Rock N Roll Bed

I couldn't believe the difference that carpet made to my van, after driving around for ages with just ply lining in the back, it was so nice to look behind and see nice plush carpet. Anyway, back on subject, the Rock N Roll bed!

I am lucky enough to work with my boss who is also really into VW T5's too, we both were searching for ages before actually buying them and then we both got our vans within a day of each other. Over the past couple of years we have been bouncing around ideas off each other and helping each other on techniques for our builds. I was looking on day on E-bay and found a couple of rock n roll beds that weren't amazingly overpriced! They were from a chap in Scotland, I am not one to name and shame but to say it was an absolute palaver would be a massive understatement we were getting excuses like "Oh Tom I am sorry I have had pneumonia and we have been snowed in because our workshop is on top of a mountain" but my mate/boss got the best excuse in the book: "Oh I am sorry, my welders has only got one arm and I've only one leg!!!" So after that it was safe to say that we would not be buying from him again!

So after it had arrived I went round to my mates workshop and we fitted the bed and cut the boards for it. Above pictured is the view from the sliding door with my mate enjoying a well earned sit down.

Here is the view from the rear doors towards the front of the van.

Here is the carpenter/designer himself hard at work! The ply wood that is on the right of the picture is to make the surfboard storage but I will leave that for a later post.

Cheers

Tom

Carpet Ahoy!!

After insulating and cleaning the inside of my van, the next job was to carpet the inside panels and as much of the metalwork that I could. I bought dark grey acoustic cloth from Mega Van Mats. The guy who owns this is really helpful with info on how to carpet the interior of your van, and also offers a lining service if you don't have the confidence to do yourself.

So here is my work, the first panel I attempted was the largest one, as I mentioned I bought the acoustic cloth, the reason I did is because it is a 4 way stretch material and therefore easy to stretch around all of the nooks and crannies of a van. Pictured below, you can see that I have attached the carpet to the panel, I did this using spray glue purchased from a local carpet shop. I laid the panel on the floor and rolled the carpet out over the top and then cut roughly to size. Next I rolled up the piece I had cut to size and then sprayed a section of wood and then a section of carpet and then rolled the carpet onto the already glued wood and then repeated the process until I had got to the end of the panel.

The next thing to do was to tidy the panel up, I roughly cut around the edge of the panel and then folded the edges over and glued them on to the back of the panel. As I have mentioned I used the acoustic cloth because of its ease of use and this is really apparent below as this was the first time I have ever carpeted anything and the result was pretty good (if I do say so myself)

I used the same method on all of my panels including the ones in the rear doors and side doors.

The last picture is inside my van looking at the sliding door panels although I'm not sure it will show up as I took it with my phone and the light was bad!

Tom

Wish List!

So what did I want to get out of my van?

I had to think long and hard about this, the van had to be used as a daily driver as I cannot afford to run another vehicle. I basically wanted a base to get changed in and out of my wetsuit, I Surf and Kitesurf at least twice a week if not more in the winter. I also wanted to camp in her a few times a year. So after much time and thought I came up with this "Wish List"

• Get rid of factory bulkhead
• Insulation
• Interior carpet
• Vinyl floor (waterproof)
• Surfboard and Kite storage
• Rock and Roll bed
• Cupboard for camping equipment
• 18" Alloys 
• Lower the van

So now with this in mind I was ready to crack on and start with Scarlet's conversion! 

The first job was to get rid of the factory fitted bulkhead, this was a really easy and straight forward job. Next I removed all the ply lining on the walls and the floor, gave the floor a quick sweep and then started with the insultion.

My friend had some loft insulation lying about and kindly gave it to me. Once all the ply lining was out I also took out the hardboard side panels and these were easy to shove loads of insulation behind. I also added it to the above panels and ceiling by using double sided tape. I did not bother with insulating underneath the plywood floor as I dont think it would make much difference as there is not a big enough gap to trap air to make it retain heat.

Hope you like the blog so far and I will keep you updated with the next stages of my build soon.

Cheers

Tom

A New Van!!

So here she is, Scarlet The Enforcer!! These are the photos that the VW garage I bought her from sent me. I purchased her through the VW assured used scheme, I did pay a lot for her but she came with a years warranty and roadside assistance, so was a safe purchase. I didn't even view her before going to buy her! It took a long time to find the van I wanted, mainly because I wanted the 2.5 ltr engine, the main specs I wanted were:

• 2.5 ltr diesel engine in the 130 bhp version (better engine in my opinion, as they are chain driven, so no cam belt, they have 5 cylinders so there is less stress on the engine and more economical)
• Air Con
• Electric Windows
• Barn Doors
• No older than 3 years
• Any colour but white!

I phoned so many garages, and checked the VW website daily. One day I made a call to a VW centre in Newark and they mentioned that they had a mint condition Tornado Red T30 174bhp! Naturally I snapped at the chance of this van and put a deposit down straight away.

So to cut a long story short I travelled up on the train to pick up Scarlet and drive back home, the feeling of getting in her and then driving away with my dream vehicle was amazing!