Celebrat......ions

Well, thanks to twisting my knee, and some fairly windy wet weather once in a while, I didnt get the Solar Panel and Electric Hook Up fitted as I had hoped. In fact Saturday, nothing was done as I had a photography job to do.

Not wanting the weekend to be a complete waste, and wanting to get 'something' done, I figured that the most useful thing to get done was finish the roof fan off so thatbit was useable.

I have been thinking for a few days now what I can use to make the cowling or spacer to fill in the gap between the van metal roof and the interior roof. It was about 6cm, without anything there, all the air the fan was producing was disappearing off in to the roof space and not being directed downwards.

Just as I was preparing to try and stand with my dodgy knee (yes it takes a lot of effort if I have been sat for a while :S) I was thinking dog bowls, with an idea to cut up a metal one if it was somewhere near the 230mm diameter, so asked Jen what size she thought they might be before I got up and measured :P, when she suggested the empty Celebrations plastic tub that has been on top of our dresser for..... erm a while :S.

Unbelievable, when I measured the wider lip of it that the lid clips to, it was around 240mm, perfect !, will sit just outside the hole in the roof. What was even better is that the main body of the tub was narrower and just right to fit the internal gap !

So, out came the Dremel, and my work for the day began :P.


The Celebrations Tin and Dremel !



After measuring 6cm all around the tub, I start cutting !



Then I am left with two parts, the ring part is what I am going to use !



The next job was to cut some plastic sheeting to cover the hole left by removing the light fitting to fit the fan, if you remember, this is how it was left.



These are the two pieces to fit the oblong hole around the roof fan trim.



Once they were cut, I tried my Celebrations spacer to check it fitted. It Did !



Actually it fitted perfectly straight away, so I went ahead and screwed it in :)



Then screwed my two new panels either side. Dont forget, all this except the fan trim will be covered in the lining carpet I have ready to fit.



Then I just swung the fan trim round and screwed in to place and yay it was done !! :).


I put the fan on, (its still wired in to the lights and light switch until I put its own wiring in), and a lovely stream of cold air came rushing downwards, and I knew my Celebrations tub had worked :). This will be directly over the bed/seating area, so will be great if its really hot (yeah right) when camping in her :).

If you lie back and look up at the fan, you can see the red tale tale signs that a tub of Celebrations was used to fit the fan :). Wonder how many people will look up and realise the significance ;). Red is also the colour of my two teams, Bristol City and Manchester United, so Im very happy with how it all worked out :).



Well, as I was on a roll, and I had the plastic sheeting out, I decided to privatise the back, as in line the rear and rear side windows ready for the kitchen to be built around them.

The plastic is really easy to cut, I use a jigsaw, and I quickly cut some rough rectangles to size, they wont be seen, and screwed them in around the windows.






This side took some nifty manoeuvering to get it behind the hoist which sat slightly inside the window frame, but the plastic is quite pliable, and bent around and behind eventually.

The I started on the back windows, these were a little more tricky as they had some shape to them. I used a piece of tarpaulin and drew the shape as it was pressed against the frames, tyen cut out tye shape and used it as a template for the plastic, once cut, I had a little bit of trimming to do to get them to fit nicely, and eventually they did :).



This now means that once the blinds are down on the other four windows, the back is completely private, except for the small bulkhead window that is quite high up.


In my mind, things are really starting to take shape now and look more like the finished article, but you cant see whats in my mind, if only lol, so you probably dont see that yet ;).

I am so glad I got these couple of bits done, hoping to get more done very soon !

The only other thing I did recently I dont think I have put on here is fitted my switch box by the seating. The main body of it will be covered in the carpet, so only the front panel will be black.





Well thats it for tonight, hopefully some more progress real soon, so dont forget to pop back, and as always, please do comment ! I love to hear from you, especially if you are doing this yourselves, leave a link to your blog or album :).



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Location:Gloucester

A Summer Solstice Fanfare Please !

Almost 2 years after adopting Nina, guess what !

Yes !

ALL the leaky windows have now been replaced ! :)

I'm so chuffed right now. There were times, a few times actually, that I really didnt think this day would come. These windows have been a major headache for Ninas conversion. They needed doing before I could get on with the interior, as rivers of water appeared each time it rained, especially from the back side windows. I think I have been through every emotion over them these past two years. They have cost an absolute fortune, I reckon around £900 for all 6 windows, fitted and tinted. Thats a huge amount to pay in a conversion. Do I think it was worth it ? Without a doubt. If I was only converting to sell on, then no I would probably have just resealed everything with lots of silicone until the water stopped coming in.

In hindsight, and hindsight is always a good thing, it was absolutely the right thing to replace them, as the rubber seals holding the glass in, were retaining water, and in turn, as we saw with the drivers side back window, the metal was well on the way to rusting out.

I still have the job of masking all the windows and tidying up the metal aperatures that they sit in with spray, but other than that they are FINALLY done :).

And this is how it happened !


The music in the slideshow is called 'Better Now' by the brilliant Kludo White from his Camper Van Radio CD, used by kind permission. I thought 'Better Now' was appropriate as Nina is definately Better Now her windows are done ! :P Please visit www.campervanradio.com and buy a copy for yourself, ideal for those Summer Road Trips (once Summer arrives :S), the profits go to Teenage Cancer Trust.

As you can see from the video, things went fairly smoothly, no nasty surprises ! :).

Even Dave from Five Valleys Windscreens has asked for pictures once Nina is finished :).

Last Sunday, Nina was a show vehicle, as we went to the Home Counties Boxer Welfare Fun Day in St Albans. Her new hoist was used for the first time to lift the Marquee in and out, and worked faultlessly ! Did I say that I got the remote working ?

Jon from Bedford Street Motors changed the oil and filter and topped up the fluids last Thursday, I also asked him to take a look at the infamous knocking 'twang' from the front. It turns out this is a common fault with Renault Masters. The suspension springs are inboard, and are literally held in by the vehicle weight. The Springs are seated top and bottom without any kind of cushion, and its the spring moving slightly in its seat that makes the twanging noise. No mods are available, you have to put up with it or DIY a cushion for the spring. So for now I will have to put up with the noise.

I fitted the flush handles I bought from the Frampton Car Boot Sale, to the bed box, they work really well.





So much easier to pull the bed box out now :).

On Tuesday my carpet lining arrived ! Its just the colour I wanted, a Sandy/Beige, I bought 10 meters, but may need a little more, Nina is a big girl and I also want to cover the seat boxes and maybe the underside of the overhead locker.


This is the carpet, it a actually looks more of a richer colour in the photo, its a little lighter in reality. It comes in either smooth or ribbed, I went for the smooth as it will be easier to match in if I need to patch anywhere without having to line anything up. Just need to buy a heap of carpet adhesive spray now !

I also bought a fridge, a Campingaz 36L Deluxe. I saw the Classic version recently in our local camping shop, Attwoolls, for £94.99....


And very nearly bought it, its the right size, works exactly how I want it to, runs from 12v or Mains, and actually keeps food warm as well as chilled ! After seeing it I had a look on ebay and found the Deluxe version, which basically comes with two extra shelves and a door pocket. It also had the optional mains adaptor worth £17.99, was unused and boxed, and won it for my initial bid of £50 plus £10 postage. Still waiting for it to arrive. It was a bit of a bargain :).

Finally, after fitting the roof fan, I needed to fit a switch fir it. I decided that the switch needed to be just inside the side door on the bulkhead, so it can be used as a fan when sitting on the seating or bed. If you remember a while back, I made a switch control box that had light switches and a couple of 12v sockets. Well to incorporate the fan switch I had to pop to Maplin and pick up a larger box, which I spent the last hour or so last night drilling and cutting holes in to for all the switches, it has space now if I need to add another switch or two as well, and is looking quite impressive :).


That's the old box on the left, the new on the right with the fan three way switch in the middle. That switch can be pushed up or down to draw air in or expel it. It has space either side for a new switch if needed :). My stepper hole drill bits and Dremel Tool came in very useful producing some very neat holes for it all.

That's it for now, I think the solar panel might be going on this weekend, and maybe the Electric Hook Up inlet, so check back soon for more fitting pics :).

Location:Gloucester

It's Official......again.

Wow, this is unheard of, a third update in three days !

Not a massive update though, just a couple of things.

First off, as rain is forecast for tonight, I needed to seal the powered roof vent I started yesterday. This meant getting the ladder out again and climbing back up on to the roof. Doing that a lot more confidently now ;).

I started by taking everything back off, that I had fitted yesterday ! Sounds backward I know, but if I had been able to find some anti rust primer yesterday, I would have done all this then. As it was I finally found the kit that I got when I ordered the back two windows, it came with a bonding kit which included a Dinitrol black primer, I dont think there is anything better to treat bare metal, it gives good coverage, completely saturating the metal, and dries very quickly, enough to bond to if needed.





I dabbed it over the drilled screw holes too, none of those holes will be rusting in a hurry !

The next job once that had dried, which only took a few minutes, was to coat the plastic fan cowling with a layer of silicone, which I then placed the rubber O ring on to. This makes sure that the O ring had a good seal to the plastic, then I ran a bead of silicone directly on to the roof around the hole I had made. Now I have always been REALLY bad at using silicone sealer, I can never put the right amount on and it usually ends up with far too much and a real mess. Today wasnt going to be any different. I had forgotten to take some rag up with me to wipe the excess off with, so was using my fingers and wiping it on the foam floor tile that I was using under the ladder to stop it marking the roof.

It looks a bit of a mess, but it IS way up there on the roof, and wont really be noticed :P. Also, if you think about it, the more silicone thats up there, the more the rain water has to get through :). Hopefully, thats true and it wont leak, we shall see when it rains ;).


Looks well sealed to me, you should see the amount of silicone underneath that cowling ! So anyway, this is the cowling fitted back on, I also spread some silicone on the inside edge where the metal meets the plastic, and here I am just about to pop the fan unit on and fix back down. The power cable is fed through a hole in the cowling that ensures it passes by the fan blades without being in the way.





As you can see, I did give the metal roof panel a clean before I started too, the fan doesnt look too different in colour now :P. The whole roof needs a good clean, something I will do before I fit the solar panel in the next week or two. I think I will add some more sealer around the skylight too as the sealer on it is looking decidedly old and does leak slightly still.

This is a more solid looking photo from underneath, inside. You can see I gave the underneath a slight covering of primer too.


I will wait and make sure its all watertight, then I will make a tube from a strip of plastic to fill the gap and channel the air straight down. Then I need to make a rectangle out of the plastic sheeting to cover the hole left by the light I removed to put the fan in. Sorry if that doesnt sound clear, I know what I need to do in my head, you'll just have to wait for the pictures ;). It will look good in the end, I promise !

I left that job there for now, and went on to my bulkhead window problem. Behind the driving seat is a window in the metal bulkhead. Quite often when I am picking up dogs to take to our field, I have to pull in to driveways, meaning I then have to reverse off. This is not a problem, Nina has plenty of windows for me to see what is coming, the only problem is that the bulkhead window is so shiny, that all I can see through it is what happens to be in front of me ! The reflection of everything through the windscreen shows up in glorious technicolor behind me :P. My idea to get around this was to find some clear MATT film to stick over the window and reduce the glare.


Thats my neighbours garage across te road you can see in the window lol.

My friend Jamie works for Signs Express, and they use a clear laminate when making signs that is also MATT, so you can see their graphic signs underneath it without reflections. He managed to get some for me, so I thought I would have a go at applying it. I sprayed the window with a soapy solution to get rid of any dust etc, then started applying it. It was at this point my eyes went all funny and out of focus. Or did they......

Lol, no they were fine, Jamie had accidentally given me some frosting film, which is REALLY cool and gives an amazing effect, just not the one I wanted here :P.


There are definately no reflections ! :P. But also, not very clear to see through :). I texted Jamie and he is going to find some of the clear stuff for me :). Thanks Jamie !

Which brings me on to the next thing Jamie did. On Friday, I contacted Jamie very late on, asking him if he could make me some signs up, it was about half an hour before they shut for the weekend, so didnt think I would get them until this week, but as Jamie is a master sign maker within 20 minutes he had all that I had asked him for made up and ready to use ! He even took them home with him for me to pick up Saturday. Thanks Jamie. You are a star :).

What were the signs ?

Nina has always been registered as an Ambulance on her logbook, as are our other vehicles through our Animal Ambulance business. As Nina has always been earmarked as a rescue vehicle, and the past few weeks has stepped up as an Animal Ambulance after we sold one of our Ambulances, we decided that we should reinstate her as an Ambulance, or an Animal Ambulance.

To qualify as an Ambulance, the vehicle has to be fit for purpose, and display the word Ambulance on at least 3 sides.

Once converted to a camper, Nina will be used as an overnight rescue vehicle, meeting rescue dogs that come over to England from Ireland etc. When these dogs are taken in to care by the rescue, the hand overs usually take place in the early hours of the morning when the ferry transport is cheaper, the temperatures are cooler for the dogs and the roads quieter. Then may be used for longer trips transporting dogs to rescues/new homes etc as well as being used as an Ambulance in our own business.

Ambulances also qualify for free road tax, which really helps the budget out no end.

Before you stick some signs on your vehicle though, you need to take your vehicle to a DVLA office where they will inspect it, then send off the details where it will be decided whether your vehicle qualifies as fit for purpose and is signwritten within the guidelines and you have a good reason for wanting an Ambulance.

So these are Nina's new signs all fitted and proudly displaying her new status as an Ambulance again :).











Thats it for tonight, I always say its going to be a quick update and you end up with an essay :P.

Not sure what I'll be doing next, so much still to do, guess I'll just pick something and get on with it ;).

See ya soon !



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Location:Gloucester

Up On The Roof......

Great song :). Now its in my head forever :S.

Well, as promised, I did some more work on Nina today, although it didnt start until late afternoon, as I had a much needed lazy morning, then when I did want to make a start, I realised I needed a metal cutting jigsaw blade, all the ones I had, that I could find, were wood cutting.

So a little detour to enquire about a car at Nissan that Jen had seen on the internet to replace our Animal Ambulance, then popped in to Screwfix minutes before they closed to grab a pack of Bosch Jigsaw blades that also fit my Dewalt Jigsaw.

We got back home just after 4, and I quickly set to work.

This is how it started !


I must be mad, but this is a 230mm hole marked out which will have a 12v fan fitted over it eventually.

I made use of my brilliant platform multi ladder to gain access to the roof which is pretty high to someone that isnt keen on heights ! I configured it into an L shape and hooked it over the edge of the roof. I popped a foam floor tile underneath it to stop the ladder scratching the "very dirty" roof, grabbed all my tools and up I went.

I was very happy to find out that Ninas roof happily took even MY weight !!! Ok I did spread out very carefully :P.

I pondered for a while, as thoughts like "do I really need a fan in the roof" and "hmmm, do I know anyone that would do this for me", but in a flash made my mind up and drilled the entry hole for the jigsaw blade.

No going back now. I reasoned with myself that if it all went wrong I could scrap the fan idea and cut an even bigger hole for a large skylight :S.

It was ok, that section of the roof was quite bouncy as it wasnt ridged like the rest of the roof, but I went along bit by bit, let the blade cut once or twice then stopped to realign the direction of the marking I made. My Dewalt 18v jigsaw has a variable speed, so I can go as quickly or as slow as I like, nobody to blame but myself :). I was quite pleased with how neat the hole turned out ;).


Whoops ! Done now, definately no going back ! I had a little bit of trouble with that wooden roof brace, it was stuck to the plastic roof lining inside with some fibreglass cement, which was really hard and proved tough going for the wood jigsaw blade that I had swapped over to. At this point I asked Jen to come and help and push up with a broom handle from underneath to reduce the vibration of the plastic and wood as i cut from the top.

We got there eventually. Oh by the way, a tip when cutting from above like this, get yourself a strong black bag, and some Duct tape and tape it open to the roof from inside directly under where you will be cutting. That way all the metal filings and the cutouts drop neatly in to the bag and not all over the inside of your van. I also vacuumed up as many of the filings I could see on the roof, as when they rust, and they will, they leave nasty rust spot marks all over your roof.


At this point, I got a call from my friend Andy who had been on a motorbike ride all round Devon all day and had just got back. He must have been shattered, but he said to come on up and he would have a go at building the mount for the hoist. Thanks Andy, owe you one, and will arrange that Takeaway soon !

So I packed everything in to the back of Nina, still with a gaping hole in the roof, and drove up to Andys.

I am kicking myself now that I didnt get a photo of him working on it for the blog, sadly I didnt so you will just have to see what he built, bolted in to place. He did a fantastic job and made sure all the weld joints would NEVER fail me, especially when lifting my heavy marquee.


It is bolted to the side of the back using the existing bolt holes that previously secured the fold away seat belted seat, so they had to be strong mounting points. The foot of the post is just resting on that platform, but I will bolt it to that too for extra security. THANKFULLY, due to both mine and Andys dilligent measuring ("that look alright ?" "Yeah think so, maybe just move it over a bit" "That'll do!") everything lined up perfectly :). Whilst we were in Andys workshop, he constantly asked, "are you sure thats how you want it ?" To which I enthusiastically reassured him and prayed for it to be ok :P.

I popped the hoist arm on to the two lugs that Andy had welded on to the mount post, this is a great system as I can lift the hoist arm off when not needed and nothing sticks out, as Andys mount is very flush to the side.


This is the arm fitted and hooked up to a leisure battery. There is a little box with toggle switches that lift or drop the arm. As I said before, there is also a remote which would be useful, but its not working, need to look in to that and see if I can get it fixed. It lights up but I think its lost its channel or something and isnt talking to the box properly. The arm originally came with a second motor which moved the arm from side to side too, but in this design its not needed as I can manually push the arm in once it has its load. Where we have chopped the arms about a bit, I dont think it will work very well anyway this way round. So I have a really decent hydraulic arm to use on something else, all I can think of at the moment is what they would have used it for on MTV's Pimp My Ride, to lift a huge TV that is hidden in the seating :P.

So the big test, would it all actually hold the marquee up in the air without bending or breaking and dropping it. Hmmm, I was a little pessimistic here, as I have lifted that marquee, and it is so heavy I can only move it about a foot at a time, I cant quite believe that a motor that small and metal tubing that narrow could actually take the weight properly.

Well, naughty me for being pessimistic, I connected the lift arm to the ratchet strap that was holding the legs in on the marquee, switched the box on and through almost closed eyes watched it take up the slack then start moving the marquee. It did slow slightly under load, but that is totally normal for any motor, even your car engines, and to my astonishment, it lifted, and lifted, and lifted all the way to the top of its lifted height until the marquee was just swinging in the wind ! I couldnt believe it and was so chuffed ! :). IT WORKS !


As I suspected, attaching it to the orange strap, the strap moved up the marquee a little and didnt quite clear the floor at the back as you can see in the above picture, the good news is that the lifting arm above it has a huge gap which was slightly more than the lack of clearance of the marquee feet. I need to find a way to connect the lifting arm on a solid connection to the marquee. I think this will mean drilling a hole through the two middle legs at the top, putting a bolt through either side, and hooking the lifting arm chains over them so that there is no movement up or down, it will just start lifting.

The main thing is it works, there is some flex in the mount post, but hardly anything, I'm not overly worried about it, but I may get Andy just to strengthen it at some stage by welding a couple of triangle metal pieces to the thinner post at the top so it cant flex at all.

Thank you Andy, you are a star :). Hope your tea warmed up ok and you got to chill a bit.

Apologies, here is a video of me playing with it, I was just SO CHUFFED :).



Sooooo, after all that excitement and playing, I still had the rather big issue of a hole in the roof to cover over somehow before I stopped for the night. The best way was to get back up on the roof and drill the holes for the fan body and actually screw the fan down for now, until I got some rust treatment and could seal it properly tomorrow hopefully.


This is the housing that the actual fan part fixes to, which needs to be fitted first, this is the bit that I need to make sure seals against the rain etc, there is a big rubber O seal underneath, but I will need to put some extra sealer under it too especially on the ribs, after giving the roof a bloody good clean of course. For now it is just screwed down with the O ring and should stop a light shower, but I need to do it properly tomorrow as we are expecting lots of rain from Tuesday onwards according to weather reports.

Once that was fixed down, I fixed the fan housing down on top, and this is the finished result !





Its very low profile which I love, wont make a big difference to fuel economy, and will blend in more once I clean that roof, I promise ! :P. Should be easy to seal, famous last words ;).

This is what it looks like from the inside at the moment.


As I said before, it ended up directly over where the light fitting was, so I need to repair that rectangle hole, leaving just a round hole there, I also need to build a wooden frame to go in the roof cavity to direct the air flow straight down. At the moment it flows throughout the roof cavity as well as down wasting the air. There is a cover/grill that will fix up to the roof and make it look prettier which I did partially fit, you can just make it out in the picture below, the big black circle to the top left of the photo.


By the time I took this picture, and had tidied my tools away, and put the cages back in ready for work tomorrow, it was almost 11pm. As you can see, the two lights from Ninas previous existence that are still in there give lots of light still. The wiring that was left from removing the front light fitting, I connected to the fan, so when I turn the lights on, the fan comes on as well :P. It will get its own power source and switch on the dash, but for now it was a way to see it working and what the flow of air was doing. Have left it like that tonight, as there is a light switch on the dash in the front, so can switch it on if needed when driving, even though it means the lights have to come on too ! :).

The hoist came in useful for lifting the metal dog cage in to the back, this is the cage I hurt my back with last week when I took it out to do the windows.


You can see the shadow, just about, underneath the cage showing that the hoist has it suspended in the air here :). I know, boys and their toys, I think I may have said before, I was just SO CHUFFED that it worked ;).

Thats its for now, I ache a bit and bed is calling, its quarter past one in the morning, although Magic on DAB radio is playing some really good love songs at the moment, so tempted to sit here a while longer and listen to them, just right for this time of night :).

Goodnight all ! :).

Location:Gloucester

Anyone for a lift ?

The past couple of weeks have been a real strain, and very upsetting. We lost two of our dogs within a week or each other, hopefully they are together again at the Rainbow Bridge (Google it, its a lovely poem, but have your tissues ready !), and I had toothache for two weeks, despite two trips to my normal dentist, he wouldnt take the tooth out, so ended up seeing a new dentist who was happy to once I had a few days worth of Antibiotics as an abscess had started forming.

So all in all I really havent felt like working on Nina.

But, work must be done, so this weekend see's me starting again.

Before I start with a small update, any of you with larger campers out there ? Dont you just love it when parking spaces are like this outside your bank ? :)


Wish supermarkets were like this too. Often I have had to drive round the carpark a few times until two spaces come up one behind the other so I can get the whole length on !

My Fiamma Turbo Kit fan arrived, its really very good, it runs on 8x D batteries, or 12v. It comes with a 12v socket for your car, also another cable that has a removeable tip, this can be taken off and reversed to make the fan push air out rather than pull air in. It comes with a set of brackets that you fix inside your skylight, then the sprung hanger that is attached to the fan, attaches to these. You can also use the hangers to hang the fan vertically on a dog crate, it will grip top and bottom, ideal for fitting to a crate in a vehicle etc. Jen is using it at the moment on the grid window of the bulkhead in her Animal Ambulance, blowing air from the drivers cab in to the rear of the van. Its very versatile and actually more useful as a 'floating' fan that can be used as an when needed wherever it is needed. It also stands on a table as a normal desk fan, as pictured here in our caravan.


I am very pleased with it and we will get lots of use out of it with the animals.

Which brings me nicely into the next bit of news. As the Fiamma Turbo Kit fan is so useful to use between vehicles, I have decided to fit a permanent roof fan to Nina. I bought the fan online, it cost £146, and comes with a 3 way switch, which allows you to reverse the fan straight from the switch and expel air as well as drawing air in.

Now the roof of Nina is VERY ridged, and the ridges are deep, making fitting something flat to the roof very difficult. The good news, at the front of the roof, there is a pattern that I think must have been intended for a sunroof, the pattern is quite shallow and the best place to fit the fan, which needs a 230mm hole.


This pattern happens to be directly above the front overhead light inside, so have had to remove the whole light, so I used the fixtures to mend the back light which will now be able to light up the rear 'garage' space.


The light casing and workings removed, just the wiring remains, which will be reused for something else.

Tomorrow I am hoping to get up there and cut the hole and fit the fan.

We recently bought a caravan to use as a tea room at the field we rent for the dogs. It has seating very similar to my seating in Nina, so I thought I would borrow the cushions and see how the seating will look and work once I have ordered the cushions.


As a seating area, it looks very cosy and homely, and is comfortable to sit on.


Also looks great with the bed pulled out, and is equally as comfortable :) as Bruno here will testify to !


I'm really happy the seating works well as a convertible bed, all those hours of designing and working out the measurements and then the building were totally worth it. Must remember to finish them off soon !

You may remember me saying that I want to use Nina as a show vehicle, and that I needed to build a space into the back compartment for my industrial pop up marquee, which is very heavy, weighing in at around 80kg. I had been wondering how to go about fitting some help in the back for when I needed to lift it in and out when needed.

Well I hadn't really been actively looking for anything, far too many other things to do first, but while browsing Facebook Selling Pages last week, I found someone selling a mobility hoist, the kind that lifts mobility scooters and wheelchairs etc into the back of estate cars. Its maximum lift was 100kg, so ideal for my 80kg marquee. It asked for offers, so I sent a message asking what kind of offers the lady, Clair, wanted, and offered up £20 for it. I was quite surprised when Clair said she would accept my offer, as they go for a bit more on ebay, and I arranged to pick it up a couple days later. This was Clairs pic that attracted me to her ad.


Its a 4 way hoist, so as well as lifting up and down, it will swing in and out too, comes with a control box and a remote. These things are very powerful and very low profile for a hoist.

Anyway, I picked up at the agreed time and Clair was the nicest lady ! The hoist had been in the garage a while after being used in Clairs Dads car before he sadly passed away. So sorry Clair. Promise it will be put to good use !

Today, I got all the bits and pieces together, and realising I might need some welding done to change the configuration around a bit, I popped by and disturbed my friend Andys family barbecue to get his advice on how best to go about it. He told me what I needed to do, so I left him to his burgers and came on home. The hoist comes with two parts, the hoist itself, and a triangular arm that fixes to the car normally. Well the triangular arm was made for the right hand side of a boot, and I needed it to be fixed to the left side of Nina as that is where the bolt mountings are that were originally securing the fold up seats, and I needed to make use of those to secure the arms to for the hoist. Andy kept the one part as he needed to chop it up ready to be welded to a length of square steel tubing I had here that was to be the main support for the hoist arm.

I had to remove the fibreglass covering between the back and the wheel arch, which revealed a strengthener that the support could sit on.


That rust cloured plastic you can see has one of the bolt fixings in the middle which will secure the new strut. That little platform will be the base for the strut as you can see here in the next pic.


You can just make out in this picture a hole to the right of the upright, which is the second bolt hole that held the fold up seat, Andy will weld an arm coming out across that hole, and a bolt will be fixed through it. This is to prevent the strut moving when lifting. Part of the arm Andy has also has the lugs on it that the hoist arm sits on and allows it to swing out, that will be welded at the top of the strut you see in the picture, making it high enough to hopefully clear the floor with the marquee which stands at around 5ft tall.

As I left it tonight, this is the marquee up in Nina with the hoist lifting bar attached and the hoist arm attached to that and hanging down to the side. Once the new bits are welded in and the stabilising arm is bolted in, the hoist arm can be fitted to the lugs and should then be operational. Just hope we get the clearance right and it lifts enough to clear the floor on its way in. I am also looking forward to seeing if the hoist actually can lift it as advertised, as the marquee is bloomin heavy and I can only just about lift it an inch or so off the ground in a bear hug, and even then only momentarily.


I am thinking I may need to drill through the marquee legs near the top, and fix a bolt through either side that the chain can fix to, as I am doubtful that the heavy duty ratchet strap wont slide up as the chains pull on it to lift.

I think that is it for tonights update, more tomorrow hopefully. Oh, one more thing, I did buy some more 34x34 timber to start building the kitchen frame, and a box of 500 decking screws to fix it all together, so that will start happening soon too, although I wont be able to fix it in permanently until the flooring and walls have been covered.

I will leave you with a photo of Nina from the field today, she loves it down there ;)





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Location:Gloucester