actually tiny

Building the closet

September 28, 2019October 26, 2019Leave a comment

Spent the day impersonating a cabinet maker, poorly. Having worked in an actual cabinet shop it always pains me to try to do this in my jury-rigged workshop where nothing is flat, square, plumb, or level. As a boatbuilder those things don’t matter terribly much to me, but for building boxes, a dead flat...

Kitchen drain assembly

September 27, 2019October 24, 2019Leave a comment

Today we test fitted the farmhouse style counter I’ve been working on and built the undersink drain assembly.One of the nice things about the geometry of the trailer and our particular kitchen is that it made the logical place to bring the drain pipe up just inside of the wheel well. You’d think this...

Applying maintenance oil to the floors and counters

September 25, 2019December 23, 2019Leave a comment

Today we applied a second coat of Rubio (this time their Universal Maintenance Oil) to the floor and countertops. As the name implies, Rubio Monocoat can be used as a single application but we both feel like one pass leaves the surface looking a bit dry. A second coat 48 hours later with their...

Timelapse: finishing the butcher block counters

September 24, 2019October 24, 2019Leave a comment

Timelapse of finishing the tiny house butcher block counters with Rubio Monocoat. For more details, check our previous posts...

Timelapse: Prepping our maple countertops

September 23, 2019October 24, 2019Leave a comment

Prepping our 1 5/8” thick hard maple countertop slabs, see previous posts for details on how we made these. Wood purchased from @buildingmaterialresources, laminations done at @cwwnw. Total cost was 14 dollars per square foot and less than a day of labor! Makita track saw borrowed from neighbor... @milwaukeetool Please make a track saw!!!!!...

Finishing our maple countertops

September 22, 2019December 23, 2019Leave a comment

I started the day by checking on the maple floors that we finished in the tiny house yesterday and ended up staring at them like a simpleton for at least a half hour.Once I was able to pry myself away from the beauty and mesmerizing grain patterns of the Big Leaf Maple that we...

Timelapse: Finishing the hardwood floors

September 21, 2019December 23, 2019Leave a comment

We finished the sanding today by knocking down any leftover rough spots with a palm sander, then blowing all the dust off the walls with an air nozzle and then using a big fan to blow it all out the windows before doing a final vacuum and then wiping the floor with a very...

Sanding the maple floors

September 20, 2019October 24, 2019Leave a comment

Working late tonight on sanding the floor. We rented a large square pad orbital sander because even though it’s not exactly the right tool we can use it in place of the three or four different floor sanding tools that you would normally use for this job. It’s also fairly user-friendly but you end...

Testing colors for the floor finish

September 19, 2019December 23, 2019Leave a comment

We’re using Rubio Monocoat to finish the maple floor in our tiny house. We stumbled on this natural hardwax finish a few years ago when looking for a finish for the reclaimed Douglas fir countertops we built for the big house. Designed as a floor finish, Rubio sounded too good to be true –...

Laying out the counters

September 18, 2019October 23, 2019Leave a comment

Started work on the countertops today. Our counters and some of our shelving are made out of 1 5/8” thick hard maple that we glued up with the help of Creative Woodworking NW.With a Janka hardness of 1,450 psi these counters are almost twice as tough as our bigleaf maple floors, and quite honestly...