Finishing off behind the driver’s seat was only a small job, that had to be done. This meant that the driver’s side wall would be finished till I put the final cladding on later on sometime. This will also stop things hitting me in the back of the head later when I’m driving down the road.
Well that’s all for the front of the coach for now, I have some small job that have to be done now in the bathroom and kitchen.
This is the last window to be fitted and that means one less job that needs to be done. Just have to mark out where the window has to go first, then double check it to make sure it’s in the right place.
Now all I have to do is rip down some timber for the size to fit around the window hole. A little bit more gluing, screwing and that job is all done.
The window frame has been sealed and screwed from the out side.
Well that makes a big difference to the outside, now it’s starting to look like our home on wheels. It’s so nice to see the job list being ticked off one by one. Once I have worked on finishing the front floor and walls,… all that will be left to do is fitting out.
This month I have decided to write a very important and quick post on helping out H&M with their garment collecting initiative. It actually goes no all year round, not just this month only.
Each year tons of clothing ends up wastefully ends up in land fill that could be used again. This means up to 95% could be used again. H&M are passionate about decreasing the waste and closing the fashion loop. Reusing or recycling all old textiles in any condition so they can bring it back to life encouraging zero waste. They want to reduce the environmental impact that the fashion industry has on the environment.
By dropping off all your unwanted clothes, worn, torn or out of style will be reused and turned into raw materials for new products in the future. Textiles that can’t be reused get a second chance as textiles fibres for cleaning cloths, or used to manufacture products for insulation materials for the auto industry.
H&M are happy to receive any bag full of clothing or home textiles as you want to hand in to any store around the country. Your textiles are sent with their usual deliveries to the nearest processing plant. They are graded and hand-sorted with zero waste in mind. If the item is too worn or torn to be reused it will be recycled into a new product.
H&M does not profit from the returned garments? No, instead they use their own revenues to reward customers to make to local charity organisations investing in recycling innovations. When rewear, reuse and recycle are not an option, the textiles are used to produce energy.
For each bag you donate you will receive one voucher of 15% for each bag you hand in, with a maximum of two vouchers per day. These vouchers are redeemable on your next purchase, what a great reward!!!
For each kilo that they collect about 3 cents will be donated to your local charity organisation chosen by H&M. To find out more about the amount of textiles collected and the money donated, visit hm.charitystar.com or to learn more visit hm.com/garment-collectingion-spirit.com
Recently I made a salad in a make shift kitchen which turned out rather well…unfortunately I did not take any photos as I never thought to do it at the time. If you would like to give it a go and try it out here is the ingredients.
Just mix and eat. I hope you like it as much as we do.
Enjoy!
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.
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.
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.
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.
The fiberglass panels needed to be finish off by putting aluminium around them. So off to the shops again, I think I should have shares in Bunnings. I though this was going to be an easy job of just cutting the aluminium to length and gluing then pop rivet into place.
To start with I had to remove the old pop rivets that held the old air-con fiberglass top in place. This was a job in itself as it was glued well in place, then clean out all the dust that had built up over 30 years.
I’m glad I started this job early in the fixing as I found another place where water could get in that was hidden. This should be the last of them as there is no more places left to fix.
I even had the reciprocal saw going to cut out the old glue and on this part, but the saw died with only 300mm to go. They knew how to glue things back then, too well. The only good news was there was more room under the coach now the saw was in the bin.
Well now it’s out with the measuring tape and start cutting things to length, or just make it up as I go along. I made up a templet so they would all end up in a straight line, well that is the plan.
Working off one ladder is not the best idea, but that is all we have. So now the sequence was marking out the holes for the pop rivets, then pre-drill 3mm holes. I had to hold the aluminium in place with tape, and drill into the coach, then drill them out to 5mm C/S pop rivets to fit. Next was to take the aluminium down, counter sink the holes for the pop rivets, put Sikaflex on the back, to fit it into place. I had to put two pop rivet in at arm’s length, climb the ladder holding the aluminium by the pop rivets. This was difficult! Even allocating the pop rivets into their holes to fit the rest of the pop rivets in place was a feat! I had to buy a pneumatic pop rivet gun which made my life much easier 🙂 happy days.
The troopy came in handy with the side awning up to work under for the drilling and cutting the aluminium flat bar.
So now it’s time to repeat the same process on the driver’s side, I even have some shade from a tree too this time. Life is great some times.
Thank goodness that I’ve been able to park the coach undercover for this job as there has been raining on and off. The Showgrounds have let us use one of the sheds for three weeks, thank you.
After trying to get the decking up and failing to do so, as I’d done a too good of a job gluing it down. Great! I had to come up with another solution.
Going over the top of the deck and sealing it instead, this way I can lay down some tiles to finish it off.
For some reason the Sikaflex didn’t stick between the decking boards. So after scraping it all out I troweled in some bitumen putty to take its place. The next step was three coats of bitumen paint to go over the decking boards. After the bitumen paint had dried the next day I got the fire hose out and flooded the area for one hour with no water leaking any more.
Now the tile underlay goes down, after cutting it to size. A box of nails later it’s all in place ready for the wet area under tile waterproofing.
Next will be cutting the reinforcing bandage with bond-breaker for the edges. This will stop any damage to the waterproofing membrane if there is any movement.
The under-tile waterproof membrane just paint on nice and easy thank goodness, so after going over the bandage and nail first. Then it was time for the first coat of three.
Next blog will be about the tile set out and the gluing of them in place, with all the other fiddle bits to finish it off.
It was one of the jobs that was started down at Leigh Creek, but I ran out of time before heading up north to Yulara. The old running lights did make it to QLD with a quick fix up here and there. We are waiting to move under cover in to the big equestrian indoor arena at the Toowoomba Showgrounds to start fixing the roof leak found on a good down pour while up here.
We have been in the Toowoomba area now for four weeks and I must say it’s quite a nice place. Apart from having to move out of the Showgrounds for one week as the place was booked out. We decided to stayed on a farm for that week at a farmstay called The Chookhouse. It was great, the owners were very nice, it was the first time for them having a 12m motorhome parked there.
The old running light had seen better days and as the front of the coach had already been fix in S.A , we now thought it was a good time to finish them.
The former owner had already fitted new LED indicators/reflectors which made the old running lights at the side of the bus look even older.
Until the inside is finished, the outside will have to stay looking like someone does not love it. I’m really looking forward to the outside being all painted, it’s going to make such a big difference, that will have to wait for another day.
With the bedroom done to a point that we are happy with it’s time to clean up. The house sit has been great! We looked after two dogs, Lexy and Kingston. The cat, Charlie who had a swagger about him strutting around like he owned the place. Walking the dogs every day kept them happy and me a bit fitter.
The rubbish bin’s were full for about 2-3 weeks as we cleaned up and set up the trailer for a tip run to get rid for more stuff …..that we really don’t need.
For the time being (as we will be living onboard again), we need a make shift kitchen again. This time it’s going to be a bit bigger then last time with more storage and bench space.
Still have a lot more to set up, but for now this is stage of the cleaning up, a lot more will be done later. I have to cleaning out the bins under the coach so we can start packing the tools from the shed away.
Sometimes I think we are mad fitting out a motorhome on the road while at the different times living in it. It has had it’s moments, but life is good and we are having fun most of the time. But now it’s time to head off up the range to Toowoomba. Charmaine will be much happy with no more having to sleep in the troopy for a week at a time.
Charlie
The next 6-12 months are going to be more interesting as we will be living and working on the coach at the same time, not sure how that’s going to work out at this stage, but we are thinking of how we are going to manage it.
Living back in the coach for now, it’s nice to be back on the road. I am thinking about looking for some part time work while still working on the coach. I’ve fortunately found a small water leak on the roof with all that ran we got the last few weeks, so will be fixing that first. I have some sparky stuff in and around the coach that’s needs a good redoing and rewiring, then onto the water tanks with some plumbing work.
Ok it’s still needs lots of work, but who cares. We are in our own place and it’s a comfy home for us.
But first I’ll have to run some 12v cables for the LED lights for the vanity as well as the laundry area so they can be switch on by them self. Than we will need 240v power for the front load washing machine under the bench, some were as well as a power point.
Now that is done it will be time to start cleaning up as I’ve made a mess, our house sit is getting close to ending and we will need time to organize the coach back into some kind of a place we can live in again. I’ve still have to put the sola panels back on and rewire then and a bit more to tidy up outside before we can start packing up.
