AlanN's MK3 V6 Day Van

[AlanN]

Well, its taken a couple of weeks for me to sort out a couple of up to date pictures of the old girl and dig out some old photos of the insides of this on and on and on-going project.
I have been really impressed with some of the ideas on this forum and with time and a little as possible cash, I might be able to use some of these great ideas.

I was given the van about 5 years ago by a friend, (a 2 litre petrol then, but now 2.5 diesel) but before I could bring her home, I had the task of fitting a new water pump, fan belt and search a breakers yard in Surrey for a thermostat housing in the snow, just to get it running for the journey home back to Essex. Sadly, she spent most of her time on my driveway over the next couple of years, having very little done to her. So I decided to convert her to a Day/Camper van with my buddy Neil, who has also started a much larger project Transit for touring, so with his help, we began a little conversion last winter.


One of the first things we did was to knock out and fill the dents before fitting the ply lining and for an older van, the body wasn't that rusty, just a bit scabby around the rear arches and some pin holes in the rear doors. I have one more dent left in the base of the sliding door and she's ready for a repaint.

Storage or cubby holes where cut in to the side panels on both side of the van for extra storage, just deep enough to be useful without having to use the main boxes when fitted. These will eventually lined with carpet. A chillier box was made from old scrap white double-glazing door infill panels. After mitring all the corners, the parts where glued together to make a tough cool box 28mm thick, perfect for storing food stuffs along with ice blocks.


With two long storage boxes down both sides, being used as seating and as a bed, a table had to be cut make the bed extension, when I saw the cost of a ready made table leg and fittings, I thought “no way”. So home it was. Very simple plate with bolts and a tube welded on and then sunk in to the timber floor to make a smooth finish when covered with lino

That’s enough for now more later.
Alan

[Luke]

neat project you got there- well done

[tranny van man]

nice van mate does it have the mk 4/5 clear indecators?

[AlanN]

nice van mate does it have the mk 4/5 clear indecators?

Yes, only done them a week back. A little mod to back of the lamps, cut slots with a dremmel, so the tabs on the wings fitted into the lamps then the same instructions as posted in the technical section here
http://fordtransit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=8606
I used the indicator bulb holders off a newer Fiesta and I had to clean the locking part of the new lamps as the molding was a bit poor, but all working great now,chrome bulbs next week. The only thing I have noticed is there is still a large gap between the indicator and the headlamp where the plastic tube bit was, I might make some adjustments one weekend.
I will post some photos of what i did, when I update the "Progress Reports"section next week.
Alan

[tranny van man]

Nice 1 am getting me some of those indecators , for some reason i think they look better on the mk3

[AlanN]

I’ve opted for a sliding window from the local breakers for £25, while out looking for my captains chair base. We cut the hole to the size of the inner chassis, as I forgot to measure the existing hole. The edges were smoothed off, primed and painted to stop any rust marks, but it was really tight drawing in the rubber seal into the van, even with soapy water and silicon spray, I’ll know better on the next one. Neil getting jiggy with it, while I watch.


The side storage boxes have been painted white inside to reflect the light and the lids are on stainless steel hinges, as used on double-glazed windows. The good thing about these window hinges, is that they have drag screws that will hold the lids open when lifted.


After seeing another VW ‘day van’ done with black carpet, I knew I had to get something as light as possible to make use of any light in this small space. Cheap grey stuff it was then, but what’s great about this stuff is, it stretches brilliantly around the corners and contours of the van, making a great finish to the windows and body panels. The lino floor is now down, leaving a nice smooth finish over the table base with my stainless table leg, which stores away in one of the boxes. The table is being painted and mounts on the wall and doubles up as the bed base. Lighting and power cables have been run through the roof down to the sidedoor box, which has the auxillary battery and switches, then the whole interior has been carpeted and the lights fitted. Oooh, I’m getting excited… Yahoo… “Let there be light”



I wanted a captains chair, but £170 on a seat base, you’ve got to be kidding. As I mentioned earlier when buying the side window, I was looking for a captain’s chair base, found in the Renault Espace, some of which have swivel bases on both front seats and this one came in at £25. This has been adapted and fitted to the passenger seat and the original base, jobs a good’en thanks to Neil’s welding. I didn’t get any pictures during the construction of the base, but its straight forward enough.

I’m still undecided how I’m going to fit curtains to the two side windows, but what I have done is fit a stainless steel rod across the back of the van and same again across the van behind the front seats and hung my blue home made curtains.
Oh! and I found half a bottle of Scotch in the cool box today, 'bonus'

[OxtonyxO]

what did you use for trim
and how hard was it to trim around the windows

[Luke]

thats superb mate
the cubby holes are a good use of space too, and i know what you mean about the light colour - i'd like to do mine in black but i think i'll go for grey too

where did you get the carpet from is it special vehicle stuff or just normal carpet

[AlanN]

The carpet is the cheap very thin foam backed stuff you get from the carpet shop, Kenbro's in Southend in my case. All the carpet came to £25 plus a few cans of spray glue which I think I have used 5 or 6 cans... All the square stuff was like wrapping a Christmas presents, but for around the window was a little different.

Each side of the window is seperate strips, we glued the top first in a straight strip and used the handle of a screwdriver to stretch the carpet into the curve, Then the two side where done the same and laid over the top of the top one, then we cut a 45 degree cut through both bits of carpet and pushed the joins together, you can hardly see the joint. The bottom was done the same way, then it was all trimmed around the window and tucked under the rubber...

Hope that sounds clear
I may have some close up pictures somewhere if you want them

[Guy88]

How easy were the windows to fit

Doing mine soon

[AlanN]

How easy were the windows to fit

Doing mine soon

Dont tempt me, I might swear
Really dam tight... I have still got to do the other one yet, but I am going to make the openning a little bigger by a couple of millimeters. Just waiting for some for warmer weather.

Recommendations: Bucket of hot soapy water, to soften rubber, 4mm cord to wrap around the seal, to pull rubber in and some sillicone spray to get things reaaly slippery!!!!

[mr Grimly]

Very very impressive, very user friendly and the colour makes it look bigger. Keep up the good work, windows are fun to fit !

[AlanN]

I wanted to slightly customise the front of the van a little, which started out with new headlights and clear indicators, just to make it look a little different, but after looking at a few other photos on the forum of colour coded bumpers and spoilers, they where soon added to my wish list. I did think of converting to a MK5 front, but it seemed like too much grief and at the end of it all, would be like all the other MK5’s, which I think is the best looking by the way…

I like the way the MK4 grille curves up from the bumper, so that was the starting point. After shifting through several breakers yards with no luck, Barry, Captain Hook came up trumps with one, complete with headlight wash. After holding it up to the front of the van, I then noticed how big the gaps where around the MK4 grille, dam, that’s a lot of filler. Then out came the jigsaw and it was duly chopped up… Arrrh! I know, there hard enough to get hold of.

I then grafted the MK3 upper section on to the MK4 using plumber’s cement, which was the only thing that would weld the parts together along with reinforcing strips on the inside. It looked kind of crap from the inside, but it was doing a grand job. It still didn’t look quite right… Out came all the cross grilles and all the mesh to show a big hole!!! Oooh, how the hell am I going to finish that?

It took some work to finish the ends of the cut parts of the MK3 grille, so with the off-cuts from the centre, a few cuts where placed in the back of the cross section and a hot air gun was used to bend the section around to face inward. Now, how to hide the joint between the two sections of plastic…

Loads of plastic filler later was spread across the joint and left to set, half hour later it just peeled off even the areas keyed up. Blast, fibreglass wouldn’t stick either. A quick search on the internet and I found that Isopon bumper repair will bond to plastics, but it only comes in 100ml tubes, didn’t seem like enough to me. After jointing up everything and sanding down, it was starting to look pretty good, it was just a matter of being artistic.



Several coats of plastic primer and with a rub down between and it was looking almost professional, even if I say so myself. The only problem I have got now, is what colour to paint it! I think white would be too much, satin black or maybe graphite.

There are two MK3 Transits with colour coded fronts near me, so I went to have a look at them, pervert! Not very well done and it put me off a bit, its funny when you look at others done on here they look fine, perhaps its something to do with brush hairs stuck in the paint still, at least I hope their brush hairs, so I have repainted the grille in satin black as I want to paint the bumper white sometime in the future.

I been searching around for mesh for that big hole in the front and it had to be stainless steel, it looks so much better than the Aluminium expanded stuff that the local boy racers are using. Halfrauds did some interesting different grille infills, but no weaved stainless, so eBay came to the rescue, but at a cost of £35, this grille was starting to be a real expensive. Mesh arrived promptly from the supplier in Leeds and had to be cut down to size with an angle grinder as the mesh was much heavier than I expected. I glued some tabs on the back the grille to screw the mesh to as I want to be able to remove it easily for painting etc.




Mesh £35, MK4 Grille £20, Paint £24, Solvent filler £8, other bits & bobs £3, Labour, blimey, it’s taken me a week of evenings £0 total outlay £90.
I will have to get a photo of it fitted to the van tomorrow, as it’s nearly dark

[gemini]

nice job

if you are doing anymore cutting invest in one of these if you have a compressor, 1mm thick blades make a nice neat job

[Guy88]

That looks awsom

Fancy doing another one