Overhead Vent Board, Re-cover and Re-fit.

So after the new cupboard, the next job to be done, because it has been really annoying me, is the space in the roof over the cab. This has a blower in it and was part of the air conditioning system which is no longer active, but does create a useful blast of air in to the back in warmer weather. It runs from Nina's own vehicle battery, and is controlled via some dials fitted in the roof above the drivers seat.

I took it off a long time ago now, and it has been used to store junk since.

I think I was putting it off because I had attempted once before to remove the old black carpet that was on it, but it proved to be VERY stuck on with glue and staples.



It had to be done though, so I spent a good hour removing the vents, which were glued in with black silicon and very hard to cut away, even before I thought about removing the carpet.

Next the carpet came off piece by piece and then I removed all the old staples. Obviously staples weren't subject to a budget when used and I removed over 50 of them in a small piece of board. They had done their job though and the carpet had stayed put for many years.

Once all removed, I gave the board a good brush to get rid of all the loose dust, carpet fibre and old glue.

Placed it on the table on top of a piece of new carpet and proceeded to cut the carpet out and start gluing.















I had just finished cutting all the slits for the curves and bends around the edges, when I realised I had placed the board down the wrong way, back to front, and the new carpet I had just cut to its specific size was now useless !!

The fresh glue turned out to be very good, Screwfix No Nonsense Contact Adhesive, it took some vigorous pulling and tugging to remove the new carpet from where I had just stuck it.

Hey, at least I hadn't gotten as far as offering it up to its hole to fix in to place !

Old new carpet dumped and new piece of carpet cut to size, the right way this time, and I glued the edges down. The new carpet is quite thick, and if you don't allow the glue some setting time before you apply the carpet, the stiffness of the carpet meant it was just popping back up each time so re glued it and waited a good few minutes for the glue to become really tacky. Once it had, the carpet folded over and stuck pretty firmly.




















Once it was all glued in to place it was time to turn it over and put the vents back in. Because the carpet was glued through the vent holes beforehand, I didn't need any silicon to fix the plastic vents in to place, just popped them through their holes lined with carpet and they stuck firm. Think they call that an interference fit ;).


It looked great when done, the black contrasting with the new sand coloured carpet lining.



Offered it up to its hole in Nina and screwed it on with brand new screws, made such a difference and really tied that end of the conversion up.







Another job out the way ! :).

It was time to start thinking about the floor, another job I was dreading because all along I had intended on removing the metal runners in the floor used to secure stretchers/gurneys and wheelchairs, then I had decided to remove the whole of the old floor and start again with insulation so that I didn't lose any height.

On looking at all the bolts that held the runners going through the floor, ensuring a good solid fixing the trolley wheels, I decided against removing any of the old floor and just fixing a new floor over the top, which yes meant I would lose about an inch in height, but after building a section of the floor up by and inch and standing on it, my hair still didnt touch the ceiling so I made an executive decision to keep it, adding to layers for insulation, and just building the new floor over the top.

More on that next time ;).

Location:Gloucester

Double Trouble - Second cupboard goes in !

It’s been a long while since I posted an update, that doesn’t mean that nothing has been happening though, on the contrary, quite a lot has happened, and I have a couple of videos already uploaded but ’hidden’ until I have caught up.

In this update, I will talk about the next job on the long list, which is the single overhead cupboard on the passenger side.

You will remember that the bank of three overhead cupboards above the seating area was the unit from ’Emma’, leaving Nina’s original cupboard for me to break down to fit the other side above what will be the fold away seat.

I did it this way round, because Nina’s cupboard was constructed in a more modular way than Emma’s, and easier to reduce to a single.

The first thing to do was break it all down into its kit form, ready to cut and re-assemble.






























You will see in the timelapse that I was having a little trouble with my jigsaw, the aluminium cutting blade just snagged and jumped out of my jigsaw everytime I tried to cut with it, after a while I went back to a normal metal cutting (fine toothed) blade and it went through like a hot knife through butter. The GoPro did stop recording timelapse halfway through so you will have to go to the photos to see it finished, but the video will give you an idea of how it was all deconstructed then reconstructed to build a single unit.






Everything was going well, until I tried to put the carpet covered wooden base in to the framework, the carpet was a lot thicker than the original stuff, and I had also left some foam covering the underneath of the wood to make the carpet padded, this would be good as it’s directly over the fold away seat and you may just stand straight up from the seat and bump your head on the underside of the cupboard, so it was all a much tighter fit, I tried tapping the frame together over the carpet to force it in to the runners, this was a mistake, and resulted in me snapping one of the die cast corner pieces meaning that the one corner just fell apart. Of course all this happened just as the cupboard was about finished, and as I was trying to fit it to the wall in Nina, it just fell apart completely. At this point I was really fed up, it had taken me around three hours to get to this point, and I didn’t have any other corner pieces.










































I removed it from Nina and took it back to the table, went in to the house and sat in the warm for a bit to ’ponder’ :S.

Once I had calmed down a bit amd started thinking rationally again, I went back out and started hunting the sheds for something to repair the corner with that would be strong and still enable me to somehow fix the chrome cover back over the corner to conceal the ’workings’.

I found a tent peg, not the wire kind, but the flattened steel bent into a right angle down the main shaft for strength and rolled over at the top where you hit it with a mallet. It was the exact size of the channel that the original corner piece slid in to. Out came the jigsaw and I cut it to size and made it into a right angle that held the bottom two pieces of the frame together, and riveted them in to place. This held pretty well and once I had attached the downward strut, the corner felt strong. Put it all back together and the unit felt good and didn’t look like it was going to fall apart again. Phew !

That’s a good point when doing a self build. If it’s going wrong, take a break, or even finish for the day and go back with a fresh mind, it’s amazing how much good that does for creativity.

I refitted it in to Nina, and it looks great and does the job it was intended for. Although I’m not used to having a cupboard on that side and have on a couple of occasions cracked my head in to it ! Might need to put a big flashing light on it ;).

Location:Gloucester

Aerial Reconnect and New Solar Regulator

Just a video today, and it's a long one ! ;).

Location:Gloucester

Nina's First Camping Trip - Part 1

Well, finally, after over three years, I slept in Nina !

I could rephrase that, but I'm not gonna. ;)

Yes, finally after such a long time I spent a weekend away in Nina, even though she isn't finished yet, and you know what ? It was great.

A couple of weeks before the camp, I was asked if. I wanted to have my nephew for the weekend before he went back to school, in fact he was just about to start 'Big School'.

As we rescue dogs, and the ones we end up with at home have 'issues', having him stay at our house, which is actually a bungalow, just wasn't an option, it would stress the dogs out in their own home, and put my nephew in a situation where things may have gone wrong, he isn't used to our kind of dogs, he doesn't have a dog at home, so it was quickly ruled out.

Something I had mentioned to him before was camping at our field in Frampton On Severn, it is fairly secluded, off the beaten track so to speak, but next to the canal and a stones throw from the River Severn. A chance to get a bit closer to wildlife (lots of spiders in this case), and for us, us being myself, my nephew, and my brother, his Dad, to spend a bit of time together, generally annoying each other.

So it was arranged, and the couple of weeks leading up to the weekend, I spent sorting out the caravan we have at the field, we use it as a tea room when exercising dogs down there, and getting Nina ready for me to sleep in. The idea being my nephew and his Dad would stay in the caravan and I would have the luxury of a quiet space on my own. This worked out well.

Part of 'readying' meant that I had to prepare two chemical toilets for the first time. Never having used one before, this was going to be a chance to learn, quickly. The caravan had come with a Fiamma one, thankfully it was cleaned out before we got it, all the same I spent half hour or so hosing it through and bleaching every point of contact on it.

Mine, the one Jen bought Nina one year, was brand new and needed no such clean up, just adding water with a nice scented chemical to the flush reservoir, and a litre of water along with a much stronger not so sweet smelling chemical to the bottom reservoir.

When we had Ninas toilet, we bought some special toilet paper that dissolves quickly, no idea where it went, so I bought some of Tescos Value stuff, and in all honesty, it was probably the same as the expensive 'special' paper.

With that done, I turned to my Aldi 12v cool box, and bleach cleaned that out too. Last time we used it for camping was down at Brean, maybe 10 years ago, so its quite old now really, but still works perfectly, keeping everything icy cold all weekend with the help of a big ice block at the bottom.

For a bed in Nina, I would have liked to use her own seating and new seat cushions, but they are stacked at one end of the kitchen at home, and there is lots of 'stuff' piled on top, along with the fact I AM still in the middle of converting, it was too juch hassle to put it all back in for a couple days, so I decided to use a double airbed, which again had never been used to sleep on. With this in mind, and remembering airbeds of the past, I threw in an ex Army cot bed as a 'just in case'.


With everything prepared, the day of the first night camping, I drove Nina down to the field, with Jen following to pick me up, and parked Nina up. The skies were grey, and it was looking bleak for the days ahead.


With work still to do, and my Mums weekly shop to complete and deliver to her just up the road from where my Nephew lives, Jen whisked me off to do that.

After delivering the shopping, then picking my nephew and brother up, time was getting on, and the Autumnal skies were fading, it was a dull day anyway, and even though it was only around 6.30, it was going to be a race to get back on to the other side of the River Severn (we were in the Forest Of Dean) past Gloucester and on down to Frampton. Those of you not familiar with Frampton On Severn, it is just South of Gloucester, and West of Stroud.

So we made haste and promptly stopped off at the old Cattle Market once we got to Gloucester, officially called St Oswalds, and ordered a Dominoes Pizza for our tea. None of us had eaten, well, when I got to my nephews he was technically eating a burger his Nan had just made him, but he is a growing boy, so with a small pizza each, and a portion of wedges to share, we sat outside Dominoes and scoffed the lot. Thats to say I scoffed my lot, my brother and nephew ate half of theirs and put the rest by to torture me with when we got to the field, as mine was all gone.

By the time we left Gloucester it was getting seriously dark, and I was starting to regret stopping, we would all now get to the field in the pitch black, bear in mind that there is no electric, no running water, no street lighting, darkness in the field is fairly total, to the human eye.

I grinned to myself as I pictured the field lighting up like Chevy Chases house in Christmas Vacation when I turned Ninas lights on and opened all the doors !

We got to the field, both my nephew and my brother a little apprehensive at the prospect of two days without a proper toilet, no mains water and more importantly limited phone charging and 3g signal capabilities. I smiled again.

I drove in to the field close to the caravan to unload the car. Using my headtorch I located the caravan (it really is that dark !) unlocked the door, flipped the 12v electrics on via the freshly charged leisure battery, and switched the caravan lights on. The next few minutes were spent dumping stuff in there from the car.

I jumped in Nina and started her up, as usual she started on the button, and repositioned her closer to the caravan but still on level ground. With that done I threw open the back doors and proudly switched on the lights. They looked magnificent ! All I had hoped for and more, and I felt my chest swelling as my brother and nephew poured congratulations on me for making such a good job of them..... "They're alright aren't they." It was so unexpected to have that praise heaped on me, it made the hours of work putting them there worth every solitary second !

The next hour was spent with me sorting my new bedroom out in Nina, in between rushing to the caravan amidst the screams of terror from my brother and nephew yelling at me that "there's another Uncle Damon !!!!!". Yes there are many canal monsters living in and around the field, so terrifying are they, that no-one dare do what we were bravely attempting, by staying not just one whole night there, but two.

I quickly caught the latest spider in a bit of kitchen roll and took it outside.



Once we were all sorted, and I had shown them around the caravan, they noticed a couple of head torches hung up just like mine, very bright cree led, comes with batteries for £7.99, yep you guessed it, in Aldi. They are fab in all honesty, and both Brother and Nephew were pleased to learn that if they were good they could keep them. "DO NOT shine them in peoples faces or I WILL take them off you !" quickly became the catch phrase of the weekend.



After the excitement we put the kettle on for hot drinks and settled down to watch a DVD on my Portable DVD player. Sadly the film I had picked out for us in the bargain £3 section of Tesco, 'Oblivion', they had already watched, and as I got in to the first couple of minutes, their attention span wained and conversation ensued driving me to give up on it to watch at a later date when the gabble boys were no longer around.



After washing the cups up, and showing them how to turn the caravan seating area in to a bed, I said goodnight and made my way across the minefield of mole hills back to Nina for my first EVER nights sleep in her :).

Location:Frampton On Severn

Replace TV and Fit Status 315 Aerial

After a mega weekend of converting in the last few posts, sadly I haven't had the time to do anymore since.

So it was great to go put and right a wrong today.

Apologies for the length of the video, it could have gone on much longer had I filmed the actual work, as it is you have the explanation and the good stuff at the end lol.

Apologies also for the constant bell noise throughout, it was pure laziness on my part, my GoPro was mounted on a kitchen timer which I use for 360 degree timelapse videos, if you look on my YouTube channel, you will see the last 360 I did of a new field we have just acquired for the dogs.

So with that out the way, sit back and prepare to be bore rigid by my presenting skills :).






If you got through that until the end, well done :).

Its a job I was dreading because I thought I would have to take the roof and cupboard back down, thankfully I got round it.


Oh, before I leave you, there will be another update soon, kind of a diary with video and photos, I ACTUALLY SPENT THE WEEKEND CAMPING IN NINA !!!

It was brill, and actually brought up a few things that I need to incorporate in to the conversion very soon, so was a good exercise too.

Come back soon and it will hopefully be up :). Laters !

Location:Gloucester

A Bank Holiday of Converting :) (Day 3)

Wow.

What a weekend, the extra day made a huge difference, and I really want to carry on now I have built some momentum, but back to reality tomorrow, and doing some work.

Things are getting so close to the good stuff now, the biggest thing, and the bit I'm not really looking forward to, is the floor, I know removing the rails is going to be really time consuming, there are so many rusty bolts through the floor to take them off, that I am sure there will be some swearing involved. :S.

I really can't wait to build the kitchen because that means that the jobs aftewards will just be small ones and that Nina will finally be useable as a campervan.

So, the final of three days of converting.

Today, I wanted to re glue the bulkhead, it annoys me every time I go in there, and it hasn't been fixed on properly for a while, barely hanging on by some loose nuts at the top, while the bottom was allowed to flap back and forth.

Quickly undid the top loose nuts, and the bulkhead was off and ready to come out.

After placing it on to the tables under the car port, it was pouring down today, I pulled the carpet back from the top down, this was actually quite hard, though there were many places the glue hadn't stuck, there were definitely some where it had, meaning some force was required, quite a lot of it actually to rip it back !

I sprayed LOTS of glue on both the carpet and the bulkhead....


Then slowly worked the carpet in to the recesses as I glued and pressed all the way back up to the top again. The glue held mostly, and kept the shape of the bulkhead nicely.


I found some window trim, left over from when Nina's windows were done, sadly not enough to make it all the way around, so will have to buy some more, but it finishes the bottom half off and stops the carpet peeling away.


After realising that the carpet was quite well stuck in places, I decided against trying to rip up the bottom, and leave it, it will mostly be hidden behind the seating, and as I found out, isnt actually going to fall off.

I flipped it over and glued the excess carpet over the edge, this will stop any noise from the edges rubbing the sides of the interior or vibrating etc and make it look better finished from the back.

Before putting the bulkhead back, I thought I would quickly cover the small overhead panel that partially covers the blower section above the bulkhead, as the plan is to refurbish the overhead cupboard later which will sit in front of it.

Its already covered in dark grey carpet, so this was stripped off first, and a new piece of sand carpet cut.















A nice easy job, probably the easiest of the weekend !

Afterwards, it occurred to me that once the bulkhead is in place, there is some white metalwork showing underneath it, so got some scraps of carpet together and went in to Nina and cut and glued some in to place which looks so much better than the metal.


With that done, it was time to fit the bulkhead back on once and for all, which. I duly did, first hanging it on the top threads and loosely screwing the nuts back on.

The problem was trying to locate the bottom bolts in to their holes, through two lots of carpet, and a heavily distorted metal bulkhead. After lots of pushing, lifting, gritting of teeth, and frustration, I was no closer to getting it fixed back on.

Eventually I got a thick screwdriver, forced it through the middle hole, then on into the threaded bolt hole, pulled them straight, and thumped the bulkhead forward, to my amazement it lined up and moved in far enough to maybe get a bolt started either side. Which in itself was a task while trying to hold the screwdriver in and keep it all lined up. Finally it all went together, and after tightening the nuts at the top, it was a matter of knocking the sides out level with the wall, and standing back to admire my hours of work !






I popped back out in to the rain and picked up the small section of blower hole panel, and using a couple of small screws, fixed it in to place above the bulkhead, this also covers the top nuts up.






Time was getting on, so I quickly vacated Nina, and back under the car port, which is such a mess at the moment, its become a dumping ground for Nina's interior, pallets, concrete blocks, and lots of other bits of rubbish, so its good to be getting on with these jobs and emptying it bit by bit.

I pulled one of the overhead cupboards down, the one that came out of Emma, as its a slightly more streamlined design than Ninas own, and also not as easy to break down in to smaller cupboards, Ninas is a bit more modular.



I started removing the cushioned panels, intending to recover them with the sand carpet, but once removed, I kind of liked the panel that was left behind, jt was smoother and lower profile, so decided to ditch the cushioned panels and carpet straight in to the wood.



After masking the metalwork on the cupboard, I sprayed the glue all over, and on the panel of carpet I had cut, and stuck it on. Looked great :). Repeated for the other end and this is how it looked.


Really like it, and so glad I ditched the cusioned panel that went over the top of this.

I cut another piece of carpet and quickly covered the right hand end panel too, I didnt bother with the left hand one as that side will be up against the blower panel in Nina. Always trying to save using carpet where possible so that I dont have to buy any more.



I think it looks brill, and couldn't wait to see it up in Nina, but it was 7.30pm, and Jen wanted to cook tea.

After a bit of pleading and puppy dog eyes, Jen agreed to hang on for an hour, so I went to work on making the holes in the right hand end for my TV unit that will be bolted underneath.



Its an AVI 10" flipdown kitchen TV, it runs from a 12v mains transformer, and actually runs straight from the 12v system fine if you remove the transformer out of the equation. Its a freeview tv, dvd player, and radio, and is absolutely perfect for a campervan. I think I got it for about £50 from ebay, there will be a post way back about getting it if you are interested in finding it to see exactly how much I paid for it.

Anyway, holes drilled, the moment had come to fit the cupboard ! :).

I put all the bits and pieces in to the back of Nina, and went to find something to prop the cupboard up in to the air while I drilled holes and fixed it in. In the shed I found a ratchet support, its like a big adjustable pole that you can ratchet up underneath stuff to hold it in place. Hoisted the cupboard up and quickly popped the support under and tightened it up.



The only thing holding that cupboard up is the pole right now, and its not light ! Its pretty heavy :).

Fixed all the brackets to the wall and the roof and removed the pole.... It stayed up there ! :)

I still had a few minutes before I had to pack up, so bolted the tv in to place to see how it looked. It looked great ! It swivels 270 degrees, plus up and down, so it can be viewed from anywhere in the back. While seated, or while cooking !


How neat does it look in there ? :).
























I didn't have time to wire it up, plus I need to buy a new power plug for it from Maplin as I lost the transformer with it on, when I say lost, it has gone in to the numerous boxes of adaptors, chargers and power supplies never to be found again, it is just easier to go buy a new plug for it :).

That's it, the Bank Holiday of Converting is over, I finally ran out of time, it's a little sad, I really wanted to carry on, didn't really want the weekend to end, but it has, and I can be happy that I got so much done :).

I think it's time for a quick then and now comparison, to see how far we've all come, lots of you reading this I know have been following from the start, so remember this ?



All those little jobs over the past three years, yes THREE years, I should have been finished at least 2 years ago, but life, and those damned leaky windows ! got in the way :P.

Anyway, all done, and if I am honest, even though it was me that planned it all and worked towards this run in, it is turning out so much better than I could have imagined, and probably like you all, I can't wait to see the final photos !

Hoping to get a bit more done on the evenings this week, though I think I am due a well earned break for a day or two, as much as I want to go on, I'm shattered lol.

See you in the next post ! ;).

Location:Gloucester