good day folks Uncle neck is here guess what I'm pretty excited but also a little daunted as I'm just about to attempt to convert a van into a camper van with my 25-year-old son jack I've never done this type of thing before so fingers crossed everything goes well but seriously what could possibly go wrong all righty let's get this show on the road so this is a set of wheels that we're working with it's a high on dive ey Lo which Jack bought for about 15 G 15 G which is a pretty good deal so let's swing open these barn doors and have a look inside what do we got so we've got a very basic setup you got the the mattress on the floor yep good your surfboard on the side yep love it your cook top just floating around your es get the end yep a camp chair and a little light so pretty basic setup very very basic when you're driving things fly everywhere it's very annoying so what's your plan of attack we need something which is practical secure so everything doesn't move around you don't want your surfboards banging around cuz that's going to break them yep we want something comfortable and this van definitely gives you enough space to do so so sweet a let's get stuck into it sounds good so the plan of attack is to get a spot where you can put your surf for securely we're going to put a sort of cabinet here to store your computers your iPads Etc uh a fold out bed um that you can pull in and out with a sort of sofa up here so the plan with the front is we're going to have a cabinet here with a pull out kitchen yep then we're going to have a fridge set up over there one you can open up from the top yep uh there's going to be a little spot for all the the batteries electricals and stuff and if we're lucky a bit more storage so see how we go cool now with the ey load and I suppose any van for that matter space is at a premium so you really need to be mindful of the real estate that you have at your disposal and then try and squeeze every inch that you can out of the space that you have now look Jack is a pretty big unit he's about 6'3 and roughly two axx handles across the shoulders so the height of the van from the floor to the ceiling as well as the width is quite limiting as is the length of the van as we need to be able to fit in a bed that Jack can actually sleep onc comfortably and then just to add one more layer of spatial complexity as Jack mentioned earlier he wants to store his surf boards inside the van when he's traveling and at night to help reduce the risk of his boards being stallen this is going to be a challenge oh yeah did I mention that Jack my helper actually lives 3 hours away up on the Gold Coast now here's a really useful tip we are going to be putting down a plywood floor which can be a real pain as you need to be able to cut around curves wheel arches doorways etc etc so what you can do is when we pull up this plastic layer here don't Turf it out cuz this plastic layer already has the curves wheel arches doorways Etc cut into it so we're going to be using that as a template to Mark out the plywood see not as dumb as I look o now one very important thing you need to be wary of with the ey load is that this black cover plate on the floor covers the fuel lines and the electric elect Les for the fuel tank so when you're putting down your floor or your Cabinetry just make sure youve got some sort of cover that you can remove just in case you need to access these things later down the track so the first thing we need to do slash I need to do is strip the inside of the van that way we can see what we're dealing with which involves pulling up the Floor Covering and removing the side panels that way we can then stall some of those sound deadening sheets and also insulate the van from the hot and cold now just like pulling up the cushions on an old sofa I was actually hoping to find some Hidden Treasures under that black mat but just my luck nothing not even a 5cent coin very disappointing what I did find though was a very dirty floor that needed to be swept up vacuumed and then thoroughly washed down with some sugar soap on a 30 for de great day seriously I'm too old for this ker where Jack when him s the cleaning lady there you go that's looking pretty good [Music] yeah pour on these flooring and insulation cool now with your insulation just bear in mind that we are in Australia so we don't get the extremes of cold like you do over in places like North America and the UK so your insulation requirements for over in those places will be more heavy duty it's basically the same process but with a higher rated insulation now the first thing we need to do is to get the floor sorted which involves cutting down some 70x 35 mm Pine studs Into Thin strips that are basically the same height as the ribs on the floor which are glued down rather than screwed down now mental note I try at all times to avoid Drilling into the outside skin of the vehicle as that will only encourage rust and you don't want that once glued the floor battens need to be held down tight to the floor till that glue dries which is usually a 24-hour process just cut some Thin strips of all scrap wood and lightly Jam them up to the ceiling wherever you find a roof mlly in so that's the floor battern all done and as you can see it's nice and flat with no lumps and bumps which is good the glue's been down for 24 hours so that should be dry so let's take off these braces and then move on to the next step of installing the floor instulation hey since we're talking about Vans and stuff how's this a couple of days ago I saw Vincent Van Goff sitting in a pub and I said hey Vince would you like a beer mate he said no thanks I've got one here I'm here all week folks try the [Music] de now I've got to say the glue that I used which is a multi-purpose adhesive and Joint sealant did the job perfectly it has awesome holding abilities as well as a little bit of give which is the perfect combination as your van is bashing and crashing ing as it's being driven down the [Music] road now when it comes time to actually stick in the insulation down to the floor of the van all I'm using is this can of sprayon contact adhesive all you do is spray both surfaces wait till it's almost dry kind of tacky and then boom you're good to [Music] go see that's too easy I should also mention that this project has been classified by Jack as budget friendly keep it simple dad and don't blow the budget Roger that mate and let's crack on with cutting out that flooring using the black plastic as a template now just a quick side note if you find yourself a little intimidated by using power tools I have links to howto videos and a course down below which you will find very [Music] useful all righty let's give this a test fingers crossed folks beautiful all righty next [Music] sheet [Music] now as you can see that floor is as flat as a tack which is absolutely fantastic and with that done we can then shoot upstairs and concentrate on installing t
