Grand Adventure

Out of all the project steps, this one is most definitely a two person process. Not understanding how much foam I’d truly need I bought a 1 inch High Density roll from Jo Ann’s. One thing is certain…I had no clue how expensive foam is. When it came time for this step I layed out the one roll and immediately realized I’d need a second. Even with the second roll I’d be piecing together scraps from the one to make ends meet on the curves. Mark custom purchased the foam (somewhere in Houston) and if I did this project again I’d try that. I can’t imagine SA not having a place I can get foam that would wrap around the entire rail piece. And based on Mark’s costs he put online I’d save half of what I paid at Jo Ann’s for two pieces.

In the picture above the foam is pieced together and the whisper vinyl is layed down underneath. I had a small moment of panic because the vinyl width was unchangeable: Jo Ann’s didn’t make any wider. The fix to that would be having a break in the vinyl. This can be compensated for but each place (at least two if you did this) where the vinyl met up with itself you’d have an obvious point noticable by anybody. It’s one thing for me to know each and every imperfection, but another that shouts out I had to compromise somewhere to make things work. As you can see the vinyl width was just about right, and that was pre-stretching to get taut on the foam.

Harry did the stretching and I did the stapling of the vinyl. We followed Mark’s directions to a “t” here and probably kept us from ruining the vinyl. A very expensive prospect (the vinyl was about 1/4 of the cost of the table).

The vinyl is dusty from my garage floor but it will clean it fine. Although I don’t have pictures to post, I’ve since pieced the whole table together (minus the legs and cup holders) and it looks good. For a first-in-a-long-time project and with the tools I had I’m happy with the results. I’ll post later a picture when I’m done with the cupholders and the table is ready for it’s first “All In!” moment.