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.
After starting on the bedroom wall at the Bowen house sit, now at a house sit in Laidley Heights a year and a bit later it’s finally time to finish them. With the floor down and the front window in place, all that needs to be done is to cut the ply to length with the window cutouts. I’ve packed more insulation around the window with some 12v and 240v cables to go into place.
I’m glad that all the wires have been tagged both ends, otherwise I’d have a hell of a time working out what I have put where. On the passenger side window I have painted some of it black as I’m covering some of it up. I will be putting in insulation where I had painted.
Apart from where the new door will go in and around the driver’s seat all the wall panels are in place. We are still looking at different products to finish off the walls, but that will do for now.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
The engine’s brakes had not been working properly since I bought the bus and I didn’t have to use them anyway as it was so flat in South Australia and the Northern Territory. This is going to be a job the will take some time as I will have to trace the wiring loom from one end of the coach to the other. The main problem is info, I’ve have most of the manuals that I need to be able to fix most things but finding out the colour codes for the wires is not so easy as nothing matches what is on the drawings that I have. I have searched the internet for more wiring diagram but to no avail and I can’t seem to find anything that looks even remotely the same.
So with a multimeter in hand, I thought the best place was to start with power to the switch, then start tracing the wires from there. Well the good thing is I’ve got 24v at the switch, the bad news is now people have been here before me modifying the wiring loom.
Looks nice and tidy in here, but somewhere in there may be the problem of the J brakes.
Doesn’t look so nice now as there are lots of wires that have been cut or have never been used. The fuse holders that have been burnt out (3 of them) after being moved, as well as modifications over the years to fix or been up graded.
So now its time to trace all the wires not being used and tagging both ends of them, this will help find where they go. After making a 9v system to clip onto the wires its just a matter of finding the other ends of the loom.
I’ve just been told that I can move into the equestrian shed so the wiring will have to wait for now, as the main problem is the roof leak under the top decking. This started after we move up to Toowoomba, it may be a small pop rivet as it’s not a big leak more like some capillary action going on.
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.
After finishing the vanity and fitting the sink in place with all the plumbing, now was the time for the draws. There will be three a deep draw down the bottom and two smaller draws above that, which will have to be modified to fit around the plumbing.
The bottom draw just missed the s/trap which was good, but the next two won’t be so lucky. I’ve even dropped the draw runners down as fare as I can go so we have more room for the top draw.
Now that was not to bad, but the top draw is going to be another thing. I’ll be left with only around 220mm of draw space on either side of the sink and 60mm at the front of the draw, but that should be heaps of space for Charmaine.
Well I’m glad that’s over, but I will properly going to have the same thing in the kitchen though.
Out of the bedroom and now into the bathroom. Starting on the vanity and laundry side, it was time to make some more cupboards up. There will be a 900mm three draw as well as a 300mm cupboard and beside that we will be putting in a front load washing machine under the bench top.
Now I can fit the sink to set up for the drain pipe as well we need to put in the hot and cold water pipe’s, as the wall lean in at the top I’ve offset the cupboards off the wall. This will give me some space to run the pip work and drop it through the floor.
Most for the plumbing has been done, but now I’ve got to put in the back wall behind the washing machine area before I can run the drain pipe all the way.
I’ve built a wall so I can finish off the washing machine area and on the other side will be the start of the kitchen, but thats an other day.
The next job will be to fit the draws under the sink, and as you can see the sink will be in the way for some of them. Looks like it will be modification time again.
