Taking sides, and chopping 'em up

I got the roofing tar applied to the floor and and 3/4" EPS insulation pressed into it during the week last week and began working on the sides of the camper last weekend.

The floor portion ended with 12 screws with fender washers secured each of the four panels. I spent some hard cash on 1 1/4" stainless steel screws and aforementioned fender washers, but the screws were just a bit too long and broke through the floor too often, so I switched to some 1" screws I had on hand. Below are two photos of the insulated and tarred floor.

We didn't get a lot of time this past weekend to work on the project - you can't devote every weekend to the build, after all. There's always drinking that needs to get done, and there were some wedding tasks that needed to be accomplished. However, we did get a trip to Home Depot in on Saturday for two sheets of 4'x8' sheets of 3/4" thick birch plywood and some 1"x2"s that will be used as spars. And whatever-the-hell-else we threw on the cart as we rolled it around the store.

We cut a few corners off the sheets of plywood, and we finally have a definite side profile to behold.

The sides each have a matching door with a window, which we laid out and marked down on the walls Saturday/Sunday. Today, the door of one side was cut out along with its windows. The cut-out from the window is discarded, so I drilled a starting hole for the jigsaw wherever I wished. The door cut-out must be saved, as it's the door, so I placed a starting hole on each corner toward the front of the wall and took the jigsaw from there.

I used the completed wall as a template to trace the door outline for the other wall, as well as the door with window cut-out to trace the window for the second wall. A few related photos follow, note that the window is easier to cut once the door is separated, which I did for the second window.

We see the freshly-cut door slid to the side above, and below, my fiancee models the raw product. I still need to take a belt sander to it.

I need to apply the belt sander to a number of things. One thing is the outline of the walls. I'll sandwich them together and hit the top, sides and curved junctions so that we'll at least end up with uniform walls. I'll straighten up the cut-out for the doors a bit with some sanding, as well as a little bit of the window cut-outs. Those aren't critical though, since some form of pre-fabricated window with molding will be installed in the spaces.

I'll finish this update with a photo of the left-side wall, with the dress side facing us. The inside is intended to be the "nice" side of the plywood, since the outside will be covered and the interior space will be stained and treated with polyurethane.

[g]