I used the butyl tape over the holes that were left when I removed the old galley. I then screwed into these holes to anchor the wooden side panels. So, I reused the holes with stainless steel screws. The butyl tape was a bit of over-engineering, but I don't plan on being the last owner of this baby!
The angle and slope of the galley was really tight. As you can see from the image above, the counter top is pretty narrow, but after experimenting a little, it does seem doable.
You can see in the image above that the stove fits perfectly in the area above the cooler. I don't have a 5 gallon water bottle yet, but my hope is that it will fit, horizontally, next to the stove so that it can 'pour' into pots, etc. I was using my Coleman lantern box as a stand in. I have a few tweaks on the drawers. I have great respect for cabinet makers. I've made a few cabinets in my life, and always am humbled by the challenges they present.
The cooler clears the cabinet nicely and even the doors and drawers open when each other are open too! That was just a happy accident!
Now that the cabinets and drawers are built, I'll take some time this week to paint, sand and paint them again. In other cabinets I've built, I've 'dressed' up the doors with some edge trim and routed the edges. I'll probably do that again, now that I know it all 'works.'
Left side open. I'm not sure if I'll need to add any shelves here or if we'll use some sort of container/baskets to store stuff in here. The right side will contain the battery, fuse panel, etc.
I plan on a couple of tweaks to the cooler area. I think that the stove, water bottle and lantern will be able to be stowed like the first image above shows. However, I'll need to create some sort of eye hook to hold a bungee cord which will hold them all in place while traveling. I'll also need to put a latch on the cooler so that it does not come sliding out. Another little happy 'accident' is that the small black latch in the center of the bumper is where the hatch will 'clasp.' I used a small slide of plywood to mount the drawer slides that move the cooler in and out. That was exactly the right amount of height that was needed to 'miss' the latch! Lucky!
It really is hard to believe that I spent a whole weekend working on the Carpe Diem and this is 'all' I have to show for it. It was a lot of miniscule progress, followed by several steps backward. Nonetheless, things are looking pretty good.
Next up: electrical rough in. I'm going to West Marine to switch the fuse panel from the four breaker system to the six. I didn't realize that one of the breakers on the four was used to power the two DC outlets. This would give me too few inputs. Going with the larger panel will give me an extra circuit or two for future expansion.
I'm not sure how or where to place the circuit panel. On the one hand, it could be stowed away under the counter on the right side. On the other, I might want to be able to 'see' the lights for each circuit. I'm not sure how important that is to me. I'm going to need to research that a bit this week. Another item that I need to research is how to 'charge' while driving. I know it is pretty simple, but I need to integrate that into my system as I move forward.
I know I want to ready the electrical system for the future use of solar power too. I explored several different 'makes' of panels, etc. They all seem to have a very simple connector system. I think I'm just going to have to decide on a system and then plan for the eventual connection before the teardrop is sealed up and insulated.
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