"Wood" panelling

[vcrt]

In all of the Sunlines and probably many other campers, motor homes etc, you'll find simulated wood panels along the sides of cabinets, dividers etc. I'm planning some mods to out 2499 and need to match the cherry paneling.
My first stop was Home Depot, nothing there, although they did have a small selection of the old grooved wall paneling that was so prevalent back in the 60's and 70's.
Does anyone know where to buy flat wall paneling with no grooves?
Thanks,
Rich

 

[poppyandnana]

When we needed the panels - we went to the section where your buy "pre-made" cabinets, got ours in Home Depot.

 

[JohnGB]

Menards (if one is near by you) has some paneling. Cherry might be a problem.

BUT, here is a thought which may work pending what you are up to. Get a piece of thin clear veneer board. Try and get a wood that has a grain that will come close to matching the grain in your cabinets.

Take a piece of that wood and a door panel etc down to a Sherwin Williams paint store. They can custom make a quart of stain that will match on that wood, your cabinet color.

I did this from a tip from Tweety a number of years ago on the stain. Each project I do with it comes out even better.

See here. This is my TV mount. That wood frame is real clear maple on the outside, a clear pine board in the center, and birch veneer board on the back. The stain made all these kinds of light woods look like maple



Here is the whole post if it helps any http://www.sunlineclub.com/forums/f65/sunline-entertainment-cabinet-upgrade-14938.html

Hope this helps and looking forward to seeing your new project.

John

 

[vcrt]

There are certainly more than one way to skin a cat (can I say that anymore?)
I like the wood veneer idea actually, I can think of 1/4" luan that I've bought at Lowes and Home Depot that had a very pleasing grain and if stained the right shade of cherry, would probably look like the factory put it there.

The later 2499's went to a half cabinet with a counter top for the entertainment center. Barbara and I have never wanted a TV in our camper, so we wondered what to do with what seemed like a waste of good space. I was thinking of removing the counter and building a wardrobe (like we had in the 2470) to go to the ceiling. I thought it would be a good place to store bulky coats and sweatshirts for our colder camping days since there isn't much room for them in the bedroom. The 2470 had two nice size wardrobes and I thought we needed to have at least one in this camper, but then we decided we would leave it as is for now and see what the real need is as we get used to camping in it.

That was one place I would use the wood paneling. The other place is one I definitely want to build, a partition between the stove and the sofa. When we first saw the arrangement, it just looked wrong to have a cook top and an oven so close to the sofa. My partition will start at the floor, extend out to the front edge of the sofa seat cushion and go up to the counter. My idea at this time is to add a piece of glass or plexiglass on top of that to go to the bottom of the cabinet. Maybe add some decoration to the glass like etching in a design of some sort.
Thanks for the ideas John,
Rich

 

[vcrt]

Just now, I decided to check out your flat screen mod, very nice design and workmanship as usual!

So which camper is that, your current SR?

Rich

 

[JohnGB]

Just now, I decided to check out your flat screen mod, very nice design and workmanship as usual!

So which camper is that, your current SR?

Rich

Yes, that is our T310SR. You walked right past it this summer. Guess it blended in pretty good.... Our T2499 had the same entertainment cabinet just I never made it to doing that upgrade back then. I have seen the large shelf version you have. I think they started that in 2006. I do not know if I like it or not. I do like the extra storage space of the entertainment cabinet. They use to hold a monster CRT tube TV. Once flat screens came in, CRT cabinets went by the way side.

Did you notice the center post on the 2 hinged doors is different then any of yours? I removed the center post, trimmed about 1/32" off the overall length and then screwed to one door. Now when the doors are open, I have uninterrupted access getting large or small things out of the double door cabinets. I have done this on all our double doors. Some floor plans have several, others none.

Here is a lower cabinet, I think yours has this too. You can see the center door style screwed to the one door. The added shelf form 1/4" veneer board really helped organize that cabinet. Did this in other areas too. Before, it seemed like what ever you wanted was on the bottom of the pile, in the back....


John

 

[vcrt]

Yes, I did see your post about eliminating the center posts. I like that idea and plan to do it on ours. Actually, the overhead cabinets above the sofa have no center posts as the doors meet in the middle.
I love slide out and swing out compartments and have an idea to make a post mounted swing out storage shelf for that lower cabinet under where the t v goes.
I'd spend all my time building my ideas if I had the time!
Rich

 

[JimL3222]

We did not need a whole lot, so we looked for pieces that we could re-use. I took the bottom out of the drawer under the dinette seat in my 2670 when I removed the giant Audiovox cassette stereo and replaced it with a car=size AM/FM/CD/Weather stereo. I backed it with plywood for strength and attached it from the inside of the cabinet over the couch. I replaced the drawer bottom with another piece of 1/4" project panel I got at Home Depot. That way the panel seen behind the stereo matched perfectly.