it was likely responding to the automatic defroster heat strips when they come on. I figured the filter material would work just as well and that placing the sensors on the shelf would definitely get them away from the floor.

Linda brought out a bag of ice from the house fridge and put it in the bus freezer. She also filled several 1/2 gallon juice and milk cartons with water, put the caps on, and put them in the fresh food compartment. The purpose of all of this was to add thermal mass to the compartments to cause the refrigerator to run less often and reduce large swings in temperature.

Inside the bus our first sub-project was installing the desk, which included putting the front passenger side HVAC duct cover in place even though it is not finished. It took us quite a while to get everything positioned just right. With Linda holding things in position I screwed the right pedestal to the wall, adjusted the position of the base and screwed the pedestal to the base. We then repeated that process for the left pedestal and base.

Linda removes the backing from the double-sided tape on the back side of the air grate in the center connector/cover for the desk.

At this point we had several things to do with, and under, the center connector/cover so I removed it and took it into the garage/shop. We cut a piece of the decorative brass colored metal grate and secured it to the back of the air opening with small screws every few inches. Next we cut a piece of black plastic mesh to fit over the grate. We then cut pieces of 3M Extreme Mounting Tape (double-sided) and attached them to the back side of the grate in between the screws. Linda peeled off the protective layer and we carefully placed the plastic mesh. Using one of the scrap pieces of the protective layer I rolled the plastic into the take with our wallpaper seam roller. Finally, we had a piece of filter material already cut to cover this air intake opening so we set that on top of the mesh, pressed it down to take advantage of the tape, and then secured it with Gorilla Tape on all four edges, rolling it with the seam roller to get good bonding.

A detailed view of one of the homebrewed tongue and groove alignment assemblies made from flat mending plates.

Back in the coach I had to tie in the outlet strip to the 120VAC power feed. I shut off the breaker for this circuit and checked with my tester to make sure it was not live. The hot and neutral wires were accessible but the ground wires were back under the left pedestal where they were not easy to reach and manipulate. It took a while, certainly longer than it should have, but I got the three ground wires tied together with a grounding clamp. I connected the hot and neutral wires (three each) relatively easily using wire nuts. I turned the circuit breaker back on and checked that the outlet strip had power between the correct terminals and did have power between any other terminal pairs.

I went to the garage to get a four foot long piece of 1″X1″ aluminum angle that I bought weeks ago to use as a support bracket for the upper rear edge of the center connector/cover. I was going to cut off a 26″ long piece and then drill countersunk holes but I noticed a piece of 1/2″X1/2″ light gage angle that was about 26″ long and already had holes in it. It was long enough to span the space between the pedestals and go under each one about an inch. That was sufficient to position it correctly so Linda held it there while I secured it to the wall with four round (pan) head screws. I then put the center connector/cover back in place.

Phil has cleared all of the organic debris from the area where the driveway extension and RV pad will be located.

Phil starts trenching and placing the plastic drain tile tubing for the French drain.

Phil had long since left in his truck to dump all of the wood debris. We had a light lunch of Amy’s Lentil Vegetable soup and fresh organic grapes. While we were eating a group of three deer came to our back yard and eventually ended up eating apples that had fallen from our tree onto the ground. These same deer, along with two others, were here yesterday at twilight and were very frisky. We saw them later in our neighbor’s yard across the street.

Another view of Phil’s smaller excavator with the 12” bucket being used to trench the French drain in the southwest portion of our property.

Phil returned around 3 PM and started working on the French drain. He replaced the 30″ wide toothed bucket with the 12″ one and started at the high end if the culvert on this side of the road.

The grand finale was the installation of the Corian desktop, which has been sitting on a blanket in the middle of the living area floor since Tuesday. I drilled countersunk holes through the four corner plates in each desk pedestal from underneath. I then inserted 1-1/4″ #8 self-drilling outdoor wood screws into each hole, again from underneath, until they just protruded above the corner blocks and then backed them off until the tips were just below the surface. We set the desktop across the pedestals and pushed it as tight to the back and right end wall as we could. Linda put her weight on it and I ran the screws home, pulling the top tight to the pedestals. We reinstalled the four drawers in the right pedestal, finally getting them off the floor in the hallway where they have been since Tuesday. We stepped back to admire the desk and agreed it was a thing of beauty and a joy to behold. Linda also marveled, once again, at how much space she now has to work in the kitchen.

A wider shot showing the excavator and drain tile. The laser level is at the left edge of the frame. The main arm of the excavator (with the bucket attached) has a laser sensor on it that tells Phil exactly where the lower edge of the bucket is relative to the laser level.

The “denouement” was mounting the outlet strip and adding felt pads to the two fake drawer fronts on the left pedestal and then adjusting the magnetic catches. I originally had the outlet strip (temporarily) mounted to the wall between the two pedestals with two screws a few inches below the cord notch in the center of the back edge of the desktop. Rather than put it back there I decided to mount it on the underside of the desktop just in front of the cord notch.

The underside location will work just as well as the wall mount location for regular 2- and 3-prong plugs but probably not as well for small AC adapters. The added pluses of this location, however, are: 1) it will not interfere with cords coming through the notch, 2) it will be up out of the way of the UPS (uninterruptible power supply) that will sit on the shelf at the top of the center connector/cover, and 3) if liquids are accidentally spilled and run over through the notch they will not run into the outlet strip. Besides, devices with an AC adapter will probably be plugged into the UPS so this was a better overall approach.

Our next task was to adjust the sofa seat until it was deep enough to be comfortable. We slide the plywood seat out a couple of inches and then got the seat and back cushions (three each) from the house where they have been stored since September 21st. We put the cushions in place and sat down. We pulled the cushions out and pulled the seat board out until it was five inches farther out than originally designed and put the cushions back in.

The front edge of the seat cushions were out farther than I liked but we both agreed the sofa was now comfortable to sit on. The distance from the bottom front edge of the back cushions to the front edge of the seat cushions was originally only 16 inches and that turned out to just be too short. With the seat board moved out it will now be 21 inches.

In order for the sofa to work correctly, both as a sofa and as a bed, we will need a cushion that is 5″ wide by 6″ high, by ~76″ long to fill in the space behind the seat cushions and below the back cushions. The height and foam makeup will be such that it is level with the tops of the seat cushions and have the same firmness and feel. Would that I had designed the sofa for this depth to begin with and had the seat cushions made accordingly, but we were trying to open up the living room by not having the sofa protrude into the aisle any more than absolutely necessary.

Next up was reinstalling the wood trim in hallway. We have an interesting plan for the lower half of the hallway but in case we do not get it finished before we leave for the winter we wanted the trim off the bed and back on the wall.

The lower outside hallway wall. There were originally three framed panels of vertical strip mirrors here. We will replace them with wood panels, probably in a lighter color to contrast with the walnut trim.

This trim originally framed three panels of vertical strip mirrors. We were able to remove the mirrors as they were glued to wallpaper. In the process we discovered that the left and right panels were the same width but the center panel was wider. The trim consisted of six pieces of wood; a long upper and lower horizontal piece and four vertical pieces. The six pieces were screwed to the lower half of the outer wall but not attached to each other. The left and right vertical pieces were tight to adjacent woodwork, but the two intermediate pieces were free to be repositioned.

We reattached the upper horizontal piece first making sure the mounting screws went back in the same holes. Next we pushed the lower horizontal piece into place but did not screw it to the wall. We then attached the left and right verticals. The horizontal distance between the inside edges of the left and right verticals was 75 inches. The two intermediate verticals were each 4-1/2″ wide so the distance between verticals needed to be 22″ (75 minus 9 = 66 divided by 3 = 22). We carefully positioned and secured the two intermediate verticals to achieve this spacing.

The trim boards all have rabbited edges on the back side. I need to measure them carefully, but they are ~3/16″ deep by 3/8″ wide. Our current plan is to use 3/16″ underlayment or other 3/16″ high quality plywood to make three panels that will fit within these rabbits with a little room to spare. The panels will either have a hardwood face or we will cover them with a hardwood veneer of a wood that contrasts with the walnut trim. We can get the veneer from Rockler once we decide what we want.

Linda spread out several towels on the new desktop and we moved tools and supplies from the A-V cabinet, behind the driver’s seat, to the new desk. I then removed the Corian top of the A-V cabinet and put in on the bed. We still have a small amount of wallpaper to install in the front of the living room and into the cockpit on the driver side, but it will not be easy to do.

These areas, such as the one behind the A-V cabinet, are small with limited access so most of my sanders cannot be used. The only one that might work is the Porter-Cable oscillating tool but I did not get it out today. I got some sanding sponges instead and tried those on the wall under the passenger side window trim next to the co-pilot seat. When I sanded a dark area about 6″ long by 3″ wide the wood in the center crumbled and I ended up with a hole 3″ long by an inch and a half wide. I could see one of the stainless steel structural members through the hole. Given what was obviously water damage I was glad we bought a bus with welded stainless steel as the main structural material.

Based on what I could see, the walls in the bus appear to be 1/2″ plywood although I did not measure the thickness. This area had obviously gotten very wet over a long period of time and some of the wood has rotted. It is the only spot we have discovered that is this damaged and we immediately realized that we will not be able to wallpaper this area. We will probably panel over it, similar to what we plan to do with the veneered panels in the hallway, but today was not the day to figure that out.

It was going on 5 PM and we decided we were done for the day. I turned off all of the electric heaters, turned on the Aqua-Hot, turned on all three thermostats, and set the temperature to 20 degrees C. The refrigerator was also indicating much colder freezer temperatures than it had been before I moved/isolated the remote sensors so I reset the freezer and fresh food controls to their “normal” center positions. Tomorrow we will replace the alkaline batteries with the Lithium batteries we bought specifically for the TempMinder thermometer system, reset the min/max data, and monitor it for a few days.

I walked down to see what Phil was doing. He was making good progress with the French drain but did not have enough of the plastic drain tile to finish it today. He plans to work tomorrow and will have the additional tile he needs to finish the drain. I left him to his work and took photos of the fall colors in our yard as I worked my way back to the house.

I spent an hour at my computer dealing with e-mail and transferring photos from the Sony a100 to my laptop. Linda called me to dinner at 7 PM. It was a simple meal of vegan Coney dogs with mustard, onion, and beans served open-faced on a whole wheat hotdog bun. As a side dish Linda steamed Opo squash. It was the first time either of us had this particular squash. It was very mild with a hint of cucumber. It is available all over the world and widely consumed as it is relatively inexpensive. It was OK, but I thought it might work better as an ingredient rather than a stand-alone side dish.

I exchanged a couple of text messages with Chuck and confirmed that we would be at his shop tomorrow after breakfast to retrieve our two bus windshields. The rest of the evening was spent in the living room by the fireplace reading and writing on our iPads before turning in and watching episodes of Rick Steeves’ Europe and Joseph Rezendo’s Travelscope on Detroit PBS (WTVS).

2015/10/07 (W) The Root Cause

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We had Linda’s homemade granola for breakfast with fresh blueberries. Berry season is just about over for the year and they will become more expensive as they have to be transported from farther away. I made a pot of Sweet Seattle Dreams, the half-caff blend that Jeff makes just for us, and we drank it in the living room. Linda checked in on the world and pulled up the latest video from NutritionFacts.org while I researched hardwood veneers on Rockler.com.

After breakfast and coffee I called Metro Environmental Services to arrange to have the culvert under the road cleaned out. They were able to schedule us for this afternoon so I accepted that appointment. I then called Brighton Honda to check on my car and left a message for Rob, the service advisor who wrote up the repair for the driver side door lock. I had no sooner left that message than I got a call from Karen at Bratcher Electric.

Mike had worked up the quote to install the 100 Amp disconnect, tie it into the output of the transfer switch, and run a 100 Amp 4-wire service entrance cable to the current sub-panel, making it into a main panel. They would also disconnect and cap the current sub-panel feed from the basement as part of the work. At just north of $1,300 it was a good $300 higher than I expected. My expectation, however, was not based on anything specific other than my own sense of the cost of materials and the amount of labor that might be involved, plus a desire for it to not cost more than $1,000. 🙁

With the phone calls taken care of we worked in the bus for the rest of the morning. Linda worked on stripping the remnants of wallpaper that remained after we removed the mirrors from the lower outside hallway wall yesterday. I worked on re-routing the heater hoses for the fan-coil heat exchangers. She got her job done before I got mine done. That’s usually the way it is.

To start, I removed one of the old 4″ round plastic grates and used my inspection mirror and a flashlight to examine the inside of the HVAC duct. What I discovered was that the two heater hoses were secured periodically with plastic cable clamps to the outer wall of the HVAC duct. I also discovered that the metal part of the duct is just the inner wall and top. The bottom is the plywood subfloor of the bus and the outer wall is the plywood wall. As originally built the metal portion of the duct could be removed but when Royale Coach did the conversion they built cabinets around the ducts and put wood wiring chases on top of them in such a way that they can no longer be removed without partially disassembling the coach.

The location of the hoses and wires in the duct was such that I could safely use my 4″ bi-metal hole saw to cut access holes for the hoses. I determined where the cable clamps were located by measuring inside the duct. I then marked where the access slots in the bottom back of the bases would be located and determined where I needed the two hoses to emerge from the duct.

The manual sheet metal nibbler used to cut a line between the bottoms of the two holes in the HVAC duct.

There was already a 4″ hole at one of my needed locations so I drilled a second one next to it with an inch in-between. I used Chuck’s hand powered sheet metal nibbler to connect the holes together to make an opening that looked like the track around a football field. We vacuumed up the metal chips and I then installed door edge molding all the way around the edge of the opening. I was able to reach the screws holding the first pair of cable clamps with a #2SR screwdriver and remove them. This large slot will be behind the left end of the center connecting cover of the desk and the hose for the heat exchanger that goes in the left base will come out of it.

Plastic U-channel door edge molding installed around the new heater hose opening.

The location of the next pair of cable clamps corresponded, roughly, to where I needed the hose for the right heat exchanger to emerge. I drilled two 4″ holes, side-by-side, at that location and nibbled out the little bit of metal in-between them to make a second slot. Again, I installed the door edge molding around the entire edge. The molding was a tight fit, and I had to use a screwdriver to get it to go on the inner curves, but I got it on. The U-channel is locked in mechanically and has adhesive in it so it should stay put once it has had a few days in place. Once the hoses are re-routed I will put screen material, and perhaps some solid plates, over the openings to prevent critters from gaining access to the living area by way of the HVAC PCTS (Prevost Critter Tunnel System).

The access holes in the OTR HVAC duct in the area behind where the desk will be installed.

Linda had two medical appointments this afternoon, both routine diagnostic procedures, so she got cleaned up, changed her clothes, and left around 12:30 PM as I was finishing up the second slot. I went inside and was thinking about making something for lunch when the doorbell rang. It was our mail carrier, Michelle, with a package that was too big for the mailbox. A few minutes later the doorbell rang again. I figured it was Michelle again, but it was one of the guys from Metro Environmental Services. They were supposed to call first but just showed up.

I put my shoes on and walked them down to the clogged culvert that goes under the road. I was really hoping they could clean it out from the south side but when we went into the woods we could not see the end of the culvert. They got a metal detector and located the end of the pipe. It was almost completely buried and had a massive root running right in front of it from a very large nearby tree. They got a shovel and dug out around the root, exposing much of it and the end of the pipe.

The tree was probably 30″ in diameter at the base and the root was at least 10″ in diameter. I got my (new) 18″ chain saw but had trouble getting it started. It turned out it was out of gasoline. Once I got it started I tried to cut through the root on either side of the culvert. I thought I was all the way through on one end (closest to the tree) and most of the way through on the other end, but the root would not budge. I dulled the teeth on the chain to the point where the saw would no longer cut and did not want to take the time to put a new chain on just to ruin it quickly. The guys finally agreed to hydrojet the culvert from the north side of the road.

The actual cleaning out of the culvert did not take that long. The pump produces 2,000 PSI and they used about 300 gallons of water from the onboard tank on their truck. The head on the end of the hose has one forward facing nozzle and many rear/side facing nozzles. The forward facing nozzle loosens and cleans out the area directly in front of the head while the other nozzles force the head forward and blast whatever is in the pipe back out towards the entrance.

They started with a small head and ran it in until there was water coming out the other end of the culvert. They then pulled the hose back and switched to a much larger head and ran that all the way through and back. When they were done muddy water filled the culvert and the depressions on either end. On the inlet end the water was only about 3″ deep in the bottom of the culvert but on the outlet end it was near the top. They billed me for the minimum first hour amount even though I think they were here longer than that.

I called Phil to let him know what we had run into. He was surprised, to say the least, as he thought he had checked the other end of the culvert. Obviously not, but that’s water under the road, so to speak. Besides the problems with the root and the discharge end of the culvert being below the surface, it looked to me like the discharge area was something of a low spot and it was not obvious to me where water would flow from there. I have learned, however, that I am not very good at judging such things visually.

Cory, our neighbor across the street, had come over to see what was going on. He offered that the discharge area does, in fact, drain to the south through his property and eventually to Golf Club Road. Cory has been here for 30 years so I have no reason to doubt the truth of that. The elevation where Golf Club ends at Hacker and where our street ends at Hacker appears to be about the same. Our street is fairly level while Golf Club has a little bit of up and down, but it is subtle. I suggested to Phil that we might have to clear a path into the woods for his small digger and do some trenching to give the water a way out.

While Cory and I were chatting I noticed that the trees along this part of the road were hanging out over the road on both sides and were rather lower than they should be. This is the very thing I complain about with regards to the way most of our neighbor’s fail to maintain their properties along the road. I decided I should do something about it so I got our pole saw and spent a couple of hours trimming the low overhanging branches.

Linda went to the Whole Foods Market in West Bloomfield following her medical appointments and got home just as I was finishing up the pruning. She went for a walk while I called John Palmer of Palmer Energy Systems in Florida. I bought our Magnum inverter/charger for the bus from John along with various accessories and batteries. I needed a 4-wire terminal block for our Magnum Battery Monitor Kit (BMK) because I had messed up the one that came with it when I originally installed it. John confirmed that Magnum Energy had recently been acquired by Sensata, and was in the process of relocating the plant to Minnesota, but that several of the old-timers were still on board. John needed to talk to Tom anyway and asked me to call him back in a week to see if he was able to get the connector.

I checked with the service department at Brighton Honda again and Rob said he expected to get the new door lock mechanism back from the locksmith tomorrow morning and to have the car ready for me to pick up by the end of the day. It will be nice to finally have it back.

The cloudy weather finally broke today and we saw some blue sky with brighter light levels than we have had recently. The day was lovely but a little on the cool side by late afternoon so we both had a cup of hot tea. Linda took advantage of the light to work on her counted cross-stitch project, a holiday stocking for grand-daughter Madeline, and I went back to the bus to sand off the last traces of the old wallpaper from the outside wall in the hallway.

I used our Porter-Cable 1/4 sheet palm sander with 80, 120, and finally 220 grit sandpaper. The sander has an integral dust collection bag but it does not capture all of the dust. I used the vacuum cleaner to pick up as much of the residual dust as I could and then used a tack cloth to wipe down the wall.

For dinner Linda made pan-grilled tofu with caramelized onions in sweet barbecue sauce. She served it open-faced on rye bread, because that is what we had, and steamed some fresh green beans as a side dish. Yum.

After dinner I drove to Lowe’s. I needed something I could use to plug the two heater hoses to keep them from leaking as I pull them back through the HVAC duct and out through the new slots I made for them today. I ended up buying two 3/4″ barbed plastic plugs. While I was there I looked to see if they had any bleeder valves but they did not. They do not sell parts designed specifically for hydronic heating systems and I will have to go to Northwest Plumbing and Supply for such items.

While I was in the plumbing isle I looked to see if I could figure out some combination of parts to make a fill valve for the system but did not see anything that inspired me. I would love to have one or more high point expansion tanks on this system but I do not have any easily accessible places for them from which I could also run overflow drain lines. There is a good sized volume of unused space behind the drawers on the passenger side of the bedroom but it would be a very difficult place to install anything. Perhaps Northwest Plumbing and Supply will have something.

On the way home I stopped at the BP station and topped up the fuel tank in Linda’s car. I drove home with greater consideration for fuel economy than usual and managed to get the average MPG up to 56.7 before it dropped back to 55.4 as I pulled in the driveway. It will drop into the upper 40s as soon as Linda starts the engine tomorrow morning but it was fun to get it into the driveway with numbers above 55 MPG.

2015/09/26 (S) A Step in the Right Direction

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We missed our ham radio club breakfast last week because we were at an RV rally and we plan to be at another rally three weekends from now so in spite of all the work we still have to do on the bus we went to breakfast in South Lyon. After breakfast we went to the Lowe’s in New Hudson, which is close to South Lyon, and bought a Porter-Cable 1/4 sheet palm sander. The sander is small enough to get into corners but has an integral dust collection bag. The bag can be removed for sanding in really tight spots, but it cuts down on airborne dust while sanding and reduces the amount of cleanup afterwards. We have several other Porter-Cable power tools and I am generally pleased with them.

Back at the house we took care of a few chores and then got to work on the bus. Linda continued working on stripping the old wallpaper behind the sofa while I pondered for a while about what to do before deciding to concentrate on rebuilding the landing at the top of the entry stairs. This landing is where the pneumatic entry stairwell slide cover was installed. Without all of that “stuff” in place the last step up to the landing was now too short and the step up to the copilot level was too tall. More importantly, the step heights were all different, and would be a built in trip hazard if not corrected.

I determined that the 2.5″ wide poplar boards installed on edge with a 3/4″ thick plywood floor and a top layer of 3/16″ SurePly underlayment would match the top surface of the plywood in the driver’s area. That would (should), in turn, allow me to install the new vinyl floor tiles so they bridge that seam. I will have to reuse the plywood in the driver’s area, but worst case that will require using adhesive remover followed by floor patching compound and sanding before installing the tiles.

The landing was not “square” (of course) so I made and rechecked measurements several times. I then built a four-sided frame that fit snugly and had the front board aligned with the face of the plastic riser. I am going to tile the steps and I am not going to use underlayment so I needed these surfaces as aligned and flat as possible. I will probably use floor patching compound, however, to fill the gaps before installing the tile. I used screws to secure the frame to the adjacent vertical wood that forms the riser to the copilot level and to the base of the landing with angle brackets.

I needed a piece of 3/4″ plywood approximately 31-1/8″ x 27-5/8″ for the new landing as the old piece I took out was not in good shape and I did not want to reuse it. I did not have any other 3/4″ plywood pieces that were large enough so I went to Lowe’s. They did not have 3/4″ half sheets (4′ x 4′) but I bought some more angle brackets while I was there. I then went to The Home Depot. They also did not have 3/4″ half sheets, but they had full sheets of 23/32″ sanded plywood that looked like it would work and a nice panel saw with an employee available to operate it. I waited while he built a complete set of closet shelving for a couple and engaged in some domestic counseling. He then cut the plywood sheet into two 4′ x 4′ pieces and helped me load them into a cart. I was able to get them into my Honda Element by myself and close the back hatches. I had a nice QSO with Steve (N8AR) on the drive home via the South Lyon 2m amateur radio repeater.

Linda had long since finished working on the wallpaper and busied herself in the kitchen preparing collard greens Cole slaw and vegan potato salad. It was somewhere between late afternoon and early evening but I still had enough light to work outside. Linda was still busy cooking so I decided to go ahead and try to cut the plywood for the new landing. Again, it was not a rectangle, i.e., an equiangular quadrilateral (four right angles and four sides with opposing sides parallel and equal in length) so getting the shape exactly right was tricky.

I determined that the right front corner, as viewed from the entry steps, was a right angle, or close enough to one to provide a known starting point. I put the plywood on 2″x4″s on the flat in the driveway to elevate them so I could clamp a saw guide in place and provide clearance for the saw blade. I measured the lengths of all four edges as best I could and placed the right front corner at a factory corner of one of the 4′ x 4′ pieces. I marked the length of the right side and the front on the two factory edges. The left side was longer than the right side and the rear side was longer than the front side so I marked arcs for the left and rear lengths and found their point of intersection. If the right front corner was, in fact, a right angle them this had to result in the correct shape. The key word in that last sentence is “if.”

I tried to confirm my layout by measuring the lengths of the diagonals on the plywood and on the bus but I could not get accurate measurements in the bus. I triple-checked my measurements and layout then marked the guide lines for the setback on my circular saw; 6-5/8″ to the inside edge of the teeth on the blade. Truth be told I initially marked the guide lines on the wrong side of the cut. I started to adjust my guide board to the outside of the blade and then thought better of the idea. The guide needed to be set up so that if the blade wandered off course it would cut into waste material rather than the finished piece. I re-measured and marked the guide lines in the proper place, checked their location with my small square, checked with the saw, made minor adjustments, and finally made the first of two cuts. I then repeated all of that and made the second cut. When I set the piece in place in the bus it was a perfect fit. I was so pleased that I had Linda come out to see it. Sometimes I amaze even myself.

I like to quit on a high note so that was the end of our bus work for today. We did not make dramatic progress but we kept moving and got things done that needed doing. My work today involved a certain amount of pondering and on-the-fly engineering combined with careful, repeated measuring and accurate cutting. This kind of work is never fast.

A beautiful sunset had developed, which meant it was getting dark, so I put a few things away and closed up the bus while Linda prepared our dinner. She made a nice salad and heated a couple of Amy’s vegan (non-dairy) lasagna entrées. A glass of Moscato was a welcome accompaniment and we enjoyed a second glass as we relaxed in the living room. We got a Rockler catalog in the mail today so I looked through that. If you are into woodworking it’s the adult equivalent of the Sear’s Christmas catalogs of yesteryear.

I called Butch at 10 PM. It was 7 PM in Bouse, Arizona and I figured they would be done working for the day and probably already had their dinner. The daytime highs there have been reaching 110 degrees F so Butch and the other RV Park employees have been starting work between 6 and 7 AM and trying to finish up by 1 PM. He did not elaborate but said the situation the first two weeks has not been exactly what they signed up for. He had already responded to an e-mail from Linda with more details so we let it go at that and talked about other things. We wrapped up our conversation at 10:30 and I went to bed. I was going to play a couple of games and then go to sleep but there was an update available for the iPad OS so I installed it. 9.0.1 was a big update and took quite a while to install. I was very sleepy by the time it finished and turned out the lights.

2015/07/16 (R) RV Work

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We were up at 6 AM and by 6:25 Mara had started the engine of her motorhome to pull in the slides. She disconnected the electrical cord and we helped her back out of the driveway at 6:40. She was pointed west so she had to drive to the end of our street and use the circle to turn around. Her destination was Cummins Bridgeway in New Hudson. When she made the appointment they said the closer to 7 AM she could arrive the better. They estimated she would be there 3 to 4 hours.

Mara’s Fleetwood Bounder parked in our pull-thru driveway. Linda in green jacket, Mara in red.

Linda did not sleep well last night, a common side effect of eating too much too late in the evening, and went back to bed once Mara was safely on her way. I decided to stay up and clean the coffee maker before making coffee.

I wiped out the upper housing and cleaned the nooks and crannies with Q-tips. The upper housing is undoubtedly designed the way it is to make it structurally adequate with a minimum of plastic but it was equally obviously not designed with any consideration for being able to clean it. Like many things, it leaves me wondering if the designers ever use the products they design or what sort of functional specifications they work from and who develops those. I think the Bauhaus had it right when they declared “form follows function.” My guess is that commercial equipment, while less “stylish” than consumer goods, has cleanability and serviceability as primary design considerations.

I remembered that we had a one gallon jug of distilled white vinegar in the bus so I got that and ran eight cups of it through the coffee maker. I added four cups of water to the used vinegar and ran it through again. I then ran 12 cups of RO water through the coffee maker. By the time I was done it was approaching 8 AM so I ground up some of the Sumatra Mandheling beans (not decaffeinated) and made seven cups of coffee. I normally make 8 – 9 cups but this was full-strength stuff. I’ve been making 11 cups while Mara is here but it turns out that she does not drink much coffee so I will be back to my usual 8 – 9 half-caff servings going forward.

I enjoyed my first cup of coffee while finishing yesterday’s blog post and starting this one. I enjoyed my second cup while researching hardware for mounting a small table to a wall so that it is essentially cantilevered, which is the table arrangement we need for the bus. I found a 2-piece aluminum extrusion that might be the solution for attaching the table to the wall. It is 30″ long and can be cut to length but I do not think it will not be strong enough by itself to support the table. I found an angle bracket on Rockler that might be the additional piece I need. It is 12″ x 18″ with a notched corner, made of 1/8″ steel, and powder-coated black. A pair of them will support 1,000 pounds so one in the center would be more than sufficient. An alternative would be a wood strut angling back to the wall but we are not willing to have a vertical table leg. I have not decided whether the table should be removable but I am leaning towards a more permanent installation.

Linda eventually got up but neither of us were hungry so we did not have breakfast. I went to my office and ordered the ZioTek monitor mounting system from CyberGuys. I then e-mailed Ewa at AFC Industries and thanked her for the second quote but let her know that the price was way out of my budget. I finally settled in to work on the custom desk design for the bus and eventually finished it (I think). Linda left around 12:30 PM for her dermatology appointment.

Now that we have base station antennas cabled to the ham shack I tend to have the new Yaesu FTM-400DR/DE dual band (VHF/UHF) radio on whenever I am working in my office. It provides a pleasant diversion from my other tasks and is actually useful. Somewhere mixed in with everything else were a couple of QSOs with ham buddies and an attempt to coordinate with Steve (N8AR) and Mike (W8XH) about testing my two Morgan lightning arrestors at Steve’s QTH.

This toad was sitting on a rock by our front porch.

Our bus had settled in the rear and was clearly out of level. The reason it had settled was that I forgot to switch the suspension system to Level Low and shut off the air to the engine accessories. It was of no consequence but it bugged me so I started it, let it air up, re-leveled it, shut it down, and switched off the batteries and engine air accessories.

Mara returned from Cummins Bridgeway around 1 PM and I guided her back into her parking spot. They did the routine service on her motorhome engine and generator but found several things on the genset that needed to be repaired. She agreed to have the work done so they removed the genset from her rig and will reinstall it next Wednesday. They also inspected the motorhome and gave her a list of other things that needed to be fixed, some right away and some eventually. She did not have them do any of that work as she wanted me to look at the list first. The added service work means Mara will be visiting with us for at least another week, which pleased us greatly.

I went over the list with her and we discussed the relative importance and urgency of each repair. One of the items involved the caulking on the roof so we both climbed up there to have a look. I also wanted to scope out how we might install her weBoost Drive 4G-X cellular booster system. While we were on the roof I was able to rock the rig side-to-side quite a bit just by shifting my weight. One of the other items on the diagnostic list was shock absorbers and I indicated that I thought that sounded appropriate, especially given that the back ones reportedly had cracked/broken mounts. They also noted that the transmission fluid was low and that the filter and fluid should be replaced. I encouraged her to have these taken care before she left as Cummins Bridgeway is a very good service facility.

The other items were things that could wait but the caulking of the roof was something Mara could do herself. She likes to take care of as much of her rig as possible and she will be here through at least Wednesday, so she has time.

Linda got back from her out-patient surgical appointment with bandages in seven different places. We visited for a while and then I left the ladies and returned to my office. I started on the design of the pull-out pantry for the bus and quickly realized that the very expensive Fulterer heavy-duty pull-out pantry slide I ordered from Rockler was too wide for the space we have available. I came upstairs and groused about it for a while until Linda and Mara urged me to try canceling the order. I called Rockler and spoke to someone in customer service. I won’t know until tomorrow at the earliest, and probably not until Monday, if I was successful in intercepting the order before it shipped. If not I will have to pay to ship it back and may have to pay a restocking fee. Although I do not have anywhere else I can use it at the moment, between the restocking charge and the cost of shipping I may just keep it and find a use for it.

Linda made a large salad for dinner and we chatted during and after the meal. It had been an early, long, hard day for all of us. Mara returned to her rig before it was dark and Linda headed off to bed shortly thereafter with me not far behind.

2015/05/26 (T) Reflections

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I decided to put off doing the laundry until later in the week. Linda made a grocery shopping list while we had our morning coffee. I called Pat Davidson at Apex Roofing to discuss the installation of a roof access hatch. We did some online research for pest control companies in the Brighton-Hartland-Howell area and decided to call Best Pest Control LLC. I talked to the owner, Ryan, about his perimeter defense package, and decided to give his company a try. They will spray outside the house for ants, spiders, hornets, wasps, and yellow jackets. I called Phil Jarrell from Precision Grading and left him a voice message regarding some additional driveway work, a French drain for the west end if the property, and a hole for a ham radio tower foundation.

I showed Linda the pullout pantry slide hardware I found last night on the Rockler website, a German made top-bottom pair specifically designed for this application and able to support up to 450 pounds. It’s pricey, but it looks like the right stuff for the job. We also found some assembled pullout pantries online, including some that were 5″ wide, but they were not deep enough and getting just the right height looked tricky. We really want to maximize the use of our available cubic inches.

Keith showed up around 10 AM with his new Scag riding lawn mower. He is still going to have the Hustler repaired as a backup, but the Scag is a nicer/better machine. It is fuel injected, which should be more reliable, and it is faster, which makes more efficient use of Keith’s time. It also has a seat that can be adjusted from soft to firm, making for a more comfortable operator experience over the course of a long day.

As much as I need to work at my computer and drafting table I need to work even more in the bus right now. I started by reassembling the inside of the cabinet above the refrigerator, except for the liner carpet, and reinstalled the fluorescent light fixture on the ceiling. I am keeping the carpet pieces for now, but mostly to use as templates for new material. I would have preferred white Formica interior surfaces, as they are brighter and easier to keep clean, but the bus has a lot of curves and carpet is a very conformable and forgiving material.

The interior of the bus deconstructed in preparation for a new floor, seating, and custom desk.

My next task was cleaning out and securing the area under the bed platform. I removed the half box covers, the flexible ducts, and the floor-mounted cleats. I threw the ducts away and stored the other pieces in the garage. I then reattached the strip light on the top edge of the forward side of the base, reinstalled the two circular HVAC registers (so the cats could not try to get under the bed through the holes), put the cover plates back on the two duplex AC outlets and reinstalled the outlet expanders which also have dual USB charging ports. I need to put some sort of temporary netting over the port holes in the section of the HVAC chase under the bed, but I need to find a suitable material for that. The long term plan is to seal those holes and install registers in the sections of chase outside the bed base. I thought about disconnecting the lift struts for the bed platform so I could raise it higher and reinstall a drawer onto its glides, but decided to leave that for another day.

While I was working in the bus Ryan from Best Pest Control called me back and said he had a crew that could fit us in within the hour so I said “sure.” I closed up the house as they would be spraying around all of the windows, doors, and doorwalls. Two guys showed up a little while later and I walked them through the job, wrote a check, signed the work order, and they got busy. They found two hornet nests by the east end of our deck and destroyed them. I hate to kill even a hornet but they have been buzzing around our windows and doors, poking at voids in the mortar on the face brick, and occasionally getting into the house and we need to put a stop to their use of our residence as a place to build their homes.

The pest control guys were already gone and Keith was driving away as Linda returned from the supermarket. I helped get the groceries into the kitchen. After they were put away we had a light lunch around 1 PM of fresh baby carrots, mini bell peppers, sourdough pretzel nibblers, hummus, and red grapes.

The dinette seat used to fit in this corner The strip mirrors have been removed from the outside wall next to the window.

I have been taking a lot of short breaks while working on the bus. It was warm and humid again today and warmer still in the coach even with windows open and the roof vent fans exhausting air. But the breaks are not just to rest, they are also to ponder the details of how the interior will get rebuilt and what additional deconstruction still needs to take place.

In the front of the coach there was a 120 VAC electrical cable coming out of an access hole in the passenger side HVAC chase, passing through a 4″ flexible duct adapter, and disappearing through a hole in the floor. I originally thought the cable came from the duplex outlet on the wall just above the access hole but I discovered that it did not. It was routed through the chase from somewhere farther back in the bus. I determined that that the hole in the floor appeared to go into the OTR HVAC bay and sure enough, when I opened the bay there was the cable coming through the ceiling. It turned towards the center of the bus and then went through the wall into the bay to the front. It was then easy to determine that it was the power feed for the electric heater mounted on the rear wall of the front bay.

The storage area under the end platform with the 4″ flexible ducts and cover boxes removed.

At that point I knew which circuit breaker to turn off and was able to cut the cable in the living room without risking an electrical shock. I slipped the 4″ duct adapter off and set it aside. We don’t generally use the electric heater in the front bay, and certainly do not need it this time of year, so I wire-nutted the ends of the hot and neutral wires, coiled them up, and stowed them in the HVAC chase for the time being. I coiled the end of the wire coming out of the floor around one of the Aqua-Hot coolant hoses so it would not drop into the bay below.

The area of the bus that was the outside rear corner of the dinette kept drawing my attention. That corner was decorated with vertical strip mirrors with beveled edges. There are also strip mirrors used as wainscoting on the lower portion of the outside wall of the hallway and at the end of the hallway opposite the bathroom door. The strip mirrors are the one thing in this bus we have never liked but they did not bother us enough to not buy the coach. Now that we are involved in a major interior remodeling, however, we are looking for ways to remove them or cover them up. We really do not like them.

In the case of the former dinette mirrors, I had previously determined that the ones against the wall of the coach were mounted (glued) onto a sheet of plywood that appeared to be mounted to a pair of cleats along the two vertical edges. I tried prying under the bottom of the first strip but it cracked and chipped. It quickly became apparent that removing these strip mirrors from whatever they are glued to was probably not a viable option.

The beveled strip mirrors in the hallway of our bus. We really do not like these things.

[p4 R] After removing a 1-1/4″ wide piece of thin trim wood I was able to loosen the left (forward) edge at the bottom. The walnut trim around the fixed window just forward of the mirrors, however, prevented me from pulling it out any farther. I had a reasonably good idea how the window trim was attached but first I had to remove another piece of 1-1/4″ thin trim that covered the gap between the window trim I needed to remove and the trim for the next window forward. With Linda’s help I removed eight screws and the 3-sided window trim came right off. We set it carefully aside and returned to the mirrors.

With the window trim removed we were able to pull the left (forward) edge of the plywood mirror backing out enough to see behind it. Our lucky “break” (no pun intended but, whoops, there it is) was that the screws holding the plywood to the left cleat pulled out of the cleat. I say lucky because the screw heads were under the glass mirror strips and none of the mirror strips broke. We kept working it out until the upper edge bumped into the return air grill trim on the underside of the upper cabinet. We removed the grill and set it aside. We were then finally able to pull the left edge out far enough that I could remove a couple of screws that were holding the right cleat to the panel that forms one of the back walks of the pantry. Something was still holding it and when I changed position I saw that there was another screw near the top. I removed that screw and the whole panel came out with the right cleat still attached. Three more screws and the left cleat was also out. We reattached the return air grill to the underside of the upper cabinet and then reattached the window trim.

The wallpaper behind this panel was in very good shape except for the screw holes where the cleats were attached. We plan to put shelves in this corner to utilize the space and they may get used for some ham radio equipment. Regardless of what ends up there having the mirrors out gives us more room for the shelves and will just plain look better.

A view from the kitchen of the dinette corner and hallway. A custom desk will go where the dinette seating used to be and double as work surface for the kitchen.

The mirrors on the other wall of this corner are glued directly to the walnut panel that forms one of the backs of the pantry. I tried loosening the bottom edge of the one in the corner and it cracked. That area will be concealed by the desk, but we will cover all of the mirror strips with some sort of thin panel. We have the same problem with the mirror strips across from the bathroom door and may just have to live with those as I have not come up with an attractive way to cover them. I need to investigate the strip mirrors in the hallway. There is a good chance that they are glued to plywood panels that are screwed to the wall at locations covered buy wood trim. If we are lucky removing the trim will allow us to unscrew and remove the mirror panels. If not, we will just put the trim back on.

I have had the idea for a while that we could make another low pantry or shallow storage area along the hallway wall above the HVAC chase where the strip mirrors are currently located. Linda does not like the idea as she is concerned it will make the hallway to narrow. The storage would not be any deeper than the HVAC chase is now, and would not be any higher than the wood trim along the top of the strip mirrors, which serve as a kind of wainscoting.

By this point it was 5:30 PM. Linda headed inside to fix dinner while I got trash and materials out of the coach and carried them to the garage. Linda let me know that a severe thunderstorm watch had been issued effective until 10 PM. It rained lightly off and on until we sat down to eat and then the downpour came but we did not have anything severe, just heavy rain for a while. She made a dish using garbanzo beans, garlic, kale, salt, pepper, and fresh lemon juice. It was delicious and the fresh lemon juice really made it sparkle. She also served the last of the risotto she made for dinner when Steve and Karen were here on Saturday. We had strawberries with Lotus brand Biscoff cookies for dessert. I worked on this post on my iPad, took a shower, and went to bed. I never did make it to my office today.

The Phase Place

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Tag Archives: Rockler Hardware

2015/10/31 (S) Boo!

2015/10/28 (W) Inside Flash

2015/10/16 (F) Desk Installation

2015/10/07 (W) The Root Cause

2015/09/26 (S) A Step in the Right Direction

2015/07/16 (R) RV Work

2015/05/26 (T) Reflections