Just a few 12 foot lengths of framing wood. 2x4's as the tough guys all say. *

I used high-quality wood and deck screws to give the enclosure a very strong, and lasting overall structure. *

This old table saw is loud as hell but chopped some awesome clean lines and worked well until Jenny got me a Dewalt circular saw for my birthday. The circular saw is far more manageable. *

Again, having the table saw helped, but I think a good skill saw is enough, and probably preferable. *

Please always use eye protection on projects like this. I know it sound preachy, but seriously. Technically your eyes are part of your brain - protect it! *

I lined everything up and glued it before I actually screwed everything together. I later found that a vice and a little bit of leverage could easily have replaced the glue for this inital assembly step. *

Sorry about the angle on this. The idea for these wide platforms, is that it gives the weight sack something to sit on, and gives the structure for the box better stability. I wanted the ballast to be sort of on, and in, the box. These boards help achieve that. *

It is difficult to see, but I wanted to make sure that the longitudinal supports here did not sit directly on the exhaust tubes, but rather on the stringers to either side of them. I took the base of the enclosure out to the boat to make sure - and marked them appropriatly. *

Originally I was going to use 2x4's for the uprights, but my hope is that people will sit, stand, jump and lay on the sun deck, so for added strength I used stronger materials for the weight bearing parts of the structure. *

OMFG I love ping pong. Why o why am I not using that ping pong table in the background. It isn't right. That's pretty much all I have to say about this image. Viva La Ping Pong. *

This is the box, complete, before the sides, front and top were produced. I decided to make it completely straight, comprised of all 90 degree angles. I have seen others that have angles and more aesthetic accents. You could do it either way. *

If your boar has them, you'll need to remove the padded, upholstered corners from the rear of the boat. Once out, you have approximately 61 inches with which to work. *

I brought the box down to the boat and rolled the tank into it. I needed to double check everything to make sure I didn't need to do any addition sanding or reciprocal sawing. Everything checked out just fine. The tank will fit. 60 inches (actually about 62 once accounting for the 3/4" plywood sides and marine carpet coverings). *

This is hard to picture, but this is a view from the rear-facing passenger seat. Nice. *

Jenny and I went to a fabric store and bought a few yards of 4 inch foam, and off-white vinyl. The foam was the perfect width but I trimmed about 4 inches off the end of it with a sharp Cutco. *

Luckily there was very little cutting that had to be done on the foam. I measured the end carefully, allowed for some overhang, and trimmed just a bit. *

Different view of the moments before actual upholstering begain to take place. Unfortunately I ran out of staples and this part was postponed, and we instead continued on carpeting the sides and front of the box. *

It helped to secure the foam to the sun deck board with heavy duty tape. This is becuase we needed to flip it over and lay its foam face down on the vinyl to begin upholstering the whole thing. *

The part I thought would be the hardest was the easiest. The marine grade carpet cuts easily with a good pair of scissors and dosent need to be "perfect". Notice the dog in the background - offering bits of advice on timing and angles during this stage of the process. *

Marine carpet glue needs to be applied to a clean dry surface. So I just dusted the plywood off and began to spread the marine glue out, thickly, over the surface of the boards. *

I spread the glue over the surface of the top and sides, then lifted each board and set them face down to begin setting. Finally I set heavy objects on each of the three boards and let them set overnight. Only thing left to do on the front and sides is to staple the additional carpet around the back of the boards and screw them into place on the structure. *

I'm not sure exactly what was happening here. It looks like it might have been some sort of battle about to begin. *

You have no idea how helpful Calypso was through all of this. She is one heck of a helper although I can't really trust her with anything that is sharp or plugs in. She also cant spread marine floor glue either and she knows nothing about upholstery. Ok so the dog wasn't very helpful after all. *

Again, the carpeting for the sides was easy to create. I just cut large squares for each part and glued it. Still need to staple the corners but with a heavy duty staple gun, this is easy.
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The sides began to take shape first, as I stapled the marine carpet to the first of the wood panels. *

Clear shot of the back side of a completed panel. *

All three completed panels posing for a group shot. *

Clear back shot of all three panels, ready to be attached to the box. *

The cushion itself, complete. A little bit lumpy, but as my first upholstery project - it came out nice and clean. *

Side photo of the completed sun deck. Still I think the vinyl could have been wrapped a bit better, but thus picture shows how it came out. *

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