We purchased our 2016 R-178 last spring and just love
it. The floor plan works perfect and
there’s plenty of room for us and friends or grand kids. A number of members of the forum have
commented that interior storage space in the 178 is at a premium. That is an absolute fact. Over the past year we’ve poured through this
forum and copied numerous mods from other’s experience in order to use the
space as efficiently as possible.
Well, on our last trip my wife commented on how little usable
space there actually is with the entertainment center. I think crappy was the word she used. You know, that skinny cabinet that takes up
space but only provides about 3 1/2” of usable depth. Well, looking at it I realized that on the
178 the entertainment center attaches to an outside wall of over 9” wide. Hey, that’s space that’s going to waste.
So, the final mod I made before buttoning up the pod for the
winter was a new, deeper, entertainment center.
So here it is with a larger top I made. What the heck, I got gutsy, took a chance and
removed the original cabinet to see how it was made. I knew that could always put it back. The removal was pretty straight forward
though you have to search carefully for all of the screws holding it in place. The hardest part during removal was twisting
the electrical panel out of the cabinet opening.
I sketched up some plans and used clear pine and pocket
screws for the face frames of the new cabinet.
Since I couldn’t find 1/8” plywood locally I opted for ¼” birch plywood
for the panels and shelving.
The actual construction was pretty straightforward. I just copied the original cabinet’s
dimensions and construction methods. The
only changes made were to accommodate the deeper shelves and adjusting some
dimensions to for the thicker plywood.
Here’s a couple of pictures of dry fitting the new cabinet
in place to make sure everything fits together properly and to check the size
and shape. I decided early during the
planning to make the new cabinet in two pieces.
The lower section holding the electrical panel is a direct copy of the
original. Because of the rats nest of
wires and cables inside there wasn’t any way to gain any additional usable
space by making it deeper. Also,
removing the panel for electrical work from a deeper cabinet was going to be
difficult at best so it just made sense to keep it the same.
The new shelving section is now about 8” deep and will screw
onto the base and into the walls.
The whole cabinet was screwed together with pocket
screws. This made it easy to disassemble
the individual pieces for sanding, staining and finishing. I had a stain custom mixed at Sherwim-Williams
to match the faux woodwork. Finishing
was with a clear polyurethane spray. This
step was pretty labor intensive took quite a bit of time to complete.
Once the finishing was complete I re-assembled it with the
screws and attached it to the walls in the pod exactly like the original
installation. I made the new top
slightly deeper than the cabinet with a raised edge trim to keep small items
from rolling off.
This was a relatively fun mod to do and I like the way it
turned out. Hope this gives some of the 178
owners an idea of how to gain some more space.
In hind sight this mod could have been done much differently. The lower section of the original cabinet could
be cut off and reused as a base for a new cabinet/shelf. Then a cabinet, maybe with doors and
adjustable shelves could be made to sit on it.
Or, just an open set of shelves. The
television can be moved up on the wall for even more usable space.