Using a Shop Smith Mark V on a Chris Craft Roamer refit

[roamer46]

With those PITA curvy V-berth walls finally installed, the rest of the cabinetry in that room is coming together relatively quickly. It's looking more and more like a motor yacht interior with each passing weekend.

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Fitting the V-berth Cabinets

Cheers,
Q

[Dccarpenter]

They are looking great, I've done a lot of yacht carpentry and cabinets and your stuff looks better than a lot of the 'pro' work I come across.

I'm right up the Bay in Chesapeake Beach, hope to see you cruising by soon.

[JPG]

They are looking great, I've done a lot of yacht carpentry and cabinets and your stuff looks better than a lot of the 'pro' work I come across.

I'm right up the Bay in Chesapeake Beach, hope to see you cruising by soon.

He has already had first hand experience with a local slow but 'good' 'craftsman' of that ganre.

[roamer46]

Thanks Dccarpenter! I know exactly what you mean! "Mr. Slow But Good" was a disaster. In fact, I address one of his disasters in today's post...still dealing with the results of professional incompetence even years later!

That said, I finished fitting the panels, cut the top cabinet panel, and then started doing the final preparation for installation. With sticky epoxy everywhere, it's best to just leave the area and come back when it cures.

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: More V-berth Cabinetry

Cheers,
Q

[roamer46]

I've been learning more about making cabinets. I think I've got the process finally worked out, but it's challenging stuff. It doesn't help that I'm using epoxy and even on mild days the temperature in the tent is way above 100°F. Getting all the pieces wetted out and put together before the epoxy kicks isn't easy. But so far it's going pretty good.

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: V-berth Cabinetry Storage Boxes

Cheers,
Q

[roamer46]

The bed foundation and cabinets look even better now that they're insulated and installed!

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: More V-berth Cabinetry Storage Boxes

Cheers,
Q

[roamer46]

I'm going to me making a lot of cabinet parts out of solid mahogany soon, so I had to get myself a new surface planer. When the missus sees pretty new mahogany getting installed, it takes surprisingly little effort to get her approval on new toy...ahem...tool purchases. :-)

I also made an 8' infeed/outfeed table for the planer. Hopefully I won't have snipe on any of the mahogany I run through this beast.

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: New Tool--Dewalt DW734 Thickness Planer

Cheers,
Q

[roamer46]

I had a long weekend, so I made some solid mahogany corners for the V-berth closet. It was the first time I'd made anything like this, but I think they turned out OK.

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Making Solid Mahogany Corners for the V-berth Cabinets

Cheers,
Q

[roamer46]

I ended up spending a lot of time one day adjusting my jointer and saws after I discovered problems with each one that was throwing all of my final cuts out of square. The problems all come down to sloppy manufacturing, which is absurd given how much these tools cost.

Anyway, once I got everything cutting true I got to work cutting and fitting the V-berth bed foundation framing. It's coming together pretty well.

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: The V-berth Bed Foundation Frames

Cheers,
Q

[roamer46]

I got the V-berth bed foundation frames wrapped up, then disassembled them all, insulated the top of the cabinet box and glued and screwed it all together. I'm ready to start cutting the plywood that the mattress will lie on.

When writing the article, I linked to an early article on my CAD concepts for the interior. When I checked the link, I discovered that all of the pictures I'd saved at Photobucket don't display. PB apparently changed its business model, and now you have to pay to allow pictures on its servers to be viewed on 3rd party sites. So now I'm spending a lot of time downloading pix from PB and uploading them to WordPress, where the blog is hosted, so I can basically recreate each article. And PB's process for downloading each folder includes a bunch of mandatory streaming of advertizing, so what could take a few minutes instead takes hours. This is sooo tedious.

Anyway, the V-berth is coming along. Gotta stay focused on the good news.

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Wrapping Up the V-berth Bed Foundation Frames

Cheers,
Q