For Bones

Pod in the raw - made from ply I had lying around the house and the legs were 4 metre lengths of square wood and basically I just screwed the ply onto these lengths.  No time to make a frame as such.

Then I had to make cut outs so the stove when in travelling mode would fit in!!!

In the end the middle shelf held food and we left the COBB at home.

And then he made me chop the legs off because he said it was too tall for the van which meant we had to find somewhere else to store the water!  Humph

Me washing up.  See the saucepan.  The hook was set so that the saucepan was actually resting on the floor so it wouldn't rattle.  Then judicious use of paper towels stopped the implements from rattling.

Hope this helps.  If your van is taller than ours you are lucky.  As although the IKEA unit was the right height for the fridge to go under etc it was too tall for us to use the bed as a sofa.  You can buy legs of various heights in B&Q so you just need the piece of Marine ply cut to size by the nice people at B&Q and bolt several legs (ideally the 12inch ones) (don't screw them on) such that you can slide storage boxes under neath.

My friend Fran now lives in a van too!  With a name like that clearly it was her destiny.

Loving the solar panels

Since I arrived here near Stone last Thursday I haven't run the engine at all.

The fridge has stayed on all night and while they have been down to 74% in the morning today they have climbed back up to 98% by 6.30pm.

That does include charging my laptop and phone etc as I have been working in the mornings.
And yesterday I also had to have the inverter on to run the printer so yesterday it only climbed to 86% before the sun set.  Plus I had run the Mikuni to get hot water.

BRILL.

I am one happy bunny.

Well sort of

The Rev counter has joined the engine hours lcd display on some sort of strike.  It happened on my way here on Thursday.

 'Luckily' ...

I can tell when I have reached my normal cruising revs by seeing when the engine stops wobbling!'  I do have to be careful not to fall or drop anything down onto the engine what with the engine boards being slightly open so that I can actually see the engine!

Being ever so slightly OCD or quite far up the aspergers (sp) scale I keep a log of engine hours time started stopped etc so every time the lcd occasionally deigns to work I have been able check it.  So far so good, but the fact the rev counter is also now playing silly b*******s means I will have it properly looked at.

Beta's suggestion that I take the lcd display home and put it in the airing cupboard has been studiously ignored!

We are so posh

 So it would appear part of the problem with the lead acid replacement batteries was that the solar panels were no longer working.

I removed them myself

This is what I found.  

This is the dreaded combination of silicon thinners used by my first boat painter Liz Portas in error

 (she was unaware that silicon is an absolute no no.)

 and water getting under the stick on panels.  

I should have let the second boat painter (Rob Bryan - Ashby Canal)  remove the panels and deal with the underside at the same time as he did the rest of the boat.  Hey ho.

and then Gareth from Shobnall Marina very kindly sorted out the mess and painted a rectangle of black - we felt trying to match the cream would have been impossible.

He found some interesting things under the paint.  Mainly a curious set of four semi circles.  I looked at them and immediately knew what they were.  Clearly Mel Davis had intended putting my centre line there and realised it was in the wrong place!  He filled in the gouges and did the first coat of primer so no one was any the wiser until now.

So here is the new black rectangle

now covered with the new solar panels from Tim at onboard solar

I spent the rest of the day obsessed with the readouts.  I got a lot of exercise up and down like a yo yo within an hour of fitting they had got the batteries from 94% to 96%.  By evening they peaked at 99% before the sun went down and the fridge did it's level best to take it all out again.  At 10pm it was 85% and I bottled it and turned the fridge off.  No idea what happened overnight but by the time I switched the engine on to move at 9.20am it was up to 87%

And today I met back up with the little chimney company and had my new chimney fitted.  It is in two halves and the bottom half at 8 inches should go through tunnels okay but it can still be removed if necessary.  It weirdly looks taller than the old chimney but I can assure you that it is an optical illusion.

Regarding the batteries I will give them the rest of the summer to improve before returning to gel ones I think.  One must be duff - but which one and by now it has probably ruined the others.  

Off to check the levels again.

 

France and Spain by vw

Our first Aire (no WC but one nearby in the village) Here we finished putting the interior panels back in the van - as we had seriously run out of time before the ferry deadline.

Besancon to meet friends and a trip on a boat.  See that entrance under the citadel?  That is a tunnel with a lock in it.  The River Doane (I think) does a grand loop in Besancon and tunnels under the citadel.  It was a holiday and everyone was lining the river in the sunshine but only us three on the top deck and a family of 4 or 5 downstairs.  A lad playing his trumpet at my shouted request for an encore played La Vie on Rose just for me!!!

No holiday is complete without icecream - and just look at the size of that Sorbet!  I did have to share it though.

Pleasant little seaside resort.  

Inside the Sagreda Familia

The flat we stayed in in Barcelona was behind a door from the street that looked from the outside as if it went into an apartment foyer.  But what you got on the other side was this little secret oasis.  The alley formed a T and our flat was the far right hand side one.  Very private and it had it's own roof terrace.  Were the apartments built around the original houses or were they infill?  Who knows.  AND it was right by the Sagreda Familia

On the way home again we just fitted into the last slot at this Aire and look I had an en-suite toilet.

  Fabulous.  

In the morning various camper vans used the Elsan and dumped their grey water etc and there was no smell whatsoever.  

Lucky.

Last Patisserie stop before the Ferry and yet another interesting village.

Natures/Air Head - improvement

I just thought I would share this massive improvement I have made to my Natures Head (identical to the Air Head)

I have removed the churning element completely and stuffed this flexible bucket into the box.  It just fits nicely 14 litres.  I imagine the 12 litre one might fit better as the 14 litre one is a tad 'snug' with the handles.

So with this shoved in the box suitably lined with a bin liner and with a modicum of sawdust/cocoa shells or whatever at the bottom to soak up any errant liquid all is sunny and bright as far as I am concerned.

Change over day takes 5 mins , no mixing, no smell, no worries.

Hope this is of use to others of the third way.

The offending article

What I caught my nose on in the lock.

How to ... How you shouldn't ... and copying another's idea

How to remove a very heavy battery from an awkward position when you are a weak and feeble woman.

Tie straps to the handles so when you lose your grip it doesn't fall into the bilges and knock the expansion tank etc etc

wrap the end of the positive cable (and same at the other end) so that you don't have to actually remove the cable at all which is firmly fixed in place!

Join the long negative cable to the short negative cable on the starter battery together with a bolt and cover with rubber (inner tube).  Job done

Oh and place errant battery in the battery box with the other 4

How one shouldn't do Swarkstone Lock.

I clearly caught my nose on the metal cover for the bottom gate paddles.

I was on the boat and other people were operating the lock for me. I took my eye off the ball whilst chatting.  Just goes to show even with a rounded nose you can still get caught.

I thought the 'Willows' idea was a brilliant one so I copied it.

Here is my lovely tin trunk.

It slides under the end of my sofa bed and lifts up sufficiently to sneak an arm in and get at the logs.

I did have to move the right hand legs over to accommodate.  Benefit of a home made sofabed!

And you can still - just - get the ash pan out.