Mk7 Race van build

[Harvy]

The next MOT failure was the lack of a discernible beam pattern on one of the headlights. Rather than buy two new ones I decided to replace the lenses of the lights I already have. About £50 for 2 new lenses delivered. Before purchasing replacements I had tried to polish the existing lenses but the putting in them was 0.5-0.7mm deep in places and I didn’t fancy trying to sand all that back.

After some heating with a hot air gun and ALOT of effort I finally managed to remove one of the lenses, pull all the bitumen glue out, refit new bitumen glue that was inexpensive from eBay and finally fit the new lense.

The comparison from old to the new is quite striking!

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You can see how bad the old ones are here.

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Then I did the second lense. At this point I wish I had just bought new ones. I found it so frustrating taking the lights apart and rebuilding them. It took me most of the day. I didn’t take any more photos because I was quite annoyed!

The end result was very good and the van flew through its MOT.

[ned]

I did my lenses last year it’s quite a faff isn’t it, I used clear silicone to hold the new lenses in to make it easier next time I have to change them, I’m surprised you didn’t paint the surrounds while you had the lenses off

[Harvy]

I did my lenses last year it’s quite a faff isn’t it, I used clear silicone to hold the new lenses in to make it easier next time I have to change them, I’m surprised you didn’t paint the surrounds while you had the lenses off

It really is. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to paint them. I’d been working away for a few days and the re mot was the next day. To be honest they don’t loom too bad with new lenses and every single bulb on the outside of the van has been changed to an LED.

[Harvy]

Next it was time to make the passenger area slightly less bare and try to make it quieter/warmer. I have quite a few sheets of this foam underlay from when I put laminate flooring in the kitchen. It’s very effective in the house keeping the floor warm so I though it can’t hurt to put some on the floor of the van.

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It was a lot of fiddly cutting but will surely have some effect.

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Then I cut slices out of the original flooring for the van so it would slide under the seat rails and screwed it down.

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Right at the back on the near side there is a hole in the floor. It looks like it might have been for a diesel heater at some point in the past. I will be fitting a diesel heater but not here….

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So I got the welder out again, made a patch, cleaned everything up, welded it in, seam sealed it and later on gave it a coat of galvanising spray on top and underneath.

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[Harvy]

Then it was time to do the back of the van too.

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It’s a good job it will be under the floor and no one will see it! It started looking more messy towards the end of the day.

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Finished by just plonking the floor down on top and screwed it down the next day because it was already after 7:30 and didnt want to upset the neighbours with the buzz gun.

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[Harvy]

Time to upgrade the stereo system. I found this on eBay.

https://ebay.us/m/RNRYXT

It came with a reversing camera which was ideal as it will help when it comes to hooking up the caravan by myself.

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I lost one of the screws to mount the camera to has to use a self tapper I had already!

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I did have to buy a 10m length of ‘backup camera’ cable (£10) as the one supplied is about 6 meters and not long enough for the convoluted path it takes to hide it sufficiently. There is also a plethora of cables coming out of the back of the unit fortunately the head unit is quite shallow meaning there is more than enough space for all the cables that I will never use!

For the money I spent I’m very impressed with it. Surprisingly it is made in Japan not China!

[Harvy]

As the van is now in a position where I can use it I want to make the experience slightly more comfortable for the passengers in the back so I bought some of this sound deadening/insulation.

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I bought 20 meters of 7mm thick stuff. What they sent me was 15meters of 10mm thick. however after contacting them they apologised and promptly sent out another 5meters of 10mm thick at no extra cost. It’s pretty easy to work with and suitably sticky. I did have to keep changing Stanley knife blades as it does seem to blunt them to the point that it starts snagging the foam.

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Doing all of this used slightly more than 15 meters squared. I haven’t done the inside of the sliding door or anything on the back doors yet. I have nearly 5 meters left over to do this but I want to build and insulate the bulk head before I do so.

We have been out in the van since I’ve done this and there is a marked difference. It’s much quieter and very well thermally insulated too.

[Harvy]

Bulkhead time.

I wanted to keep the bulkhead as far forwards as possible to keep as much room in the back as I can. So I decided to make it follow the angle of the seat uprights before going vertically up around the head rest height. Building it out of 20x20 2mm box section seemed to be suitable strong. I did some calculations as to how much I would require and came up with just over 14 meters. I bought 15 meters because it’s sold in 7.5 meter lengths from my local stock holder. £30 for 15 meters seemed very reasonable to me!

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It was so much nicer welding this together than it is welding the really thin body panels! I’ve welded the frame together but it will be bolted into the van. 4 bolts through the floor, a couple through the sides into some rivenuts that I’ve fitted into the vertical body supports and 2 on the top horizontal bar to hold it in place. The top bar is fitted behind the roof beam so the bulkhead can’t push past it.

I think it should do the job, what do you think?

I intend to fit 18mm ply on the back of the frame for a few reasons. Firstly I have a few sheets of 18mm , secondly it should make it easy to mount shelves/hooks/tyre racks etc to it, and thirdly I will stop anything from the rear coming into the passenger area in the event on an accident. (Everything in the back will be strapped down properly.)
On the front side of the frame I’ll fit some thin ply wrapped in some of the stretchy carpet stuff that I’ve just bought.
The 20mm gap inbetween the two sides will be insulated with more of the stuff in the post above.