Vacuum pump city

Ups and FedEx both came today with packages. A bunch of fittings from veneersupply and a Thomas vacuum pump off eBay. I spend the majority of the day running around getting the last of the fittings, and getting plumbing. I got about $20 worth of PVC to make a big u shaped tube as a reservoir. Haven't connected it yet. I hemmed and hawed over the 5 gallon propane tank at the restore for $15. I thought it would make a good big reservoir for pulling the big panels, but I figured it would be a pain and expensive to remove all the propane, then I'd have to figure out some kind of fitting to get to the tank. There are a few so I still have time to change my mind. I think the smaller tank setup is probably gonna cycle alot on the big panels but that's 6 pieces. For the rest I think I may be ok with the PVC setup. I am scoping a piece of 4x8 melamine at the restore also to make into a large laminating table for glassing bulkheads and deck sections.

This afternoon I spend mulling around assembling fittings and pondering the mounting. I salvaged some old plywood for the base, took the router to it quick to make it look not completely thrown together. I assembled fittings and found the mounting I liked with the pump mounted on a block in the center with the u shaped tube on PVC around it below. Looks good and will hopefully be very functional too. I messed around getting mounting for all the stuff and figuring out what is left. I need the drill to come tomorrow so I can drill all the holes for wiring and zip ties, and tap the pc caps. I need some smaller PVC for the reserve reservoir, and a vacuum filter I forgot on my order. I've hunted around town for 2 days trying to find something to work, sofar all I got was a ford fuel filter, some huge diesel fuel filter, and a paint spray gun inline water trap filter. I may have to order the real thing on the Internet and wait another week for the part to get here. I'm almost ready to assemble and wire it up.

Yesterday evening michelle and i cut the last 1 ft sections of side panels. we masked all the edges of the corecell with 3m packing tape to keep epoxy from the joints from getting on the panel and to make a clean joint. Tonight I gave the end grain of the corecell a whack with some raw epoxy. Ill let it soak into that foam overnight, then tomorrow morning ill mix up some thicker epoxy with cabosil and fillers and hit the joints again, butt joint it and clamp the big center joints side by side with a piece of visqueen covered wood clamped to the underlying plywood to hold everything in place. The one foot tail section will get butt jointed and a visqueen covered stick will be weighted with bricks to hold it in place while the glue kicks.

I cleaned out the back of the wood shop where the wood shed is. It's kind of a disaster back there, but I moved enough wood around, swept and organized and was able to make a space on the floor to store the 2 4x8 panels for the floor and the 2 offcuts. This stuff was bulky and was clogging up space in the shop. I moved unnecessary stuff from the garage into the shop to make it less cluttered.