Last time, for Scooby, I bought material that had lots of the colours in them to match the interior of my camper, which was blue, yellow, and kind of denim, with light coloured wood.
This time, I still have no idea what colour the inside is going to be, I did want the nice bright Yellow that I had last time, but all over, no blue on the bottom half, but the Yellow is no longer being sold in the amounts I need to do the whole inside out. There is someone selling 10 meters by 2 meters of Sand coloured ribbed carpet, which in all the places Ive looked, seems the most likely colour i'll be getting.
I didnt want curtains this time, I wanted nice neat looking blinds, motorhome blinds, I didnt want to go down the normal venetian blind or roller blind route, as they are too much like a normal house, and Nina aint normal :P. Motorhome blinds are pleated, and come in a frame which also acts as a catch to stop it from retracting etc. One small problem with this, is that they cost from £80 PER WINDOW, and thats if you can find them big enough for Ninas windows, which is unlikely, Caravan windows just arent that big, or plentiful. Sooooo I started Googling for pleated blinds, during my searches, I found out that you could get CORDLESS pleated blinds. I looked into this some more, and basically, like motorhome blinds, you just pull them down or push them up, they are on some kind of pulley system, so that there is no need for cords or bars at the sides. Making it all very simple and easy to use, and less to lose or break. So I started searching for Cordless Pleated Blinds. In my searches, I found some on the B&Q website, that looked like they would do the job. They came in about 3 colours, all pastel shades. All the blinds are smaller in width than Ninas windows, but I have a work around for that, all are more than long enough, which is fantastic. Now these blinds are normally expensive, but not as expensive as real Motorhome / Caravan ones, so I started putting them into my basket. I soon found that these blinds were discontinued, and that actually finding some in stock was going to be a challenge. My preferred colour was a white, I figured this would go with whatever I put in there after, the three colours were White, Linen (browny colour) and Aqua (greeny blue). They didnt do the white small enough for Ninas middle windows though, and they cant be cut down to size because of the pulley system in the head gear. The only colour that I could get enough blinds in the right sizes to cover 7 windows, the three side windows on each side, and the long window in the bulkhead behind the front seats, was Aqua, which was my least favourite, but beggars cant be choosers and I decided that maybe they could be sprayed with vinyl craft spray to whatever colour I wanted. Gloucester B&Q had the 4 longer side window blinds and the long bulkhead blind, but didnt have the smaller middle side window blinds, dont forget these are discontinued and they are running the stock down. I searched stores out of the area, and found that Birmingham had the 2 smaller ones in Aqua, so my friend Rich who lives up that way, was kind enough to go and pick them up for me and deliver the next time he was passing.
All in all, ALL SEVEN BLINDS, cost me £50 :) The five longer ones were £8 each in the end of line sale prices, and the two smaller ones were £5 each ! BARGAIN ! I cant believe I got them so cheap ! They work great too, in the up position, they are fairly solid and dont look like they'll fall down as Nina is driving along, and they feel positive when you pull them down too, and stay wherever you put them.
The sizes I got, if you are reading this and converting a long wheel base Renault Master Ambulance or Minibus, 4x 90cm wide, 1x 120cm wide, and 2x 60cm wide.
As I said, they are too small in width for the windows, leaving up to 3cm or so either side of the blind in the middle windows where the 60cm ones will go. I did say I had a work around. Well, what I intend to do, is fix a large board across the windows, so that they are completely covered, cover the board in the same wall lining carpet that Nina will eventually be done out in, and cut aperatures in the board where the windows are, but slightly smaller in width than the blinds, so that when the blinds are fixed into the normal window aperature of Ninas, then the board over the top of that, you wont be able to see where the edges of the blinds are as they will be sandwiched between the window and the board. From the outside, the windows which are dark tinted, will be normal huge size, from the inside once done, the windows will be a bit smaller. But from either inside or out, you wont really notice.
Sorry if that sounds complicated, but in my head I know what Im going to do, Im just not very good at explaining :P.
When you see the finished result, you will know why I did it !
So, thats the blinds bought and ready to be fitted. Lots of stuff to do first, but at that price, I couldnt turn it down, even the curtains I had in Scooby came to lots more than that, 3x more I think by the time we'd bought the material and got Robs mum to make them. And they look nice and neat when up or down.
Here I am just holding one of the middle 60cm ones in place to see how it looks :)
That will do nicely thank you ;)
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