We have a two and a half month house sit in Laidley heights looking after a little fur ball called Timmy, as well as the house. The weather is a bit hotter down the range than up in Toowoomba, but we will be back up there before it get’s hot again.
New spot to park the coachOn the side of a hill.
I had some fun trying to level the coach up this time, had to jack the front drivers side up a lot and still couldn’t get it perfect. So it’s as good as I could get it.
Jacked to the max at the front to get the blocks under to level her up.Only need to put blocks on one side.The back tag axle wheel off the ground, that’s a first for me.
So now the next stage of the coach can begin, first of will be clearing out the front of the coach through to the bathroom. Which will give me some where to work and make a mess as I finish of the bathroom. After that it will be into ripping up the old floor on the front half of the coach and replacing it.
We didn’t have much room getting in the driveway.Over looking Laidley Heights..
Just one of those days, Charmaine had gone to work and I was packing up the coach to move to a new house sit in Laidley Heights. While going down the road driving, I decided ro stop on the side of the road to check everything was ok inside and out. After checking things I jumped back into the driver’s seat turned the key and nothing happened apart from some clicking. So there I was on the side of the road…. the only good thing was I parked under a nice big tree, so I had some shade.
I gave Charmaine a call and when she had finished work she came back so at least I could jump-start the coach. That didn’t work either and we were going to have to spend some money and get some help. A $110 and a 1hr later help arrived, we hooked up two 12v batteries to make 24v and even that didn’t work until he put power straight to the starter motor bypassing the solenoid the Detroit started like nothing happened.
That was not the only problem
So back on the road again, I had tested the engine brakes on the flat but now it was down the Toowoomba range to give them the real test. Charmaine went on ahead down the range in front of me, as I put it in second gear and switch on the engine breaks and down the hill I went no problem. Finally something worked right, I made it down the range in one pice.
The next thing to go wrong was the inline diesel filter under the bus started to block about 10 klms from a our next house sit, so I had to pull over, stop to clean the inline filter and the main filters too. On the side of the road for the second time in one day with no way to start the coach by myself, so another call to Charmaine to come to the rescue again. This time Charmaine was inside the coach to turn the key while I did the 24v power bypass to the starter motor and back on the road again.
Now to fix the starter motor
It turns out the contacts in the solenoid is stuffed, so another thing to fix. Good thing about big motors there’s lots of room around them to work.
Easy access to the starter motor.
Just have to remove the end plate to the solenoid.All fixed just forgot to take pic of it apart. oops…Just the wires to go and it will be as good as new.
I forgot to take photo’s again, I just had to clean up the contacts for the 24v solenoid till I can find some new one. This job was a lot easer than working on a car. Well the starter motor doing it’s thing again and turning over the Detroit 6V92TA, got to love that sound.
We started in the bedroom and that’s all we were going to do, but why stop there as it was a dirty job. So it was out with the scrapers again to remove the form underlay, only another 8 meters to go. I so much love working over my head.
So much fun I love my job.This is after sanding all the contact glue off the ceilingHalfway there.
Now to start on the new ceiling.
Well it’s now time to start on the new bedroom ceiling as It had to be finished so I could fix the roof above. Des had the sheetmetal already, so it was time to cut it up and start fitting it up in place.
The sheet metal that will be going up for the ceiling.Time to cut it all to length.This lot should do the bedroom through to the bathroom.
Now the fun beginnings of positioning them in place with Charmaine’s help and some timber I think we can do it. This will be done one sheet at a time as gluing them in place takes 24hrs, then the pop riveting and then we do it all over again with the next one.
The 1st sheet in place.pop riveting done on the first sheet.Onto the 2nd sheet.Most of the bedroom ceiling done as well as the bit from the flat to the curve ceiling.
Now that we have done the ceiling in the bedroom, the rest will have to wait for another day and another blog.
We had already done the first part of the work on the bedroom ceiling, but to finish that job. We had to rip the rest of the old air-con off the roof. I started with getting the sola panels off first, then remove the cover plates.
Now time to remove the solar panels again.This will be the last time the roof looks like a coach roof
This will be the last time it will look like this.
The finished look of this project we will have a roof top deck up here, but not now that is a job for an other day. Now it’s time to remove the evaporator, heat exchange radiators and blowers. Stripping out the copper pipe, heat exchange radiator pipes as well all the electrical pits.
Stripping all the sparky stuff and back grill to accessing the pipe work.Old air condition control unit in the ceiling.One side of the evaporator, heat radiators and blowers to be removed.Heater units and evaporator removed.
More Stuff For The Scrap Yard
I did a trip to the scrap metal yard with all the copper, brass, evaporator and the heat exchange radiators. It’s always good to get some money back, that lot gave me $145 to put back into the project. Next will be cutting out all the aluminium that we don’t need off the roof air-condition area. I all ready have some that we have removed so that we will have an other trip to the scrap yard soon.
All the fans are out now,Time to start cutting out all panels.Almost there.Let’s hope it doesn’t start raining.
Did I see rain?
Well it did start raining on and off for a week, lucky we could put the covers over the holes and with some buckets inside it didn’t get too wet inside. This means I went back inside to do some more work on the bedroom/bathroom ceiling, while it rained but thats an other blog.
From the start the old coach air conditioning never worked at all, the gas was gone and Des had already fitted a reverse cycle air conditioner into the coach before it ever became our project. I started to remove the old air-con in Leigh Creek S.A. in my free time.
The old compressor pump was the first thing to go.One less thing we have to drag around. No more compressor pump.
The coach is getting lighter.
After taking out the compressor pump, which almost made me blow a pooper valve. After the compressor out it was onto the roof to remove the condensers and fan system. Now the coach is about 120kg lighter, every bit counts the lighter the better.
Condensers and the fan unit are no more.This is where the condensers and fan came from.
Now Time To Pack Up.
It was starting to get to hot to be working on the roof at that time of the year in Leigh Creek S.A. So before I put the panels back on we used this area store the spare set of wheel for the Toyota land cruiser. The next stop was to Yulara N.T. to do some camel farm work which was great fun especially getting to race at the end of May in the camel races. Curtin Springs Cattle Station was a six day a week job so not much could be done on the bus when we were there, until Zac came up for a trip to do the outside just before we left there in November 2016.
One of the main reasons we decided to head back to Brisbane was that we realised we could not both work and get the bus built properly. The other reason was that while in Yulara we bought a gas strut storage bed that costed us $500 and by the time we got it out to us at the farm it costed another $480. This was way too expensive, so on to Brisbane it was as we found out it was the cheapest way to get the parts we would need for the fit out on the bus.
The bedroom ceiling is the lowest overall in the back of the coach, so it just touches the top of my head. The old ceiling carpet had already been removed by Des, so all I had to do was grind the toilet ceiling panel off then scrap back the foam underlay that was glued to the ceiling.
Old Toilet ceiling, it had a 10mm step down made out of sheetmetal.Toilet ceiling after removing the sheetmetal panel.
Time To Remove The Underlay
With scraper in hand it was time to start scraping back all the old underlay. This might sound like an easy job, but it had been glued up there very well. I thought it wouldn’t take to long, but I was wrong again as the bedroom ceiling end up taking around 8hrs just to get the foam off.
Stripping the foam off.Last of the foam off the bedroom ceiling.
Now To Get Rid Of That Glue
With the contacted glue still all over the ceiling, the only way that I could think to do was to put a sanding disc on a grinder and go for it. Well… it worked, I had been covered in glue and dust. Thank goodness for a dust mask and safety glasses as once I was finished the job there was crap all over the place.
Now time to get covered in crap.Almost there.All the old glue has gone with most of it on me…
I’ll Just Keep On Going
Now that I’ve started on the ceiling, I’ll keep on going and finish it all off inside the coach. The next project will be the bathroom then onto the kitchen ceiling area, so once I have cleaned all that up it will be ready to glue and pop rivet some white Colorbond sheet metal that came with the coach from Des. The ceiling is a good job to do when the weather is wet and raining so while its nice and fine I will go finish removing the old air-con on the roof above the bedroom, they are the wholes in the ceiling you can see on the photo.
Now with the roof fixed while in Bowen, it was time to start on the bedroom. The first thing was the windows…. I had to remove the old toilet window which Des had put in, because for us it was in the wrong place.
Time to remove the old window so we can fit the new one’sReplacement toilet window.Old window out, now to patch up.Des had kept the old panel he cut out for the window he put in.Old panel back in place.No more whole.
Time For Some Walls
With the window in place it was back inside to fit the insulation and wall paneling 16mm ply the we got when living in Yulara N.T. First thing was to remove the old aluminium sheetmetal so we could put in the new insulation.
Removing old sheet metal to put the new insulation in.Aluminium sheetmetal off
With the inside panels going on its starting to look more like a bedroom, later we will be putting some kind of lament over the ply to finish it off.
Right side insulation and paneling going on.Charmaine doing some OH & S, Insulation in and starting on the timber paneling after fitting the bedroom window on the left side.One side done one side to go.Bedroom ready for the trip down the Queensland coast from Bowen.
So with the bedroom side walls in place it was time to set up the new sleeping area for the next part of our trip down the Queensland coast. We also had to re pack all the stuff we moved into the shed while house sitting in Bowen.
One step closer to having a motorhome, so the dream’s getting their slowly but we are on our way.
The condenser unit was fitted in the front bin on the drivers side and only had an out vent so if the bin door was closed, things didn’t work that well. This should have been one of the first things that I should have fixed, but as we were not on the road much I didn’t think about it at all. Now after driving from S.A. to N.T. and now into QLD, it was defiantly time to fix it.
Only one vent that didn’t work to well.Air-con that was fitted.
Time For Some Modifications
To start with we had to seal the air-con unit to the outside bin door, so off to the hardware store for some sheetmetal. Ended up getting some flashing which would mean I would not have to bend any 90 angles. So out with the tin snips and pop rivet gun to make some ducting.
Made up some ducting to get the air out.Rubber seals in place so the hot air only go’s outside.
Time For Some Intake Vents
Now all we had to do was the intake vents, I thought three would do for a start and thats all they had at the hardware. So back to the coach I went to start fitting the intake vents. First off was to mark out the holes for the vents then cut them out.
Marked and cut out ready for the new ventsNew vents in place so no more over heating while driving down the road.
One Cool Motorhome.
Now that job is done It’s so much cooler inside when driving down the road. Also when we stay somewhere I don’t have to open up the air-con’s bin door again, now that all the hot air is blown outside.
The only time it’s good to have a leaky roof is when their is nothing to get damaged inside. After a year thinking the roof was ok in Leigh Creek, we started having problems with the roof again. Mainly because where we moved to rained a bit more. To start off we thought it was only the fiberglass panels that were replaced from the old original bus windows that Des had fitted.
Thanks to Zac for his great help in getting the huge job started by cutting out the old Sikaflex. I was working six days a week @ Curtin Springs Station N.T., all I could manage was regluing after work. It did stop the water coming in around the fiberglass panels.
Fiberglass panels before we reglued then back in place.Panels from inside
Its Still Wet In Here.
Our first house sitting job was in Bowen for Michael and Michelle. We had no rain forecast for the next few days so Charmaine and myself started on the roof to fix the rest of the leaks. The first job was to remove the solar panels and hatches from the roof.
Time to take the sola panels offRemoved the Solar panels now the hatches.Time to start sanding back the roof.
The Fun Starts Now …….Not !!!
The fun of sanding back the old paint job as well as getting rid of the surface rust around the hatches. It was one of those jobs you love to hate, but had to be done, so with buckets of water and sanding paper in hand it was head down & ass up and off to work we go.
Rust all goneRoof all sanded back and cleaned.
I Do Like Painting
Time to undercoat….. we had been so lucky as it had been raining all the way around us and only that a couple of rain drops on the coach. So after I Sikaflexed all the joints it was time to undercoat using some Infrared Heat Reflective Primer.
1st undercoat.Second undercoat, ended up with three coatsInfrared Heat Reflective Primer
Now for the topcoat, the best part of the job as it’s almost done. Des (the bloke we got the coach before us), had already paid for the paint, so now it was time for three topcoats.
Topcoat Solar Reflective Elastic Ceramic Membrane.The roof finished with three topcoatsNo more leaks on that area now.
A Job Well Done
So after four days we had finish painting the roof and the inside temp had gone down at least 4 degrees. The paint was a polyurethane membrane which meant no more water leaking when it rained and would be a lot cooler in summer. We just have to remove the old air conditioner unit which is now under the solar panels. This is way down the back of the coach once done the roof will be totally finished off, in time this back area will also have a deck for us one day.
Leaving Leigh Creek S.A on the start of our new life, We had to be in Yulara to start work in five days. With a smile on our faces the next stop was port Augusta for the night, then head north on the Stuart Hwy. The coach was packed full with only room down the front for our bed and some were to cook on the road.
On the road camping in the coach all packed up.
Too Good To Be True
All was going fine, then I started to lose a little bit of power we were only 150 klms down the road and almost to Hawker. Just an other 140 ks to Port Augusta I thought, then the gauges on the dash started flutter around. Thats when the coach started to drop the RPM of every 30 klms…. I was losing around 100-150 RPM, it looked like some electrical gremlin had raised it’s ugly head. We made it into Port Augusta but just at a max speed of 60k/h, fill it up at the first servo we came to. After a 750 Lt hole in my pocket an 1000 Lt tank sounds great till you have to fill it up.
Let’s Sleep On It
After a good nights sleep it was off to the truck work shop across the road. They just so happen to have someone free to start working on it there and then… How good was that? So off we to the shops to stock up on things you can’t get in the middle of nowhere. ( Yulara NT).
Back at the workshop they had found after 3 hrs it was not an electrical problem at all but a fuel supply problem…..in particular the in tank filter. Bugger I’d just filled the bloody thing up and now It has to drain the hole lot, so 5 x 205 Lt drums later it was 5pm on a Friday night and the filter was out.
Who puts a filter inside a 1000Lt tank?Diesel Tank out put
Back On the Road
So by Monday afternoon, the filter was clean, pumping the diesel back into the tank, we’re back on the road.
Curtain Springs to Alice
But about 9 months later driving into Alice Springs….. Oh bugger it’s happening again! With only 450 Lt in the tank and some drums from a caravan park, we drained the tank again. This time it was modification time because that filter was not going back in again. Some more shopping in Alice and a movie it was back to fix the filter system for good.
New fuel filter train.New diesel filter on the outside with ballcock valves so I can have it cleaned in 20min.
We are still getting sludge out of the tank I’ve cleaned it out about 5 times now, but the tank is slowly cleaning it’s self out. I just have to remember to turn the valves back on after I clean the filter, yes I did forget the first time and had to bleed the diesel pump to get it going again. You only ever do it once..
