XyloVan

Random, random, random!

We flit from project to project, looking like hummingbirds on crack (one day it’s instrument construction, the next day body work), but we’re still on a headlong parallel-tracked trajectory to getting the beast ready for Maker Faire.

FORWARD! IN ALL DIRECTIONS!

We did a lot of unfinished business today, (not all of it documented here).

I cut and drilled the stringers for Keyboard 3.

alienrobot and I bolted down the main mounting clamps for Keyboard 1. We bought a double fistful of bolts, nuts and washers for attachment of the mounting hardware for Keyboards 2 and 3.

And then we got busy installing the rug and putting the seats and doorsills back in … Continue reading

Kind of amazing that I haven’t already done something like this – sliced it open on the inside of the body structure while trying to thread a coarse nut onto a fine-threaded tap bolt. Duh.

Today we began sorting out the foundational hardware – the junk that holds the xylophones to the van. They’re going to be big, heavy, and somewhat springy, and we don’t want them flexing loose or tearing the metal.

Rogan helped me hem and haw my way through the engineering challenge – how can we make the keyboards ride high enough when stowed that they won’t scrape the ground – but still be easy to deploy and play? … Continue reading

First mounting hole.

(Rogan‘s photo)

So I spent Saturday morning in the junkyard with Dave (thanks, Dave!), who helped me pull a rear door, a ladder and an extra panel of headliner.

Then I picked up a chunk of carpet remnant (right) which should mesh nicely with the body color and look pretty clean once I get it glued and screw all the floor moldings down again.

I spent a couple of hours cutting it to the shape of the vomitrocious (as my wife says) poo-brown carpet that had served as the van floor for a sober living facility taxi-bus and and for numerous band tours including one (or so John told me whilst selling it to me) involving the Germs.

I then promptly forgot to take a photo of the new interior until all the furniture was back in the van, none of it bolted down.

On Sunday, we yanked off the trim all the way around …

Continue reading