"Paradigm Shift"

[Steve]

Internet Acronyms Dictionary

[Eric von Kleist]

Hmmm...just glancing at the dictionary, I notice that they don't have ADIDAS...

They did have AYBABTU...

All Day I Dream About Sex

[Griff]

Thanx, Steve! WOW, is there anything the internet DOESN'T have!?!

[Eric von Kleist]

I had overnight houseguests...or as I call them, PASSENGERS! LOL! My brother-in-law and baby sister stopped by to crash for the night on their way from Chicago, IL to Jacksonville, FL. It was nice to see them, and the entertaining (for the couple of hours after they arrived and before we turned in, and the couple of hours this morning before they left) went well. I showed them my composting toilet...the workings of it, not just the outside. They could not smell it at all in the bus, so it's not just my wishful thinking (and smoker's nose) that can't detect any smell, which is nice to know. When I opened up the hatch over the two holding buckets, that disrupted the airflow from the vent fan, and they could smell it. My BIL said it was an "organic" smell, and my sister said it smelled "kind of poopy" as she covered her nose with her shirt. LOL. They both used it. My sister said she did not have any trouble "hitting" the funnel/urine diverter, so the concept works adequately for wimmins plumbing, too. I had meant to empty the "active", or collecting, bucket before they arrived, but they got in earlier than anticipated, so they had to face a nearly full bucket of poop in order to use the toilet. The contents look more like a bucket of mashed up horse turds than people poop because of all the rabbit food that goes in with each use, so it's really not that disgusting to look at. If you've lived on a farm, you've seen worse, probably.

I fixed pico de gallo and salsa (pico de gallo in tomato sauce with some chipotle hot sauce for flavor) for a snack when they arrived. They got to see that the kitchen functions just like any other kitchen. For breakfast I cooked some fried potatoes, and also scrambled eggs with peppers, onions, tomatoes, and garlic in them...not quite an omlet, since I never can get an omlet to hold together, but almost. We also had a honeydew that I had purchased the night before. I have a suspicion that my sister will make a report on my living conditions to my mother, so proving that I can have a home cooked meal and nice fresh veggies will go a long way toward convincing everyone that I'm not entirely crazy (of course, they all lived on sailboats for years, so they know it's possible to do without a lot of "conveniences".)

Lately I have not accomplished too much work, although I have made progress on finishing the bathroom walls, completing the driver's side wall. That leaves me with only the rear driver's side wall and the door, and the overhead panel (not the ceiling, the back wall part) to complete back there.

I got some 1.5" donut shaped magnets for the shower curtain at RadioShack, but they were not strong enough to hold it up. I need to get some of the rare earth magnets. I also decided that I could probably use the rare earth magnets to hold up curtains over the front door until I get the driver's area framed in and finished off.

I have worked out a good way to cover the windows from the inside in areas where you don't want to use windows (in my case, a hanging locker) but you don't want to go to the effort of putting up sheet metal on the outside. I will post pics once it is done.

I almost completed a shelf in the pantry side of my hanging locker that will accomodate canned goods and let me reclaim the upper section of my hanging locker for kitchen utensils and cookware, as planned.

Sister and BIL slept on airmattresses (therma-rest brand - excellent) on top of my imitation persian rugs, and claimed to have had a restful night. Then we put the mattresses up and lounged around on the rugs all morning just visiting and chatting, so that "furniture" arrangement seems to work adequately. Of course, they're pretty open minded people....

Sister is 26, and BIL is 30 (I think), so they are quite a bit younger than me (44). He is from India, having emigrated to Canada when he was about 12. He is a Canadian citizen, and now, since I sponsored him, he is also an American citizen. She has applied for Canadian citizenship, and will have it in about a year, IIRC. He is just finishing up his architecture licensing exams, and they will be moving to Toronto, where his parents live after that. But first....they are about to set of for 5 weeks in India, 2 weeks in China, and about a week and a half in Japan. What an adventure that will be!

[Eric von Kleist]

I have come up with my own kind of window covering. Well, actually, this is a fairly common solution to window coverings, but this is my version of it. This allows you to block off windows without doing structural work, insulate at least half of the window, and still have the window available to use for ventilation when you want to.

http://www.skoolie.net/gallery2/album46



It's just a sliding panel over the top (opening) section of the window, and a fixed, insulated panel over the bottom. The panels are made out of masonite tileboard, with the white side facing out, so they will reflect lots of light and heat.

Wouldn't look too good from the outside on a bus with a dark paint scheme, though!

[Steve]

Do those rattle quite a bit when driving?

[Eric von Kleist]

Driving? What's that???

I haven't driven the bus since I parked it in the RV park. The framing around the window shouldn't rattle, as it is fastened down very tightly (or will be when it's done). The lower section of the window also should not rattle, as it is screwed and glued to the framing. The upper part might rattle, as is, but I intend to improve it by putting strips of felt along its edges where they slide up and down behind the framing, both on the outside and the inside of the board, just to make it a tighter fit. As is, when everything is in place, the upper board drops like a guillotine blade when you release it, and I want it to be a tight sliding fit.

[Eric von Kleist]

Here's the view from the outside



The white masonite tileboard really keeps heat out. I can tell a major difference in temperature between the two halves of the hanging locker.

Since the tileboard is pretty close to the window surface, and the framing seals around the window edges fairly well, this should also function to some degree as a storm window by preventing a circulation of air against the window.

[captainkf]

Hey, I was wondering about using masonite as a flooring material. We use it in theatre's all the time. What do you think about it as a floor? It seems it would be easy to clean, paintable, somewhat insulating and reasonably priced. Just floating ideas. - Richard

[busone]

Since it is a fiber board you would need to make sure you seal it good. My house had Masonite siding on it and it was built in 1956. If termites had not damaged so much of it, it would still be there. You could varnish it with marine grade varnish and I bet it would look real good.

[Eric von Kleist]

I'd be leery of using masonite for flooring. It might very well work, but... Next hot day, take a cold glass of your favorite beverage and set it on a piece of fiberboard until it the beverage warms up to room temperature. The condensation from the glass will settle on the fiberboard, and within a few hours you'll likely have a nice lumpy area in the fiberboard about the size of your glass. If you got any significant amount of moisture on fiberboard flooring, either from above or below, it would swell up like those little dried, compressed sponges that you sometimes see. I'd even be skeptical about painted fiberboard.

I think that the difference in price between 1/4" masonite and 3/4" plywood would be a lot of "peace of mind insurance".

OTOH, I could be completely wrong!

Ideally, I would rather have used fiberglass tile-board for the windows. If there is condensation on the windows (which I'm sure there will be), it will eventually transfer to the fiberboard and cause it to distort. The white surface on the masonite I used will *probably* delay that for some time, but not forever.

...but, I got two whole sheets of it for free, so for now it's what I have to work with. I'm debating using it as a surface for my galley countertop, which right now is only primed plywood. I really don't think I'm going to use it, though, for all the reasons mentioned above. I'm just going to go with my original ceramic tile idea...when I have the time...and $$$.

[Eric von Kleist]

No, not that!

I got about 60 square feet of glazing today, in fairly utilizable framing. I got a 4.5 x 5 picture window with 24 panes (three missing), three 2.5 x 3 insulated storm windows in frames, and a 2.5 x 5 tempered glass shower door. All came from a home rehab project.

I'm going to convert the shower door into a solar collector for heating hot water for my radiant heat flooring system and my water heater.

I'm going to convert the picture window and the storm windows to air-heating solar collectors.

Total solar radiation on 60 square feet is about 6kW. With the air heaters I should be able to achieve a 50% conversion rate, and they're about 2/3 of the total glazing. That would give me about 2kW of net heat; however, I'm going to put half on each side of the bus (for now) because my bus faces due north. That way I should get about 1kW in the mornings and about 1 kW in the evenings. That ought to keep the bus toasty throughout the day.

I'm going to put the water heating panel on the roof, but have no idea what efficiency I will accomplish with that. Probably be lucky to get 20%, which would give me about 200 Watts of heating. That's not much, but I don't want to get the water too hot, as it is piped under that dadgum self adhesive vinyl tile that comes up when it reaches much over 80 degrees. I'm hooking it to the hot water heater so that I can use my water heater backwards -- it has provision for hot engine coolant to run through a heat exchanger, but I'm going to run cold fluid through it to heat the fluid from the hot water in the water heater, and then run that fluid under my floors!

The water heater is electric, so that way I can have heated floors at night and when the sun is not shining (as long as I have AC power).

Yee-hah! A "tinkering" project, as opposed to a build out project!

[Eric von Kleist]

Not much progress lately....very darned little now that I am both in school and working on the weekends. The windows are sitting unused still. I have managed to construct one more window slide for the other side of the hanging locker, and hope to get the hanging locker finished off tomorrow, including installing shelves for clothing. And I wanted to have this ship-shape and road ready by the first week in December! Hah!

I found a junked IH S-1900 truck that I was considering using as the donor for a rear-end swap if the price was right; however, when I examined it closely I discovered that it had a 2-speed rear axle. Completely different housing and set-up, and I'm not even going to think about a whole rear-end clip swap.

BUT!! I am going tomorrow to pull a 50 gallon diesel tank from the truck to use in my WVO conversion plans. Looks like only 4 bolts to remove. I'll have to cut a hole in the skirting on the bus to create a fill door, and I'll have to drill mounting holes in the frame for the tank mounts, but other than that it should be easy.*

*Famous last words!

[Eric von Kleist]

Whew! I completely forgot about checking the antifreeze in the bus! We've had 2 freezing nights, and I was worried. I bought a cheap tester at Wal-Mart, and I tested it last night. The school must have used a 70/30 antifreeze/water ratio: the tester indicated that I'm good down to -25F. What a relief!

[Eric von Kleist]

Haven't been able to work on the bus much lately, but I did manage to get a set of cannister racks completed. http://www.skoolie.net/gallery2/album44

Next project in the pantry is going to be to mount the cast iron pots and pans and the other dishes on the walls.

Oh, yeah, tonight I put on the $42.00 left front turn signal that I got at NAPA. If you look at my avatar, you see that I'm missing one in the picture. Not any more!

[Eric von Kleist]

Working on things as I can...

Got the cast iron holders completed. Now I need to mount them in the pantry.



Also completed a rack for my EZBake Oven (Coleman Campstove).



Now I need to make the plate and bowl holders. The goal is to be able to unplug and drive off without having to spend a lot of time packin things up.

[Eric von Kleist]

Yippee! The pantry project is nearing completion!



You can see the three recent projects in this picture:

EZBake Oven rack at the back;

Cannister racks on each side;

Cookware holders above the cannister racks.

It's a reasonably efficient use of space, and none of the various things interfere with each other's functioning. I can get the cannisters in and out with the pans in place or not. I can raise the bottom board to access storage without bumping any cannisters.

Yet to make: holders for my enameled camping plates and bowls, and perhaps for my cups and mixing bowls. I'm thinking of some kind of strips of wood that their various rims will slide into. I want to locate them beneath the shelf.

[Eric von Kleist]

Well, it's only 4 weeks until school is over! Woo-hoo! I'm planning a whole bunch of (cheap) projects for the summer. Depends on how much "building material" I can scrounge.

At least I should be able to finish hooking up the WVO conversion...that's already paid for (except for the "oh yeahs"....)

[Eric von Kleist]

Well, I'm out of school for the summer, and don't have regular internet access, so it's going to be hard to post much.

I managed to finally tile my countertop! Yippee! It looks pretty dadgum good, if I do say so myself. The countertop is about 25 inches wide by 7 feet long. I used 8" white floor tile that was leftover from a bathroom floor project in my old house. With the cutouts for the stove and sink, I probably only used about 1/2 box of tile. I used a running bond pattern, where the rows of tile are offset by 1/2 tile, so you never have 4 corners meet...BUT...I turned the pattern on a 45 degree diagonal, so when you look at it there are a lot of diamond-ish and triangular shapes. The pattern is continued up the backsplash, too.

If you are going to do any amount of tilework, buy a wetsaw. They have cheap ones for less than $100, and they work fine. It makes things SO much easier.

Besides looking darned spiffy, it is so nice not to have to have a dirty, rough plywood counter. The entire thing is 2" thick (two layers of 5/8" plywood, plus backerboard, thinset, and tile. I will post pictures when I can.

Later this summer, I'm going to finish the final connections for the WVO conversion that I (mostly) installed back in the fall. In the meantime, I'm going to finish the bathroom wall coverings, and the bathroom vanity, to include tiling the tiny vanity top. Oh, and I'm also going to build some bookshelves, in order to gain control of the stacks of books that are beginning to develop in the bus.

Oh, and a computer cabinet...

And I have this idea to cover the roof of the bus with old circus tent fabric, not real, but something home made to look as if someone had cut up a huge circus tent, and used parts of it to cover the ceiling... "LEY CIRC"... "OG-FACED BO"... "IONS and TIGE"....."FREAKS"..."NAKE LAD..." Of course, flammability is an issue in having a paint soaked piece of canvas glued to your ceiling, but I think I can make it work. Soak the canvas in Borax first, and let it dry -- then it won't burn. The paint might, but the canvas won't.

So many ideas...can't go having too much fun at once, though, I guess!

[Griff]

So many clowns, so few circuses! Sounds like you're gonna have the best show under the "Big Top"! Can't wait to see yer counter top pics, sounds snazzy!