Glad to hear you are listening.

Hope the powered vent is to inject air in, so the combustible fumes exhaust without passing the fan.

Otherwise, the fan may have sparks inside that can ignite the mixture.

 

Induction fans don't.

 

Just explosion proof the whole thing..

I have had the fun of seeing a battery after it exploded internally...

Cracked the whole casing and spilled acid.

 

Acrylic lid continued:

Supplies:
Lowes
nylon hose barb splicer - 5/8" x 5/8" - $1.41
Loctite Plastic Bonder - 20 Min -.85 Oz - $5.72

The battery box lid has been assembled and water tested.


Now add vent hose fitting.
Here are an assortment of parts for the venting system. Most of these I'll be using later. For the lid I'm using one of the 5/8" x 5/8" hose barbs.


Only need half of the fitting. Used a hacksaw to cut it.The fitting had a ring around the center to separate the two hoses that normally would have been attached. Cut it so all of that ring is on one half. I'll use that half and call the ring the base.


Need to find the diameter at the base.


Closer to 11/16" than 5/8"


Will use a 3/4" spade drill bit. Figure out the hole location. Ultra fine Sharpe works really well for marking on the acrylic. Cleans off with alcohol.
Choose the location just below where the two Top acrylic panels meet. This is the highest point so hydrogen gas will collect here.


Supported the lid from underneath with a piece of 2x4 to reduce the chance of cracking it as I drilled.




Maybe not dead center, but close enough.


Do a test fit of the hose barb. The barb is pushed through the hole from inside the lid. The barb base is up against the lid on the inside. Looks OK.


Here is what I'll be using to attach the hose barb to the lid. I've read that the if you use a slower setting epoxy the joints will be less brittle. That's why I'm using a 20 minute epoxy versus the 5 minute kind. Instructions recommend roughing up the acrylic with 220 grit sandpaper first, which I did.


Mix up the epoxy and apply liberally.


The connection between the acrylic lid and the hose barb has to be air tight. I used clamps with a piece of scrap wood to hold the base of the barb tight against the side of the acrylic lid. I put a piece of plastic shopping bag between the epoxy and the wood so the wood wouldn't also get stuck. I figured I could always just pick off pieces of the bag after it set up.


Let it sit more than 20 minutes. Then when I went to take off the clamps I found that the shopping bag hadn't stuck at all. It just fell right off. So either shopping bags don't stick to this epoxy or it had skinned over before I put the bag against it.

Looks OK. Let it sit overnight before I stressed it. No problems.


continued -

 

Nice job in building and posting the pics and details of your progress. I once built a VW camper where I transferred the camping equipment from a VW camper to a cargo (Kombi) version. The fiberglass insulation wasn't bagged and I did find evidence of condensation so I bagged it when reinstalling. I was able to get some insulation (Armaflex) that is used in the refrigeration trade to do my sides and the doors.
After that I picked up a 62 Ford stepvan that some one had started to convert. I picked up some self stick carpet tiles for the walls and the floor to cut down on noise and insulated the roof with bagged fiberglass. An old Dodge van conversion project came my way when the PO didn't want to deal with pulling the fuel tank. He had done a very nice conversion that wasn't fancy but was very comfortable to sleep in. The dinette in back made into a bed and he had put furring strips and paneling on the walls and roof. I did install a 12v computer power supply fan in the roof vent.
My last project was a conversion van that I made into a "half back". The front was a 92 Chevy/ Mark III conversion van. I removed the bed/sofa and built a wall in back of the rear bucket seats and made a small work area to mount my tool box and shelves on either side for parts and tools. My stealth was to make it look like an old conversion van and not a work van. Work vans get broken into much more than family vans. That one had a inverter for the 2 golf cart batts mounted in a sealed box that was vented with a 1" hose through the floor. I put a stainless steel scrubby in the hose to keep critters out. I also used a small solar charger and 3 12v computer fans provide some ventilation.
The project I never completed was a 82 GMC C 3500 Ambulance. It was a great trailer hauler but it was a little much for a DD.
BTW most of these were used to haul my tent trailers and made excellent tow vehicles. As a tradesman, coach, cubmaster, scoutmaster, and father of four kids I loved the versatility of the Dodge and Chevy vans.

I've got a small fifth wheeler now so I'm stuck with a 95 F 150 pickup.
Just some ramblings, keep up the good work.
regards
rikard

 

Hey Rikard,
Thanks for the kind words. I liked reading your ramblings. In regards to van break-ins I never really thought about it before but you're right. It's work vans thieves want to break into. Nothing is easier to hock than tools. Now you got me thinking about making more of a show that my plain white cargo van isn't a work truck which is what I was going for. I'm going to have to ponder this one for a while. Either way once I start really fixing up the inside an alarm system and kill switch will be in order.
Thanks for bring up the point.
Dave

 

Get a set of magnetic signs saying the truck belong to a roadkill collection / rendering operation, or an exterminator firm.

Should stop most tool thieves.

 

County morgue.

 

Funeral Home?

 

Acrylic Lid continued:

Before adding hold-down straps I'm going to beef up the lid with some more supports. None of these might be needed but since this is my first work with acrylic I'll err on the side of caution.

Add an extra panel on each end. Since this panel fits flat against the panel next to it no need for the tedious edge sanding.


Mistake Number 1. When I first went to glue these together I used the squeeze bottle to cover the new panel with Weld-On #3 then leisurely held the panel against the lid to join them. WRONG.

Live and learn. From when the Weld-On #3 first hits the acrylic you have about two seconds to finish applying the glue and get the two pieces together. Not nearly enough time for a piece this big. No permanent harm. Clamp together the two pieces then use the capillary action method for applying the cement.


Did both ends.


Then add a brace across the middle of the lid at the location of the hose barb. Had to notch the end of the brace so it would fit over the end of the barb. In this picture the lid is upside-down. The brace doesn't go all the way to the top of the lid as so not to obstruct the airflow. Used tedious edge sanding on the brace before cementing.


The hold-down strap will be made from a bungee cord I had hanging around. Need to find it's diameter. It's close to 1/4 ".


So if its .25" and the acrylic is .2" thick then four pieces stacked together should give me a good base. Cut out the needed acrylic pieces from some scrap.


Glue together 2 pieces at a time. Since the pieces are so small the "apply Weld-On #3 on one side then slap the two pieces together" technique worked OK. The problem is that once the two pieces touch each other you have about an instant to get them properly aligned.


Next join two sets of two. Because of the quick setting nature of the cement I didn't get the blocks as even as I'd like. Here I'm about to sand a block to even the edges. This is just for looks. I'll be gluing it to the lid using the flat side, not the edge


Drill a hole through the middle for the bungee cord.


WARNING: As the drill bit exited the other side it grabbed the block and caused it to spin. This is apt to happen when drilling harder materials. I thought I had a good grip but not good enough. It spun around and gave me a right little knock on the fingers. Luckily No damage.


Cut bungee cord in two. Feed one cord through the block. Add a washer for extra support.


Fold over the top of the cord. Use three 4" cable ties to squeeze and hold closed the fold. Needle nose pliers work well at cinching up a small cable tie. Clip off excess tie ends. Do the same for other block.


Glue block to end of lid. One each end.


Add a screw hook to the base block. I've glued the bungee blocks an inch off center so the hooks won't be in the way of the bolt that should go through the center of the base block to secure the battery box to the van floor. The screw hook is where the bungee cord attaches to keep the lid shut.


Take the base outside and give it a couple coats of paint.


All done.




In this picture you can see Quality Control Engineer Bob checking where the lid meets the base to see if the closing tolerances are within agreed upon specifications. Either that or she smells fish.


Without the batteries weighted the box and lid with a bathroom scale.


And one battery.


23 + (4 x 64) = 279 pounds of house batteries.
Consider this the finish of the Battery Box build.

 

I said morgue because who'd want to break into that.

 

You're right. Much more gruesome than funeral home.

 

A quick post on using calipers. More particular vernier calipers.
If you've been following these postings you'll have seen pictures where I'm using them.
Here's the three I own.


The top (plastic) one cost me about a buck. The middle one got for around $6. The bottom one I inherited.
I use them to measure width or depth.
I wouldn't trust the markings on the plastic one but it's good for getting a size then comparing it to a tape measure.


These are the Outside Jaws.


And for measuring inside, the Inside Jaws.


On the other end is the Depth Probe.


Once you've taken a measurement, this is how to read it.
On the Main Scale is marked inches and 1/10 of inches. Only the even numbered 1/10 marks are labeled. The top scale is the Vernier Scale. This caliper is accurate to 3 decimal places.


Here's an example measurement.
Find where the zero mark on the Vernier Scale lines up on the Main Scale. It's between 0 and 1 inch.


On the Main Scale the zero mark is pointing between 0.5 and 0.6. Between the 1/10 inch marks are three shorter marks. Each mark equals .025 inches. This value will be the same as the largest value on the Vernier Scale. Since the zero mark is to the right of the third .025 mark the measurement is
.5 + .025 + .025 + .025 = .575
before adding the Vernier Scale.


To use the Vernier Scale find which of it's marks line up exactly with any mark on the Main Scale. It will only line up with one but you have to look closely to determine which one. Add the value from the Vernier Scale, .012 in this example, to get the total measurement.
.575 + .012 = .587 inches.


Or you could use a dial caliper.


And why might you need to know measurements this accurate?
Here's one way I used them. The smaller bits had fallen out of my drill case.


The bits have been used so much you could no longer read the end markings.


Use the dial caliper to get the diameter from a drill bit then convert fraction to decimal.


Worked like a champ.

 

Sofa-Bed.
It's not done yet but at this point I've finally got it all figured out.
Time to start the write-up. The sofa-bed will be the most complex thing I'm going to build for the van conversion. It would have been nice to put this off until later in the project but so many other elements depend on the size and placement of the sofa-bed so it has to go first.

The usual warnings apply. I've never designed and built anything like this before. I've had to make a bunch of assumptions (wild a** guesses) and not sure how these will work out in practice. Will find out after I put it to some use.

One more point. Even though this will fold out to a bed I don't believe it's sturdy enough for any serious "bouncy-bouncy". Seeing is how I camp alone that wasn't a design consideration, unfortunately. I like how the English would phrase it, "More's the pity".

When the the sofa-bed is in the bed position it will be 74 inches long by 42 inches wide. I choose 74" long since I'm 6 ft tall (72") so that gives me room to lay flat with a couple inches extra. 42" wide because when it's in the sofa position the seat and the back will each be 21 inches wide and that felt to me like a comfortable seat size. I'm using two electric actuators to open and close the sofa-bed.

For padding I've bought 3 inch thick foam and a 2" thick memory foam topper. Not yet decided about how to cover them.

Here is the basic design I started with. I've stayed fairly close to it.




So far on this build I've made more mistakes and wrong turn than I care to admit. Here's a picture of the sofa-bed bone pile and I'm not even done yet.


I got started on this about a month and a half ago. First cut the two end pieces. They are 30" x 31". I'm using 19/32" plywood.


Made the seat and back frames from a 3/4" thick pine planks I had laying around.


Each frame is made from five pieces. Here are the dimensions of the pieces used on the back frame.


The seat frame is slightly different in size. I had some 5-1/2" wide boards on hand so instead of ripping them down to 5" I just increased the width of the frame an inch. So the back frame is 74"x20" while the seat frame is 74"x21". 20" + 21" doesn't equal 42" but the foam is cut to 42" and it can easily overhang the edge of the frame by 1".

continued.

 

Sofa-bed continued:

I've constructed the seat frame this way since I'm planning on having "hatches" to access the area under the sofa.


I copied the same design for the back frame but the hatch part won't be hinged.

Before I assemble the frame pieces I want to route out a lip so the plywood hatches will sit partially recessed. Here's my router attached to the router table.


Like other power tools the router can put a put a good bit of hurt on you if you're not careful when using it. It uses a sharp bit spinning at very high speed and the wood has to be held tight against the bit as it is moved across the table. All kinds of chances to make a unfortunate slip.

In operation there is one noticeable difference between a router and other power tools, like a saw for instance. A saw takes one piece of wood and then produces two pieces of wood and some sawdust. With a router you start and stop with one piece of wood but the amount of sawdust that is produced seems exponentially larger than the amount wood that was removed. I think of it more as a sawdust production machine than as a router. Because of the sawdust problem I always attach my shopvac to the router table. The table has a fitting just for this.


Problem is that once you start both the router and shopvac the amount of noise the two of them make in a small garage is not to be believed. I've never stuck my head inside the exhaust of a spinning jet engine but I bet I know how it might sound. I make a point of not using my power tools later that 9:00pm so my kindly neighbours won't be tempted to host a necktie party in my honor.

Here is the router bit I've installed on the router. It's a double fluted carbide tipped straight bit. It's used to make square edged cuts. I'm going to make the recess cut 3/4" wide. I could explain why this is the best possible size for this application but in reality it's just the widest bit I have.


The boards I'm routing are 3/4" thick so I'm setting the bit to cut 1/4" deep (1/3 the thickness). Use the caliper to set the router bit depth (height?).


After making changes to the router bit I always do a test cut with a piece of scrap wood to check the settings.


Here's how you'd use the depth probe on the cailpers to check the cut.




continued -