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
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