Last minute things before load-in

I have been scrambling the past week or so, trying to get things done before we load in on Saturday.  When it was all said and done, the truck took longer to finish than I had hoped. My goal had been to have it completely done and ready to move by May 1.  But that deadline slipped a little bit as I still worked on it last Saturday and Sunday.


SATURDAY
On this truck, the wheels need to appear to support the vehicle, but in actuality, they will hang on the frame and weight is carried by four legs.  We fixed plywood discs painted black at the end of each wooden "axel" to bolt the wheels on to. I spent 2.5 hours on Saturday morning trying to figure out how to deal with the lug nuts.

Because it is a Japanese truck, they are, of course, metric versions of 1/2" nuts.  But Imperial won't fit and our hardware stores are pretty limited in their metric selections.  Turns out that they are 12mm and there are 3 different threads for 12mm. 12mm x 1.5 threads/mm is the most common size.  Naturally, the lug nuts are 12x1.25 threads/mm. Those bolts are $4 each!  So, I explored buying new American lugs. But they come in packs of 20 for $30 and these wheels have 6 holes.  So, it is either $100 in metric bolts or $60 in new lug nuts.  I compromised...no lug nuts. I cut off the 1/2" cheap bolts that I bought and put on basic nuts.  Looking at the pic of the wheel below, I think that they will pass OK.

Saturday, while I finished the mountings for the wheels, Kathleen painted the aluminum rims.  I know that sounds like sacrilege but they were beat up and stained.  A coat of silver paint made them look good, at least from a distance.  I purchased four replacement chrome hub covers on eBay.

After getting the wheels worked out, finally put the truck behind me and went home.

SUNDAY
Patrick had his first tech rehearsal for a production of Spamalot that he is in and Melanie had a Special Olympics competition Sunday morning, so I started the day by myself.  Well, almost.  I brought the supervisor with me. She guarded the door while I began the next task...the whole rest of the SET!

My design calls for a pair of parking lot lamp posts and a large billboard upstage. More about the billboard later.

Most people don't pay much attention to parking lot lights except when they back into the concrete base.  They are actually fairly simple geometry and proved to be easy to make.  They are not much more than an aluminum "shoebox" that hangs off of the side of a square aluminum pole.

I made the light fixture out of 1x6's and a piece of 2x4 as the bracket.  The pole is a pair of 1x4's held together with two 4" wide strips of luan.  For the concrete base, I started with a 12" diameter sonotube concrete form and then capped it with some 2" styrofoam.  A little carving, sanding and a coat of paint and they have the right shape.  Gary will make them look like concrete after we install them.




I found a really cool paint at Home Depot that makes them look like the bronze aluminum. Melanie base coated them with chocolate brown and then Monday evening, top coated them with this bronze paint. It gives them a nice, dark metallic appearance.









Another project that had to be done was to make legs for the platforms that will hold the band.  They can be made on site, but if I pre-make them, setting up platforms goes infintely faster and smoother.

It took only a couple of hours on Tuesday evening to cut 2x4s and screw them together into a neat stack of legs, ready to haul.


Today, my attention turns to the billboard. I think that I have held this one until last because I hadn't made decisions on it yet. But I am at the point where I must. I knew that it was going to be painted on scrim so that the band could see thru it.  I knew that the band platform was 16' wide, so the billboard is 16' wide.  I bought 3 yds of white scrim.


I want to make a frame that hangs from the lighting structure overhead, but appears to stand on legs. So, tonight I will make the pieces that form the frame. I will also make some fake legs.  The thought is to staple black fabric to the bottom of the frame to hide the band platform and then apply the fake legs in front.  Then the scrim will staple to the back of the frame.

After designing the framework, I had to decide on the content.  Since Floyd King Nissan doesn't exist and doesn't have a real sign, I had to turn to the Internet for inspiration.  After a bit of playing, I came up with the following.

We will paint it on to the scrim in the art studio and then I will install it later, after the frame is in place.  If  that doesn't happen this weekend, I have a week before the band moves in and makes access to the back of the billboard a problem.

Friday afternoon, Patrick and Larry are coming to the shop and we will disassemble the truck and wrap it in moving blankets for the trip over.  I will feel SO much better when this thing is on stage and assembled!!!

More after the weekend.  If anyone has time, please come to the theater Saturday at noon to give us a hand.  The bed and cab of this truck are heavy and awkward to move.  It will take a few muscles to get it in place.

See you at the theater! R

PS...the components for the billboard are done and base painted.  They will get a coat of "bronze" tomorrow and they will be good to go...