Blood, sweat, and teardrops

Well we did it!  After looking at the weather forecast for Columbus Day weekend we decided Friday night was the best bet for an overnight, so after work we hooked up to the Jeep and towed the Peapod across town to a little known campsite also known as my back yard.  We still had to cut the bevel in the front of the memory foam mattress so we made quick work of that and then got down to setting up for the night. Laura and Kerry were in town for the weekend and joined us for a campfire. Retiring to bed we were cozy as two peas in a pod. Can't wait to finish up and make plans for trips next Spring.  Saturday and Sunday was spent with Kim working on finishing gluing the top rail on the galley decorative rail,  mixing and applying more epoxy on the hatch  and then we fitted the aluminum hurricane hinge to the back of the roof. We had to notch for the side walls and cut reliefs for where the wiring passes through from the roof into the hatch....

This week is a little bit of melancholy as we progress toward the end of building and head into the very real possibility of actually spending a night or two camping in this project next weekend. We're running out of good warm weather to work and it won't be 100 percent done before we'll have to tuck it in for the winter but it won't take much in the Spring to finish the last details.  We have enjoyed figuring out each step and the challenges of making everything fit together. The need to think many steps ahead and avoid doing something at one point that messes up something else days or weeks later has kept my feeble brain from getting more feebler. There's no instruction manual for our specific camper, but there is plenty of good information out there on "the interwebs" and we've learned that this teardrop community is bigger than we knew going in. We look forward to the end of Covid and maybe taking a journey to a group meet somewhere.  ...

This weekend we got some little details added. Kim found some old style wooden thread spools and painted them teal to use for the decorative rail above the cabinets in the galley. I ripped some thin strips of wood on the evil table saw (as Kim calls it) to make the top and bottom rails.  We also installed the painted wooden knobs to the galley cabinet doors and a painted edge band to hide the end grain on the countertop boards.  Wednesday after work I filled the 178 screw holes with wood filler. I wanted to get back Thursday evening to sand it all smooth in preparation for the fiberglass cloth and epoxy but didn't feel good enough and went to bed early.  Saturday morning we were up with the sun and back at it. Kim worked on the galley rail while I sanded all the wood filler smooth.  This is the seam in the plywood on the roof. The sheets are 5 foot square which is perfect as the outside measurement is a hair...

We finally got the outside plywood on this weekend and it's  really looking more and more finished. Lots of preparation to get to this point involved filling the spaces between the roof spars with styrofoam insulation and heat shrinking the wires together and running them all together in a nice bundle  to exit the plywood and run into the tounge box and connect to the battery.  Kim got the cabinet doors all sanded smooth and coat of epoxy brushed on last weekend. I finished up the epoxy evenings this week. Saturday she started adding the inserts to the interior cabinet doors which are actually placemats that we found at Walmart in the clearance isle. The doors in the galley are chicken wire inserts.  This is a view of the styrofoam inserts in the roof panels. I glued them in place with hot glue as we couldn't locate non solvent based contact cement.  A view of the plywood installed. We used PL adhesive and lots of 1/2 inch scr...

  Our little project, based on my mind wandering and basically thinking out loud about building a small camper, was based on two premises: One was that we could build it for the $1200 second round of stimulus checks that is still being discussed or not by our elected officials in Washington. Even though the checks not even in the mail we decided to give it a shot anyway. Well that $1200 premise was pie in the sky and we've made new friends with the fine folks at Lowe's who have enjoyed taking our cash upon every visit.  In reality this is turning out far nicer than my original idea and it's been a lot of fun challenging myself to better my skill set. Figuring out how to complete something that was started by another and still make it our own has been really great fun. And it's been great doing this all with Kim.  The second premise was that it had to be light enough to tow it with my Jeep Renegade which was really not intended to be a toy hauler. The rated towing capaci...

 Things are really moving along this week. Kim has sanded all the epoxy inside the camper nice and flat and smooth. Sore wrists seem to be the price to pay but she has mastered getting a surface nice and flat. She spent Saturday sanding the inside of the trailer by herself while I worked at NAPA filling in for a coworker.                                     Kim's dusty legs covered in epoxy dust.  We bought these light switches from a used camper parts guy on Craigslist a month or so ago. Surprisingly we were not murdered and got a few good deals. Kim painted them a nice retro teal color. I installed them underneath the front cabinets to contol the interior lights.  Here she is after a ten cent lesson on using the scroll saw making spacers for the side marker lights. She can still wave at me with all her fingers! I made a cardboard mock up of a box to go on the trailer tongue fr...