Carpeting, storage, LEDs, and glue. Lots of glue.

After a two month hiatus for exams, Sundown is back 'on the road' to completion (sorry, I'm tired).

Lots of carpeting has happened since I last blogged. A lovely cockney chap called Mike from Go Carpets (http://www.gocarpets.co.uk/) allowed me to rummage around in his basement, as it were, and gave me a load of old rolls of carpets for a 'cut me own throat gov'nor' price.

Firstly there was the bamboo weave-type stuff, with which I've done the front driver and passenger foot wells.








Then there's the stripy stuff which I really like, and am doing all the walls (bottom half) with. Totally down with the stripes at the moment, don't know why, maybe because they're slimming.

From this view you can also see the back shelf, also carpeted. From tomorrow I'm going to be building some storage in that back left hand (right as you look at it) corner, which will incorporate, a wardrobe, kitchen cupboards, and utensil drawers, then around the back, in the same unit, will be shelves for the bits and bobs you need when campervanning: wire, fuses, gas bottle, water tank, cocaine, bucket and spade, deck chair, ....hmmm?

Also carpeted the front shelf today and fitted the new LED bulbs.

I did have some 50w spot lights in these sockets (and the other 3 sockets in the rest of the van) but they a) set fire to our retinas every time they were turned on, b) announced our presence to anyone within 50 miles when we were trying to sneakily camp in cheeky beach-side spots, and c) used a lot of power, 50w to be precise, which was a lot to take from the leisure battery. These LEDs cost £1.50 on eBay (from Hong Kong, delivery - 0.99) they're 21 LED which gives you enough light to do stuff, and read by, they only use 1w of power, last for up to 50,000 hours (normal bulbs are about 900), and they run cool which is great because the 50w bulbs could have set fire to a damp extinguisher.

The big news from today is carpeting the ceiling which was a horrible nightmare and involved me swearing and shouting at pots of glue and paintbrushes, while my girlfriend stoically stood bent double holding the carpet up with her back while the glue dried. Horrendous. Would never do it again. Nevertheless, it turned out alright. Big thanks to Diamond Millenium Carpets (http://www.diamondcarpets.co.uk/) for giving me half a massive bucket of glue at cost price.

I've also been building some boxes for storage under the bed. As you'll no doubt remember from my earlier posts, the point of building the fiendishly clever sliding double bed...



...was to conserve storage space underneath. So, yeah.....tadaa!

These were made from more recycled wood from TRiM and the fronts from the left over teak laminate flooring.

So, a little more carpeting tomorrow. Actually quite a bit more. Then the next priority is some work on the mechanical workings of the bus. Now, I know my way around a jigsaw, but what the hell all that stuff under the bonnet is, is anybody's guess. Looks like Optimus Prime's bowels. Anyway, the steering on the bus is a bit, shall we say 'wandery' on the motorway so, as I understand it from the manual, I need to do something with the power steering box (what? did it come in a box?) and pump grease into the king pins (that's GOT to be a joke. Apparently not.) Wish me luck.

So after a 12 hour day, a just reward was at hand.

Then, as punishment for my naivety that there should be a reward, I'm off to it in the bath while my girlfriend cuts the glue out my hair.

Until next time... (which will probably be tomorrow so the air of mystique lent by the 3 dots is redundant).

ENDS.