The Second Build

Hi again, reader.

Yes, I'm still camped out in my Mum's spare bedroom in South Wales and NOT travelling around the wilds of beautiful Scotland. There are still three problems to sort out before I can depart and I attribute them all to this gentleman:

This is the dodgy bloke who sold me the van and made grand promises about converting it into a luxurious mini-camper. I don't want to name and shame him here, so let's refer to him as Del Boy.

When my friend Gavin and I went to look at the van the first time, we could tell Del Boy was shady, but he talked a good game. He described his grand plans to fit the van with a solar panel, leisure battery control panel, full insulation, ample storage and so much more. He claimed he could get it finished in 3 days and keep the total price for van and conversion below 4000 pounds. In the end it took him 11 days, cost 4370 pounds and the end result was a far cry from what he promised. As soon as I saw his conversion work, I knew I'd have to undo his shoddy work and start over.

During this last week, two more problems have become apparent:

Firstly, an electrician friend of mine inspected the leisure battery set up and wiring and his verdict is that it is possibly dangerous and likely useless. He estimates it will cost around 400 pounds to put right.

Secondly, I drove my Mum to nearby Barry for shopping a few days ago. The tank was nearly empty, so I put 20 pounds worth of diesel in. By the time we got home (less than 20 miles round trip) the tank was nearly empty again. I took a look underneath and confirmed my worse suspicions - a fuel leak. Given all the lies and broken promises over the last few weeks, there's no doubt in my mind that Del Boy was aware of this leak when he sold me the van.

I'd love to wring Del Boy's neck, but I'm determined to stay positive and keep moving forward. I'm getting the leak and the electrics looked at tomorrow morning. In the meantime, let's focus on the rebuild. Gavin is a jack of all trades and has done quite a bit of carpentry. So starting Friday morning, he set about ripping out all of Del Boy's work and building something better.

It didn't take long to pull it apart. This pile of scrap represents 570 pounds down the drain. Gavin noted that there's no way he should have billed me 370 pounds for materials, since this is clearly random odds and ends of scrap wood, probably fished from a skip or left over from some previous work. 

And here's the van ready to start over:

The first thing we did was unscrew the wall panels and put some insulation up inside the walls. It's not ideal - just some left over carpet underlay pushed up from the bottom, but it's better than nothing.

Time for Gavin to get to work. 189.75 pounds for new wood, screws etc and 200 pounds for two days of his labour. This van is getting more expensive by the day!

By lunchtime, the van had a new bed. It's like a futon. Ideally, the bed would be on the right, keeping the sliding side door clear for easy access. However, the van's short wheel base means it's too short for a bed to go behind the driver's seat. Luckily the passenger seat folds right down allowing the bed to extend into the cabin. Nobody will see my feet there when I'm sleeping thanks to the window shades I've made (see earlier post).

This bed is much lower. There's hardly any storage space below it, but I can put shoes, extra blankets, butane gas cannisters and other items under there. The upside is that I can now sit up on the bed without my head hitting the roof. so if I find myself confined to the van by bad weather, I'll be able to read a book, use my laptop or cook in relative comfort.

This mattress folds in three places. I bought it from Amazon for about 40 pounds. In these pics you can see that when the passenger seat is upright, the bed folds up to make a kind of sofa or chair. When it's time to sleep, it takes a couple of minutes to fold down the passenger seat, extend the bed and put the window shades in place. 

Next up, the storage and work area.

On the left there are three levels of shelves for food, clothes, kitchen items etc. On the right is a little work bench area where I can cook, write, use my laptop and so on. Below the work bench is where I'll have the leisure battery and a plastic container that can hold a few gallons of water. Up above the bench, we've fixed two plastic baskets which can be used to hold regularly used items such as toiletries, phone chargers and the like.

I'm concerned that there is very limited storage space. This wood is good quality and sturdy, but it's also thick and heavy and takes up valuable real estate. This is the smallest model of the Ford Connect. Other versions have a longer wheel base and higher ceiling. Bottom line - I'll have to think carefully about how much to bring, what's essential and what gets left behind. 

There you have it. After two days of work, Gavin has made the back of the van ten times better than that clown, Del Boy. It's been a costly learning experience. Tomorrow, I'll drive the van to Cardiff where I'll find out the extent of the fuel leak problem and the viability of getting that leisure battery working.

Fingers crossed, if everything can be sorted, I'll use Tuesday to do some shopping for supplies, then I'll say goodbye to Wales on Wednesday and hit the open road. 

Stay tuned and thanks for reading.

Brian