Tuesday 11 October 2011

Almost Done!

Well, not quite but it feels like we have made massive progress in just six weeks.  Almost mid October and thanks to the mild weather up until recently, the build has progressed well.  We will have a functional - though by no means finished - camper before long.  The carpeting and wiring are more or less complete, just need to buy some more LED lights, voltage regulators and a leisure battery among other things.





Mains
Consumer Unit is a domestic garage unit which will feed three single sockets and two doubles.  Wiring connected via a 16 amp RCD which is greater than most campsite supplies and therefore more than adequate for our needs.  Unfortunately I used domestic solid core cable before reading that solid cable can fatigue and break in a mobile environment, and that stranded cable must be used for vehicle wiring.  Well it is done now, and cable tied at regular intervals so I don't envisage fatigue being an issue however I am prepared to replace one or two cable runs over the years if necessary.

12v
Fuse box from eBay, every appliance from lighting units, 12v socket, voltmeter and water pump will be individually fused.  The leisure battery will be installed just forward of the driver's side wheel arch. Heavy duty 12v switch installed, along with a 140 amp self-switching relay to control the split charging system.  This setup allows the vehicle alternator to charge the leisure battery while the engine is running, but isolates the starter battery when parked up meaning our 12v appliances will not drain the vehicle's starter battery.  Cable run from starter to leisure battery is fused at each end .

Awning
 Jude's diligent EBay searching paid off and we now have a lovely 2011 Victor  Khyam awning, I liked it so much I bought the company.  It really is a great piece of kit and erects in seconds I can see why people rave over these awnings.


We have yet to fit an awning rail to the van and have a delivery of aluminium "J Rail" from Bluebird Customs in the post.   Though I'm not keen on the idea of drilling holes in our roof, and have read that top quality adhesive (the sort they bond windows in with) is sufficient, I think we'll probably go for overkill and use self-tappers AND adhesive.

Stereo
I removed the double-DIN VW Stereo and replaced it with a Sony unit, very similar to the one in our Golf but with Bluetooth functionality for streaming audio files from our phones.  I also replaced a piece of trim where the previous owner had glued something to the dash.  Before and after pics:































Units
We made a start on the units building a framework out of 33mm square battens.  The first unit will be for the fridge, but since we don't yet know what model we will be getting, the side of this panel is open for now.  The first three cupboards will have a single 40mm door each.  Those further back in the van will have two doors one at floor level and one above bed/seat level so that we still have access to the units when the bed is down. We toyed with the idea of building a small full-height cupboard at the driver's side rear quarter like most conversions of this type have, but we both like the open layout.  Also as we spent so much having those windows fitted that it makes no sense covering them up even a little bit.  I don't want our "view" from the seating position to be a cupboard door.


Worktop
We bought a 2.2m length of worktop from Ikea last weekend and after making several templates it is now fitted, glued and screwed down.  It is really cheap stuff but a campervan kitchen won't get as much use as a domestic one so there didn't seem much point in spending a lot on hard wearing worktop.  We did consider making use of a piece of beech worktop left over from having the kitchen done last year, but it weighs a TON.




Next stage of the project is to complete the unit dividers and shelves as well as ply-lining the bed and making a start on the upholstery.