Now, where did that scope creep off to?

In April 2024, I purchased my first pop-up camper. I’ve tent camped most of my adult life, and my 50+ year old back was yearning for something more… comfortable. I knew the general floor plan I was looking for: a dinette slide, a cassette toilet to eliminate those 3:00 am trips to the bathhouse, a furnace, and a kitchenette with sink and stove. I couldn’t afford new, so I was expecting to purchase a diamond in the rough and had already picked out paint colors!

After I brought home the 1999 StarCraft, I got to work getting it ready to be the cute little glamping hideaway of my dreams. First, I had to open the thing up.  Pop-up campers rely on a winch and cable system to raise and lower the roof. Each camper model has their own type of system, which may also vary from year to year. My pop-up roof raised just fine – lowering was a different story. Everything I read on the *many* pop-up groups and forums I joined indicated I needed a new winch, but the model used for my lift system was no longer manufactured. The company had gone out of business, and parts were impossible to find. Undaunted, I continued working on the perfect pop-up aesthetic.

Then, I realized the canvas for the pop-up was more damaged and worn than I expected. I ordered a replacement from a company in Wisconsin for far too much money and waited for it to arrive. In the meantime, I removed the old canvas and discovered bare and fraying wires for the 12V system that runs the main systems (fridge, furnace thermostat, water pump, lights, etc.). So, I ordered wire, connectors, a new multimeter, wire strippers, and fuses, and got to work.

Then, I realized that the floor really needed to be replaced. The subfloor was still in great shape with no rot or soft spots, but the linoleum was peeling and breaking apart. I ordered peel-and-stick tile and was embarrassed at my incorrect estimation of what I needed. (I still have about 20 boxes sitting in my garage. Maybe I’ll use them for my laundry room floor.)

Once I had the wiring sorted out (my father is an electrician, and it wasn’t difficult to remember what he taught me when I was a child), I realized that the electricity converter was too old to understand that my battery was a lithium-ion (or LiFePo4) battery instead of the traditional lead-acid. A replacement would be too expensive, so it went on to my holiday wish list.

I decided that some wood trim would look great with the sage green paint waiting patiently in my shed. I bought cedar tongue and groove, some quarter-round molding, and then realized I could really use an air-powered nailer to install all of this. So, off to the blue hardware store I went to buy a “pancake” compressor, some brad and finishing nailers, and all the accessories. I happily spent the last hot days of summer cutting and nailing, painting and finishing, and ripping out old linoleum.

But then I realized the glue on that old linoleum wasn’t coming off. So, two days were spent with a (brand new) orbital sander getting it off, then applying self-leveling floor compound to smooth everything out. Finally, I could install the flooring, and we were ready to install the brand-new canvas!

In between work and school, we got the canvas installed in September. Right about the time we finished, I saw an ad online for a smaller camper of the same year, make, and model. The owner was selling it cheaply, as he didn’t want to pay for storage over the winter. I chatted with him for a few days, and we discovered it had the same winch as my “Daisy”. Yes, for all this work, the thing deserved a name.

So away we went to buy a “sacrificial” camper. The door, bunk end plywood, dinette cushions, stove, and the all-important winch were destined to be moved from one to the other. Before we could do much else, winter set in. Where I live, one does not work on a pop-up camper outside in the winter, and my garage roof is too low to raise the roof fully.

Camper price? We’ll call it X. Price for the tools, parts, and additional camper? Another X, probably. I’m almost afraid to add it all up. Camping trips in 2024 = Zero.

Now, in October 2025, I am headed out for my final camping trip of the year. The winch was swapped out (with many a bloody knuckle and swear word along for the experience), the door was replaced, and the bunk end plywood will be replaced next spring. I’ve done all the work myself, with some help from my very patient husband for heavy / hard-to-turn things.

Daisy still needs some things – head shrink on the electrical connections, repairs to the propane furnace, a leaking drainpipe, and the outside looks as old as you’d imagine. I did not have a project manager for Daisy. If I had, perhaps they would have been able to say “no” when I wanted to do more, and more, and more (Greer, 2010). If that project manager had sat me down in an initial launch meeting as Dr. Stolovitch suggests (Walden, n.d.), perhaps they would have said, “We’re going to work on function, not beauty,” and the furnace would work. Maybe it would have been beauty over function, and I’d have chosen a different paint formula that wouldn’t have scratched so much in such a short time. Perhaps, in the moments of “How can I fix this?” I wouldn’t have headed to a hardware store to buy yet another tool. Daisy was expensive, and she’s not finished yet. But she’s my labor of love, and a functional warning against scope creep.

Resources

Greer, M. (2010). The project management minimalist: Just enough PM to rock your projects! (Laureate custom ed.). Walden University Canvas. https://waldenu.instructure.com 

 Walden University, LLC. (Executive Producer). (n.d.). Monitoring projects [Video file]. Retrieved from https://waldenu.instructure.com