More done today

Well the supplies arrived at 2pm today but I was missing the kitchen Worktop which will be delivered on Tuesday.

I lifted the floor next to the bed and got the insulation down,  unfortunately 50mm insulation is too big to go all the way under the bed so the front is only partially insulated at the moment.

I then moved onto blanking out the right hand double entry door.  This is now ready for a door frame between the living and driving area.  I also got the gas Cabinet made out of 18mm ply.  I had to go with an internal one as there are structural bars across all the walls except for the rear one which is not a place I can put the cylinders.  However on the upside it means no going out at night to change cylinders now.

I insulated the hole in the washroom ceiling and fitted the ply covering.  I also fitted the two panels to the entrance to the washroom ready to install a door.

I had a couple of ideas today which I will measure up tomorrow to see if they are practical.  The foot of the bed is the washroom wall,  I am thinking of making a hole big enough for the toilet to fit through and mount it on a sliding platform so that when it is not in use it slides under the bed.  The space it will go into is not really usable as it has the boiler at the back and the gas manifold at the front so the dead space there would be useful as a toilet storage place.

I am going to fit some book shelves above the head of the bed as this space is not usable for anything else and it will be handy to have my books to hand.  I will also install some 12V electric sockets there for mobile chargers and my ebook charger.

I am also thinking about extending the 2 washroom walls and putting 2 doors in them so that the washroom is the full width of the Bus,  It would mean taking out the window on the passengers side of the bus to restore privacy but the bigger wash room would be a bonus.  It would also mean that the kitchen area and the bedroom area are separated by 2 doors meaning a reduction in cooking smells into the sleeping area.

Final big order placed

I have placed the final big order for materials today including the kitchen work surface.  It will be arriving tomorrow and I can make a last push to finish the internal structure.

When trying to describe where abouts on the build I am at the moment I use the terms, Structure, Infrastructure and finishings.  By structure I mean anything fixed like beds, shower room walls, kitchen units and bench seating.  Infrastructure is power, gas, water and waste plumbing and lighting etc.  Finishings are wall linings, wood panelling, carpeting and other flooring, wall tiles, curtains, blinds and painting.

Built in ironing board?

I quite like the look of this and am thinking about adding it to the kitchen area.  It’s a slide out  ironing board the retract back into a drawer.  At £65 it is not bad value either?

Plans and Layout for The Bus

I have just dug my cad package out and did some screen grabs of the layouts.

This one shows the dimensions of the internals of the bus (click on the image to see full size)

The grey area at the bottom right is the drivers area.

This is the layout as it is now (no scale and sizes are just guesstimates)

The box at the top right is the steps down to the door and the box to the left of that is the gas cabinet probably too large for the scale of the drawing.

Planning next steps

Due to the way the banks work I may not have any money till Tuesday,  this means Wednesday before any wood can be delivered.  So time to plan next steps to keep me going till then.

I just had a wander up to the Bus and had a look at the jobs that still need to be done and picked apart the ones that I have the materials to do.  I have the following in stock

• a load of 2″ X 2″ carcassing wood.
• A box of 3″ screws
• some half sheets of 5.5mm and 18mm ply

I can’t do anything on the kitchen area yet as I don’t know the actual dimensions of the work surface I will be buying.  That leaves the bench seating.  So tomorrow I will move all the cushions out of the way at the back of the bus and start cutting the carcassing for the seating.  I have decided that the seating will not be accessible from the top like it is in my Eura as that is a pain to access, so I will be putting in doors on the front and sides.  This will allow access to the underseat storage without having to take all the cushions off etc.

I will also make a start on removing all the black paint off the windows that I put on when I had planned on having the bed at the back of the Bus.  I can also have a really good tidy up and organise stuff better for when the wood arrives on tue/wed whichever day I manage to get it sorted for.

Shower Room progress

The first job today was to replace this support.  It was going to be for the kitchen work surface but now it makes more sense to extend it all the way to the ceiling and reline the other side.