XLWB Campervan build - what I'm learning

Link to Mike D's thread missing from first post

Excellent. I'm really looking forward to seeing the photos.

Brilliant, need to see this as we are on the same journey now.

Same requirements as you to sleep 4 but we need a shower / toilet also.

Looking at a van on Monday.

Still scratching my head with layouts

Good work. Looking forward to the pics and play with Fusion 360!

Looks good.

Van bits are not that much dearer than big car stuff.

I've a small T4 which suits us just but I'm wanting to build a bigger van

I'm not too convinced about having a shower unit either though a toilet is a must.

I thought about rigging over of these to the rear doors and using a couple of poles and shower curtains as a cubicle and using Gas shower

As it would be small and keep the condensation out of the van.

We have a toilet. Would not be without it now even though I thought it was extravagant.

Don't have a shower though.

We throw a kettle of hot water in the mobiwasher and use the shower head on that post ride.

Van parts are really expensive. As I took a risk on a cheap van, I had some reserve, but after reading around on forums it’s not really enough to cover multiple large faults like the gearbox/clutch/engine and even smaller faults can add up quickly.

Not really compared to comparable cars. Even comparable quality tires for the big van are cheaper than the size for the partner combi.

Also interested in how this goes.
Am I missing something obvious buT why are pop tops only used on smaller vans. A normal transporter pop top on a boxer van would free up loads of space.

MrsMC and I have the occasional van conversation. Love these kind of threads.

She wants a small van, I want bikes inside. Suspect we could have a lot of nights in Premier Inns for what we'd end up spending.😄

. A normal transporter pop top on a boxer van would free up loads of space.

Seen a few done like that.

One issue is weight. Often with big vans you are drawing close to the max allowable weight 4up.

Often the vw sized vans with conversion 4 up with bikes on the back etc are also over weight.

trail_rat Yes we plan on doing something similar with a shower. Haven't tried yet. The build is usable but very very incomplete at the moment.

TheDTs I've had a Bongo which was a superb roof, but I didn't want one in this van for many reasons. They're cold in the season extremities, annoying to pack away wet, require more sealed joins/surfaces, take away a bit of the stealthness of pulling up at the side of the road/layby. They're also pretty expensive and complex. Most of the ones I see on VW are there for daytime headroom rather than berths.

I'll try and put up a post about the first job we did - windows - tomorrow.

This is ours built over a year from a brand new L3H2 Boxer nartound 600hrs work but so worth it!

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Alex - can I ask what software you used for the 3D layouts?

That's a funky looking layout. What happens if one of the singles needs to get up in the night?

5. So many van layouts you see looking amazing on pinterest/forums are for 2 people in a large van. That would be sooooo easy!

This is a big point! I was considering a van convertion rather than the van plus tent we use at the moment but unless you go coach built 4 in a <3.5 t van is a challenging layout.

The only challenge would be making the bike garage big enough surely.

Either that or your using the wrong base van

We get 5 sleeping in the post bus on strathpuffer weekend .

2 in the rear bed 2 in the front bed and 1 across the front seats on a self inflating mat (room for 6ft )

And all but the short straw in the front seat can get up and use the toilet without disturbing the others.

And all but the short straw in the front seat can get up and use the toilet without disturbing the others.

They could just wind the window down surely 😃

They could but We don't condone shitting in lay-bys. To many folk already doing as their default option at popular spots and making bad name for the rest of us.....

Was said in jest.

I made a hammock thing to go in the front of our van, turned out fairly comfy too

@Blazin-saddles - That looks amazing. Particularly like the top lockers.

@andykirk - This is the incredible Autodesk Fusion 360. Free for hobbyists! Use it all the time for 3D printing, CNC routing and general design work.

Bookmarked! Good luck.

@trail_rat Re: complexities of fitting 4 people. Yes, the garage is what makes it tricky especially if you can live without a bathroom. I can't imagine wanting to leave bikes on a rack though, if I was parking in a honeypot area and going hiking for a day for example.

@AlexSimon, looking forward to some updates and photos. Also thanks for the Autodesk Fusion link, downloading it now.

Windows

Took ages to decide whether to go with bonded or plastic double-glazed windows. I think what finally swung it for me was a) the difficulty of finishing the inside against the bonded windows and b) some reasonably-priced Polyvision windows came up on Ebay from Magnum Motorhomes.

The Polyvision windows were massive (1100x550). I could only find one other person who'd managed to fit them on a Ducato and info was sketchy. Measured about 10 times and decided it should be possible. It's caused complications, but the big windows are ace and all issues have been overcome.

First job was to make some internal frames.
All these caravan/motorhome style windows assume that you're fitting it to typical caravan/motorhome sandwich wall at about 20-30mm thick so we had to make a wooden frame to make the van up to this thickness. They also assume your surface is flat, so you have to make a decision on whether to try and pull the panel flat (which is easier on smaller windows) or try and make the frame follow the curve of the van and then leave the outisde window relying on sealent to fill in the gaps at the top and bottom edge.
We opted for the latter.

So the frames need to be curved vertically and our first issue caused by the large window size meant that a square-cornered frame wouldn't fit in the sliding door. We could have done it out of shaped wood, but we thought using our 3D printer would be cool and we could get the 3D curve perfect.

It all worked out well.

Second job is cutting the hole out of the van.
This was scary as it was the first job to do and I've never done anything like this before.
Advice from Mike D and others was to do the sliding door first, so that if you mess up you can get a whole new door! That doesn't really settle the nerves!

We applied very wide strips of masking tape so that the jigsaw surface wouldn't scratch the van. We also took precautions inside the van to catch metal filings as they can be the start of rust.

Anyway - I will say that it was an absolute doddle. We used a stepped drill bit to start off, then Jigsaw and Wickes metal blades worked like a dream and it was easy to follow my curves. Cut the top edge last, so that the panel is supported (althouth we added masking tape after cutting the sides so that it was supported even more).

(this pic shows the double-wall skin of the van. We put string inside to stop metal filings going down - we hoovered it as we pulled it out)

This is where the second side-effect of choosing large windows showed itself. We'd cut up to a double-wall part of the skin which didn't really want to push together so we thought it best to fill this. I didn't fancy having wood in here as it might hold moisture, so I bought a UPVC window ledge and sliced it up with a track saw to make some strips to fill the gap

BTW - Loads of clamps are essential for building a van. These are cheap and great in addition to some heftier quickgrip clamps or g-clamps: https://www.toolstation.com/roughneck-spring-clamp/p75191

Left those overnight to glue then glued on the inner frame

(this pic is from the kitchen window but it's all the same process)

Left that overnight

Then it's more scary stuff!
These Polyvision windows don't have an internal frame - just loads of metal clips that you have to screw put on in a specific order

I haven't got any photos of the next bit because you have a time limit!

Basically you've got about 40mins while the Sikaflex 221 is still nicely wipeable. So you put a bead of Sika all around the window, offer it up to the outside, then fit about 20 of those stupid clips to the inside of the frame - not too tight at the top and bottom, because that part of the window is going to NOT pulled to the side of the van - our calculations made it a roughly 6mm gap top and bottom that you have to fill with Sika.
It swallows loads of the stuff to fill that gap. So we cut the nozzle quite wide so we could quickly stuff in a load of it.

Then we used baby wipes over fingers to shape it, clean it and kept topping up the Sika where needed. The baby wipes were absolutely perfect! Quite stressful, but we just kept at it until we were happy. We were struggling for time on a couple of bits and the Sika starts to drag a bit and doesn't go completely smooth, so we left those bits to come back to with fresh Sika over the top later.

Anyway - it all came out good - you can see the 6mm gap filled with Sika in this photo:

Praise The Lord for Sikaflex 🙂

Repeat all of the above 3 times to get a full set! (although we didn't need the 3D printed corners for the other 2).

One complication was that we could only find a cheap sliding kitchen window in grey and not black.
We considered just putting up with grey, but I thought I'd go to my local car body place and get a quote to spray it. He was amazing and said that it wouldn't be worth his time, but that I should do it myself with a rattle can and spent about 10mins diving me loads of advice and also gave me some scotchbrite to rub it down with.

His advice was to do 3 very thin coats, using a hair-dryer to warm the metal frame beforehand and also warm the spray can in a jug of warm water. It worked perfectly and my nervousness of the paint flaking hasn't proved founded in 14 months of being sat outside and driven. The hardest part was masking around all the seals/brushes on the window.

Next: Rooflights.

Excellent!

Tidy work, well done!

More!

Nice! I like the 3D printed corners - easier than whittling away at battens.

If you haven't discovered them yet, Everbuild Wonder Wipes are like baby wipes on steroids - they are extremely good on silicone and PU adhesives and don't leave a residue. Must have's for a van build.

Any good for the post-vindaloo toilet shuffle?

Any good for the post-vindaloo toilet shuffle?

If they don't shift it, this will:

🥵

Just a note about Fusion 360. It's an amazing tool and for me, much easier to use than SketchUp (or at least I get stuck less often), BUT you do need to do everything in a specific order to get the most out of it, so it's worth taking the time to watch several official tutorials.

When you do it right, the flexibility is amazing. For example on the above drawing of the van - because we've parameterised any dimensions that might change - we can change the thickness of the floor, or cladding, or size of the box section for the seats and the whole of the rest of the drawing updates to fit them in.

I'm always very impressed by these builds as I have none of the talent, patience or time to do it myself.

Some questions:

how many hours do they take and do you guys really stay on budget?

Also - what is the final weight of the vehicle? This will affect the payload in a 3.5T van

Awesome build, fantastic detail. Enjoying the build photos.

For anyone trying Fusion 360, Lars Christensen on Youtube is excellent.

@ElShalimo
How many hours? Lots and lots and lots. Every time you think something's going to be a couple of hours, a day goes by. I haven't kept a record, but it's hundreds of hours for 2 people.

Do we stay on budget? Nope. As with anything, the more time you invest, the more you start choosing fancier materials, more expensive components, etc, etc. I was on budget until I decided to use Birch Ply for all the walls/surfaces. Roughly double the cost of the normal ply used and it takes longer due to it not hiding any mistakes - i.e. because I'm leaving a raw oiled finish, I can't use filler/paint/ugly joints/etc.
Also - all the tubes of sika/tape/screws add up to much more that you imagine at the start. I have a full spreadsheet of every penny spent, so I know! I'll publish it sometime.

Weight? You have to be a bit careful (i.e. don't overbuild anything or have massive slabs of wood), but you should end up with about 500Kg for people and kit. This can be worse if you've got 100L water tanks, large gas tanks, loads of batteries, etc.

Rooflights

We really wanted large ones of these - for light and ventilation, but the price really ramps up and there seems to be only one manufacturer which probably contributes to the high price.
So we settled on 2 normal 400x400mm ones

During the process of specifying the van I seem to have grown an aversion to the Dometic/Fiamma/Seitz/Waeco/Smev/etc/etc cartel (they are all the same company).

So I chose MPK VisionStar Pro rooflights because they are pretty cheap, infinitely adjustable (so we can open them just a tad in the rain) and nice and clear. They seem good so far.

The only real difference between fitting the windows and the rooflights is that instead of using permanent Sikaflex, I used a non-setting mastic so that they can be removed if needed.
This was based on advice from a number of sources.

I used Hodgeson's Seamseal bedding mastic from Magnum Motorhomes (who supplied the rooflights).

The position of the one at the rear was critical, due to other things in the van and the planned domestic-sized solar panel, so it meant chopping through a roof rib. There are two very close to each other here, so I didn't feel too bad about it.
Used an angle grinder with a box underneath it to catch the bits. Whenever we revealed bare metal we painted it with UPON X182 Zinc primer and then Hammerite smooth white. Forgot to mention that we did that on all the windows above.

Then taped a box under the rooflight position

Then got on top of the van for the first time. It feels pretty solid to walk around on although I only weigh 60Kg
I drilled centre holes for my 50mm holesaw. (the radius spec is probably different for different rooflights)

Then the holesaw

Then I laid a wide strip of masking tape to jigsaw the rest. These jobs are all really really noisy. I got shouted at from someone up the street (who I've never met) for doing it at 10:30 on a Sunday morning "It's a Sunday morning for ****'s sake" she shouted at the top of her voice. Ah well.

You can see that the piece has dropped into the box as planned.

Then dry fit the rooflight to check

(A hint of how much light these might let in)

Minion #2 couldn't help himself

The front rooflight (shown above) was on a flat area, so that was straightforward, but the rear one was over some ribs, so you have to make sure the area where you seal is flat. You can buy plastic plates designed for the van, but they are £40 or so, so learning from Mike D, I cut some uPVC pieces to fill in the gaps.

On this part I went back to using Sikaflex, as it's a permanent addition.

No problems in the 11 months since this.

Again, the rooflights expect a typical 20-30mm motorhome/caravan ceiling thickness, so you have to put in a frame inside the fan around the edge. We used 25mm timber just like the windows. The blind for these rooflights has screw points a little further away than 25mm so we did an 'H' shaped frame and stuck it on with all the clamps as per usual.

(I didn't get a good pic of this, so this is a pic from further on in the build showing the wooden frame shape inside the van and the plastic clips used to fasten the rooflight in place)

I had to leave this to dry overnight, so we covered the van in a tarp

Then the next morning applied liberal amounts of mastic and set the rooflights in.
All went well. IT wasn't quite as easy to shape as Sika, but it was ok (and you have tons of time because it never sets).

Next: Clean out and sound deadening.

As mentioned in the post above.
When fitting the windows, whenever we revealed bare metal edges we painted it with UPON X182 Zinc primer and then Hammerite smooth white. If we were in a hurry we used a hairdryer, but most of the time we just left it overnight between each.

Also – all the tubes of sika/tape/screws add up to much more that you imagine at the start.

Same building a house. I'd budgeted every part of the build except consumables and it was amazing how much screws, sealant, spray foam, tape etc etc adds up.

how many hours do they take and do you guys really stay on budget?

Also – what is the final weight of the vehicle? This will affect the payload in a 3.5T van

I have around 600hrs in mine, give or take. It seemed at the time like 500 of them was insulating the damn thing, seemed to take forever.

Budget - Yes, but I had a healthy budget for our build, I had £12.5k to convert on top of the cost of the van as I knew I wanted a high spec. I had a spreadsheet of every penny spent. We took advantage of the scene tax on our old VW Transporter which turned a nice profit so it only cost £8K to build this one on top of the old van. all in with purchase of brand new base vehicle we spent £27.5k.

Weight - ours weighs 2750kg with fuel, water (120l) and undercounted LPG tanks full. we used lightweight boards to build all the furniture and walls but didn't skimp on stuff, for eg. I used full bearing drawer runners, we have 2x 110ah batteries, I over built the garage and fixed bed and still have plenty of spare weight capacity for loading.

Amazing! Keep it coming

Bookmarked

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/registering-a-diy-caravan

@paton it's actually the external features which are causing a lot of controversy at the moment. They've pretty much stopped allowing re-registering of vans as motor caravans unless it looks like a motorhome on the outside. They reckon it's important that someone on the street should be able to identify it in line with it's registered body type without too much thought.
Currently that includes more than one window on one side, awning, stickers, etc (although these are still open to interpretation by the individual assessing the request)

I've pretty much given up on getting mine changed over. My insurance is cheap enough and I can live with the 50mph on A-roads, 60mph on dual carriageways and 70mph on motorways. Not changing it means I don't have to fit in with their specific interior rules too.

Strip out and Clean

While doing the windows and waiting for various paints/glues to set we stripped out and cleaned the rest of the van.

First job was unbolting the bulkhead. Straightforward apart from 2 bolts which have had their heads deliberately sheared off to prevent tampering. Using pliers and a tap with a hammer worked for me, but some have had to resort to grinding.

I put it on ebay, but nobody was interested, so after one annoying no-show, I took it to the tip

Then stripping out the ply lining. Mine was screwed into the metal in all sorts of random placed with self-tappers. Some awkward burrs to clean off with a file. Most jobs working in the van I ended up with cuts to hands - the the back edges of the skin is sharp, so when stuffing insulation, cleaning or anything you tend to catch it at some point.

The only holes that went to the outside were on the floor. So with these, we used a wire wheel on a drill to smooth/clean them, then I used Jenolite rust converter, then UPON X182 Zinc primer and then Hammerite smooth white. Then I used white Sikaflex to fill any holes.

Floor looked rough when first removing the ply, but actually cleaned up very smart indeed.

The lower half of the walls were covered in a tough plastic material into these clips.

These were a pain to remove as they are riveted. Managed to chisel a couple out, but the rest needed drilling out which causes more metal filing to be controlled/caught/hoovered/etc.

Something I should have learned but haven't
I'm a hoarder. I need to learn to let it go.
I kept thinking that the old ply lining might be useful as boards or as templates, so I kept hold of them. As the van is miles away from the house (36 steps and about 30m) and we don't have much storage space anyway, they stayed in the van. This meant I was always shifting everything from side to side, doing half a job, waiting for things to dry and then doing the other half.
Absolutely pointless and ultimately the ply was of no use. I really wish I'd got ride immediately. Same with the bulkhead and the double-seat (which also eventually ended up at the tip).

----

With the floor clean, rust-free and clear, we then got under the van and marked on every obstruction on the floor.

There isn't much, but the chassis is like a ladder so marking the long rails and cross rails was important as well as the exhaust.

(that's the exhaust on the left with the cross rails in view)

This is the bit that was most critical for us because we want to install an LPG tank under there (behind the exhaust) and bolt through the back seats just at the back of the sliding door opening (just behind the LPG tank location).

FYI: If you don't have a spare wheel fitted, it's possible to buy LPG tanks designed to fit the recess which a wheel would fit into.

@Moses - yes, however as soooooo many Relay/Ducato/Boxers get converted into campers (diy and professional coachbuilders) there are kits made to fit just in this exact location.
We've already fitted ours and I'll do a post about it soon.

Great thread OP.

I was also thinking about the possible weight issues?

500kg for 4 people, bikes and kit? Doesn't sound enough?

No, you're right. It's tight. We're a light family so we'll be fine, but you definitely have to keep an eye on it.
4 ebikes would be too much for example.

If you go over, you can re-register it as heavier, but you need to upgrade to the 'heavy' suspension and youngsters can't drive it without passing a different driving test.

If you go over, you can re-register it as heavier, but you need to upgrade to the ‘heavy’ suspension and youngsters can’t drive it without passing a different driving test.

Only with certain vans.- is the ducato/relay/boxer one of them , I've not seen any 3750/4t versions for sale like you do with the mercs, dailys and masters And the different driving test is your truck test. It's spendy.

It's worth fitting the hd suspension or better still airbags anyway as your less likely to get tugged for looking over weight which if your near 3500kg on standard suspension in something french youll always look overweight.

Mine's the 'heavy' version already. Rear arches still look quite roomy (weighed at 2580kg last week half converted)

Sound deadening

This is one of those jobs that you kind of do because you can't ever go back and do it later.

Depending on the type of insulation you're going to use it may not be necessary (spray foam for example, or maybe celotex stuck firmly to the van skin).

It's about £80 and takes half a day or so.
I used one pack of this: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Silent-Coat-2mm-Bulk-Pk-40-Sheets-Car-Van-Sound-Deadening-Vibration-Proofing-Mat-/151155678947

Here's a video showing the before and after of a fairly badly ringing panel.

As you can see, there's no need to fill the panels. I used a mixture of full sheets and half sheets of the mats to cover the main panels, then went around tapping panels to see if there were any remaining 'ringing' panels. Many of the roof ribs go uninterrupted along quote a few ribs, so as soon as you deaden one bit, there's no need to go over it all the way along.

The rear wheel arches are somewhere where people recommend covering more than usual as a lot of road noise comes from there.

One pack was just right. I've got a couple of sheets spare.

well done. I recon my next van will be one like this.

I`ve just done a LWB vivaro crew cab conversion. i love it.

Sound deadening pt 2

I've just remembered (because I spotted it in the photos when they posted above).
As well as using the sound deadening mat, I also found all the bits of the van where ribs were bonded to skin or where two skins were meant to be bonded and ran a bead of Sikaflex (this time I was using the Sikaflex EBT+ you can buy in any toolstation/screwfix) along them. I did this before the deadening mat in a few places and it worked really well. I think there was a factory foam in a lot of these places, but it had often split, or wasn't applied properly.

Crap photos alert

Just a note for anyone reading this and planning their own - I used adhesive flashing instead of the 'proper' sound deadening stuff on my van. Worked a treat and cost a lot less (under a tenner from memory).

I read about using flashing but a few folks said it ponged a bit, what with the bitumen.

Have you found that?

I bought the 'proper' stuff in the end but was tempted by flashing.

Actually - that mention of flash band reminds me of something else I learned (I was going to leave it until insulation, but I'll mention it here.

Everybody argues on the internet
It's not just that person a suggests one thing and person b suggests another, it's that person b will say that person a's solution will completely destroy your van and person a will say that person b's solution will completely destroy your van 🙂

Coming from a position of ignorance, this can mean you get stuck very easily.

In the end, you have to trust your own judgement, make a decision and keep moving forward. It can be very tricky at times. Sometimes that means following someone's build and copying. Sometimes that means making it up as you go along.

It'll probably be fine 🙂

I used Flash banding in ours (the genuine Bostick stuff) and it worked well - no smell, no problems with 40° heat in France this summer and very effective. (£20 for a 225mm wide x 10m roll from Toolstation)

I wasn't going to bother, but early in out build, I was in the van when it started to rain and couldn't believe the racket.I tried to make a vijeo to show the difference (which it sort of does):

As per the comment above - it's very difficult to go back and do it later!

Interesting about the rain tillydog. To be honest, I was mostly thinking about road noise while driving for ours, but that shows a massive difference.

I read about using flashing but a few folks said it ponged a bit, what with the bitumen.

Have you found that?

Can't say I noticed any smell whatsoever. Certainly not once it I installed insulation, boards, carpet etc. It did make a huge difference in road noise (I drove it for a few days without a bulkhead and fully stripped out - could barely hear myself at motorway speeds. Just adding the flashing and nothing else made a massive difference).

Looks like a great project and progress looks top notch.

This is my tomaso's XLWB Ducato project, also in part inspired by Matt's highly skilled output.

Mechanically my van has been great so far, but I have an intermittent fuelling problem and need to take it to a diesel specialist for a P0089 Fuel Pressure Valve sticking problem. Its been great for 20k miles and every vehicle you keep for a long time costs you money no matter what.

@tomaso - are the photos still online anywhere?

Projects look brilliant, well done all.....

Alex I'll send you a link to the google photo album via direct message.

Can I also have link to images pls.

All essential research

Cough me too.

Anyone looked at the Chinese diesel heaters.

Where are you based I used to work for fiat professional so have some contacts

@duncancallum. Yes, I have looked at Chinese Diesel heaters - there's a massive facebook group and I reckon I would do it for the price saving.
But I decided to go with Gas as it's a bit quieter and I need gas for cooking anyway.
It's a shame there isn't a Chinese diesel cooker 🙂 at a similar cost saving.

I'm near Macclesfield

@alexsimon

Shame got contacts over here.

Google feather diesels they're good chaps

Is the L4 worth the difference?

Seems it’s only a foot longer

the extra length will push you over 6m which makes ferries more expensive

Anyone looked at the Chinese diesel heaters.

Staggeringly cheap compared to Erbespatcher(sp) and the reviews on the T6 forum seem to confirm that they are OK but for me there would be a nagging doubt about there safety given they dont adhere to EU/UK safety regs (as I understand it)

Is the L4 worth the difference?

Seems it’s only a foot longer

It is if you want to fit a shower / toilet at the back of the van - it's ~360mm longer than the L3*, all of which is between the rear wheel arch and the back of the van. There's precious little floor space there in the L2 or L3.

(Also, the L3 is too big to fit into a standard parking space already, so the extra space of an L4 is not really any additional inconvenience.)

Ours is an L2, btw.

(*Assuming we're still talking Boxer / Relay / Ducato vans)

Re: Diesel heaters... If you want to avoid the Chinese heaters, have a look at Planar.

I fitted a Planar 2D Russian made heater and it's at least as good as the Eberspacher D2 we had previously for well under half the cost. Seems very well made (brushless fan motor, etc.) and seems very efficient. Full UK warranty and spares, etc. from PF Jones:

https://www.pfjones.co.uk/planar-2d-12-tm-air-heater-12v.html?currency=GBP

(N.B. some ebay sellers have cottoned on to this and are selling generic Chinese heaters as Planar now - they're not the same).

@Tiger6791

tillyog (Also, the L3 is too big to fit into a standard parking space already, so the extra space of an L4 is not really any additional inconvenience.)

Actually I see a fair few L3s in normal spaces, whereas I haven't to large it over 2 spaces.
Also - as mentioned as soon as you go over 6m, there are extra restrictions on ferrys and chunnel (not that I've done either in it yet).

So, rather than saying is the L4 worth it, I would say going for the smallest van you think you can fit everything in is sensible, even if it causes some headscratching. 4 people and 4 bikes aren't going to fit in an L3 though.

My thinking is that the bikes will be on the outside if sleeping etc. With the ability to store inside if needed, ferrys or parked up.

I would say going for the smallest van you think you can fit everything in is sensible

I’d definitely agree with that! (Hence L2, but there are only 2 of us... and 4 bikes 🙂 ) I have no regrets - it’s worked out very well.

For us, the whole point of converting the van was to keep the bikes inside, but YMMV, etc.

See, I’m the other way round. I have an L2 boxer for work and an L3 camper, If doing again I’d have probably gone L4 camper to give more bed and garage space in my design.

I was scratching for mm’s when building, no space wasted at all. I wanted toilet and shower cube and the garage had to house all of the kit and bikes, can get 6 in but I have to take both wheels off every time which is a bit of an arse ache. However I wanted all the kit locked inside so it was a compromise worth making, had a T5 before and bikes had to go on a rack and I was never happy leaving it unattended or over night.

Solar setup

Before insulating the ceiling, I wanted to fit the solar panel. I'd wire it later, but to make the decision, you kind of have to decide EVERYTHING - which is a right pain. Anyway....

Early on in the planning, I found out that domestic solar panels are much cheaper than the smaller ones you get for vans/boats/etc.

Lots of people put them on vans and a single panel can be around 300W for around £100-140

But obviously they are big and required specific placement of my rooflights.

There are loads around the same size/price/power, but depending on what solar controller you're going to use, some may be too high volts (as they tend not to be 12V)

There was also some debate as to whether my van (Euro 5) came with a smart alternator or not.
Smart alternators mean that you can't use a simple split charge system to charge the leisure battery from the alternator. They need a more sophisticated and expensive B2B charging system.

(note: As it happens, since this, I've come to the conclusion that these vans don't have a smart alternator unless they also have stop/start - but check!)

Sooooo. With both the panel voltage in mind AND the B2B system in mind, I decided to go with a B2B charger with a solar controller included.
I bought everything from Bimble Solar

Ring RSCDC30 B2B Charger
Solar panel 300W JA All Black
Solar accessories Brackets, Cable, Gland, etc

For a total of £418

The brackets and panel frame come undrilled, so you have to work out how to attach them to each other and the roof.
I personally didn't fancy sticking them with glue, so I nut and bolted everything.

First, I made sure the brackets were going to sit ok on flat pieces of the van roof. All good.

Then attached the brackets to the frame. Quite exacting work.

I used 2 stainless M5 bolts per bracket (4 brackets) with washers.

Then drilled the brackets where they were going to go through the roof. I can't remember what M size I used here, maybe stainless M6

Then added those sticky zip tie pads to route the cables neatly

Then lifted it onto the roof, drew through the holes with a marker pen, drilled the holes and then touched them up with the usual Upon/Hamerite process.

Then applied the non-setting mastic to the areas where the brackets were going to sit. I didn't want water sitting here. Quite a lot of mastic used!

This is the bolt from the inside - big washer and as this was close to a sloped bit of metal, we spaced it out with a bit of ply.
I smeared mastic all around top and bottom of the holes before inserting the bolts.

All good!

Last job was to drill out the holes for the wires (using a box inside to catch the bits again).

Thread the cables through glands and stick the box down. I'm only using glue for this bit, so good old Sikaflex to the rescue.

Totally forgot to get a good pic of the completed roof 🙁

BTW - I haven't installed any of the electrics yet, so can't even comment on whether the solar panel works, or anything about the Ring unit, etc.

Drilling the roof is horrible isn't it! Don't get me wrong, you've done a lovely job. I just hate that moment when you're going to put a hole in the solid roof and bring in potential leaks. That is a hefty bit of solar, top job.

@spacey - yes, the whole thing up to this point was unnerving!
But I have to say (if I haven't already) - take things slowly, measure twice, have a cup of tea then measure again and look up some simple techniques on forums and it's surprising how straightforward everything was!