Three-Two-One....

...ignition. Blast off! With a whoosh and a roar, the Wallas hob is up'n away!

Or, in our case, not. If this was a moonshot, we'd have got about as far as first-stage separation before the mission was terminated with an embarrassing "phutt". We are dismayed....

But before we get to that, it's time to unveil our new rear end. So to speak. Elly has had a massive makeover over the last few weeks purely to accommodate the Wallas hob, some of which we've already shown. With all the trim and fancy stuff now in place, it's time for the Grand Tour of our Grand Design. Actually, Kevin McCloud probably wouldn't be that interested...more in the territory of George "Oh My Word" Clarke and his Amazing Small Spaces. 

So, cue drum roll, here is our new home-on-wheels, our latest room-with-a-thousand views, with sales pitch from Bodgit & Scarper, Estate Agents:

The view from the entrance hall

"Hello and welcome to this rare opportunity to view a unique approach to Pikey Living. From the street you could be forgiven for thinking that this is just another 110, but open the back door and...
The designers have thoughtfully provided space for 3 Wolf boxes along the entrance corridor which can form a bed base if the occupant is solo, unmarried or in trouble. There's room to stretch out too - the area under the drawers and storage box which used to have the wheel change kit is now clear, allowing a space to place the feet. Or foot, if pedally challenged. We like to be inclusive.

Moving along, on the left we have..

The kitchen

 This is mostly 12mm waterproof external grade ply with aluminium edging, sensibly finished with quick-drying, heat resistant woodstain varnish from Messrs Ronseal. The drawer and closet fronts are 6mm ply as they carry no loads. The rubber flooring which extends up the skirting boards (or where they would be) is waterproof, hardwearing and easy to clean and is insulated underneath.

And on the right, we have...

 

The lounge/diner

😃The tip-up seat won't be a pair - see previous on this - but it doesn't matter since the only time it needs to be is if we're carrying passengers, which almost never happens. If/when it does, someone's going to be sitting on the floor or on the guest chair:

This is a seat from an old Series which was thrown out from a mate's garage. I thought I'd never find a use for it and it almost went into the bin... The load rail can act as an anchor point for a lap belt in extremis. Probably not legal....must remember to take it out when MoT time comes around again. 😶

Ahem...excuse me, don't interrupt! Moving on along the corridor, on the left we have...

The sitting room

This cosy little nook is a quiet haven for the non-chef to relax and enjoy the papers while other activities take place.

😉It keeps me out of the Soup Dragon's way.

60 litres of drinking water can be stored under the desk top which  is removeable to allow access to the filler cap, as well as being a lap-top laptop tray.

 With the worktop folded into place, the kitchen is 1/3rd bigger without sacrificing anything. The view through the blind spot window isn't compromised whether the flap is up or down. It's supported by timber fold-out bracing which makes it capable of easily holding 30kgs.

 Retracing our steps and looking to your right, we have the sink, neatly covered by this bespoke worktop, just like they have on telly. This can itself be covered with an aluminium sheet, tailored to fit, that was lovingly crafted from an old computer cabinet. It can be used as a cutting board or a heatproof potstand.

 The sink is an innovative design feature which came about in response to the extortionate delivery charges demanded by The Usual Suspects in the caravan accessories business. The sink has 2 depths depending on how clean one wishes to be or how dirty one has become. In the worst case, the sink may be extended...

...to provide a hip bath. There is ample headroom should the bather wish to adopt a more erect stance.

 The slide-out fridge freezer is a masterpiece of the Skip Diver's art, using as it does items that have been carefully retained 

 he means "hoarded"

for many years. This re-use of materials doesn't reflect the previous, numerous and failed attempts to achieve this result, which have reduced the Materials Store 

He means "junk pile"


to a mere fraction of its former volume.

Kitchen storage has been imaginatively arranged to get a quart into a pint pot. Once again, recycling of various items has reduced the carbon footprint of the design and freed up space to accumulate yet more treasures from the Tip.

 A family-friendly dining experience is enhanced by this pull-out table which allows 3 people to dine in close proximity provided they are not over Size 10 or have big arses. Prospective occupants who exceed this criteria may have to dine Al Fresco. If he's open. 
We hope you have enjoyed your tour of this delightful bijou mobile residence."

All we need now is a bloody cooker that works! We're going to the Danny Boyle "Pages of the Sea" Remembrance event in Findhorn Bay tomorrow and had hoped to be able to provide tea and bacon sarnies to friends from our brand new kitchen but it's not to be; at least, not using our very expensive Wallas hob, it ain't. We can't get it to work. We'll be using the Old Faithful gas cooker instead. Hmmm.

We've spent a long time this week firing the Wallas up and trying to get it to stay lit. It works fine - up to a point - now that we've finished the fuel plumbing. I'm still waiting for some parts that might be useful to come from the supplier since he's happy to swap the "bean tin" for the VW T5 kit. In the interim I've plumbed the fuel line into the main tank using the redundant breather pipe I blocked off before since it was breathing a little too readily! I've passed the fuel pipe through some PVC hosepipe so it's protected under the chassis and now the connections are made the diesel flows properly into the filter and beyond. In fact the filter filled so quickly the pump must have quite a powerful suck to it.

This is the final Final Arrangement of the feeds to the Wallas hob. I think....hope?

The ignition sequence works just as the manual says, but after exactly 4 minutes and 50 seconds - actually plus or minus 5 seconds on that - we get a flameout indication and everything cools down. This time is consistent over the 15 attempts we've now made to get it going and suggests to me something other than fuel starvation; like some kind of auto-shutdown is happening. We've been through the fault-finding guide in the manual and eliminated all the listed causes, so we're stumped. Again. Not only that but I've had to run the engine occasionally to keep the battery up to charge and I've now got a bloody headache from the fumes.

Having got thoroughly fed up with playing about, I gave up and turned my attention to something else. 
In the box of bits that the PO gave me was the broken cover to the rear door latch. I nearly binned it but now that I've seen how much these trivial bits of plastic cost, I'm glad I didn't. Obviously nobody makes copies of these so we're forced to pay Landrover Dealer prices. You can add a nought or three to the actual production cost to get a replacement...so I've repaired it with a bit of aluminium trim left over from the kitchen.

 I intended to put the ally under the edge to make it neater, but this makes the cover stand so proud of the frame the chequerplate skin won't sit down correctly, so I had to put it on top. It's not too noticeable, though, and a lot cheaper than the alternative.

Another quick job now that the heater box and blower duct are back in, was to put one of these on...

We've replaced the cable grips on the drainpipes with proper p-clips too

This is called a Snow Cowl and hopefully will keep the water out of the blower duct and prevent the problem that the other one suffered from. Some people reckon that a ram-air duct on this intake works to assist the blower, but our experience doesn't support that theory. I reckon that you need to be moving at considerable speed for a small duct suchas anything that can be fitted here will have any significant effect; otherwise it just gets in the way and actually collects more water than the standard intake grille. Since we never get up to anything approaching Escape Velocity, we wouldn't ever get any benefit.
I thought I had some photos of the final stage of refitting the blower motor, but can't find 'em. Suffice to say that the resistor

arrived last Friday at 12 and everything was back together and blowing like the London Philharmonic by 2pm. At 2 speeds anorl 👍

 

I also made up a couple of these:

They need a slight dimple in the centre of the slot to make them easier to use, and a coat of, in our case, black paint to make them less obvious. If you're an Alu-Cab owner, you might realise why I've made them. If you're not, I'll not give anything away. 'Nuff to say that they address another security problem in addition to all the others that Defender owners have. If anyone wants an explanation, post a comment with your Alu-Cab receipt and I might tell you...

A short update for Alu-Cab owners...the slot that I cut in these was slightly too long and I've closed the gap a little with a washer on the back. The important thing is to support the channel by the lock so it sits high enough to guard the vulnerable area. I'm sure you'll know what I mean....

And finally, say Hello to the newest recruit to the Elisfor Overland Adventure Society:-

"Jess" is a Coxie - a cross between a collie and fox, we think. Anyway, she's car-friendly, lightweight, quiet and likes to travel. She's been in the Shetland Islands since birth 2 years ago and spent the last week in trucks, ships and strange places. She's been with us for 36 hours now, and has already decided where she likes to spend her afternoons!

Killing Time

Mail Order. I've learned to take delivery times with a big pinch of salt, but it's always frustrating to have to wait a week for a tiny part that could arrive within 24 hours if the supplier could be bothered...

So, since I'm still waiting for the Pony Express to arrive with the replacement resistor, the heater repair has had to be put on hold. There's no point in putting everything back together only to dismantle it again, so we're immobile until this £3.00 bit arrives. I could link the heater hoses together but, to be honest, it isn't worth the bother of topping up and bleeding the cooling system just in case a dump of snow means we need the truck on the road. It isn't likely to happen.

So I've turned my attention to other little jobs. Now that we've proved the concept, I replaced the plastic tabs that had been holding the "downpipes" in place with proper "P" clips. I wouldn't say that this is the first experimental fitting that has made it to Full Production status, but probably not far off.

Having spent months thinking about the rear wash/wipe system I eventually admitted defeat and bought a new switch from MUD UK which is supposed to be a "plug'n play" replacement for the existing one - if it was there.

  Since it isn't I thought it would be easy to find the wires behind the dash - they must be there somewhere - and connect the two components together. Of course, the new switch arrived with more spades on the back than there are wires to connect....which goes where? And the promised wiring diagram is nowhere in site/sight. I went onto the website in the hope there was a clue in the "fitting instructions" menu. No chance. Never bloody simple is it? Especially when you discover this on Saturday evening and you can't get advice until Monday. Yet another job gets shelved...Late entry: the matrix  - on the website - that explains the pin locations assumes that you know that the pin numbers are etched into the side of the switch in numbers as easy to read as the Dead Sea scrolls. Simple when you've found 'em, though. I also got a bit stumped with the wiring to the wiper motor. I had 5 wires but only 3 connections. All the on-line diagrams and pictures showed a 3-pin Econoseal connector on the top - that bit was easy.

They also showed another 2-pin connector, apparently on the side. It is, actually, on the "back" of the motor. Having already bolted it to the door this connector is hidden...once I'd taken everything apart the connector revealed itself but, of course, I hadn't got a 2-pin plug to go into it. A bit of lateral thinking ensued. I'd bought 2 Econoseal connectors in case I messed one up, and the pins would fit into the connector with a bit of persuasion, all I had to do was insulate them...Of course, it wasn't quite that simple. Since the pins in the socket don't seem to fit the female pin I had, some force was required. This resulted in one of the pins disappearing backwards into the motor body and required the dismantling of the motor cover to get it back. Eventually, though, all 5 connections have been made and the wires - albeit not the correct colours - led out of the door to the loom. I'll make the final connections later, once the switch is in place. I'll make sure I keep a note of the wire colours in the Little Black Book, though.

The wires exit the door on the left of the picture and normally have a plastic cover and rubber tube to lead them into the tub. These are silly money so I'll make my own out of something, although I've ordered the little support bracket to keep it all aligned.
The motor and cover protrude quite a way from the inner door skin and this needed to be accommodated if we're going to retain the drop-down table. I could just cut the appropriately sized piece out of the table top, but this will look a bit odd and probably make the thing unusable. The solution I came up with was this:

First, cut the table flap in half, rivet a new hinge along the cut line.

 

...then re-attach the flap and connect the stays. There's a bit of a kink in the joint, but it's in the "right" direction to stop things rolling off.

The flap then goes through a double fold before being retained as before. We might enclose the chains with something to stop them rattling.

We might do a bit of colour-co-ordination eventually to make it all look a little less experimental.
                                          An EGT gauge. Do we need one?

Having bought a "boost pin" - they can dramatically improve the pulling power, apparently -  I really don't want to fit it until I can monitor the engine temperatures more carefully. This requires a method of measuring the exhaust gas temperature. I have two from a kit that came with a Rotax engine and tried to find a way to connect the probe to the exhaust system without drilling through the EGR housing, which is how most people do it. I replaced the EGR system earlier this year for the benefit of the MoT rules which now state that any interference with OEM EGR systems etc will mean a "Fail", so I don't have this simple option and will have to find another. Before getting the drill out, though, I tested the probe by heating it with a soldering iron. The results weren't exactly spectacular. The temperature needle didn't budge. Either the sensor or the gauge are broken (or both?) or the connections between the two aren't good. Given that there are 2 wires from the sensor and 4 pins, some guesswork was involved anyway. Another job that didn't get beyond the tinkering stage.


About the only major progress this weekend, then, has been the installing of a waste water tank and the sink plumbing.

This is the old fresh water tank from Dapne's kitchen.

The pump, tap plumbing and sink waste are all shoehorned into the space between the cooker and the forward storage box. I originally had the cover screwed on, but Sue suggested that Velcro would be a more useful alternative if I needed to get in there in a hurry. It's a 6mm ply panel and very small, so we did it that way. The pump filter is now more accessible than before and the whole thing is much neater...

As is the wiring behind the passenger seat. This was sorted out when we installed the second aux battery. The wiring for that is now in place, although at the time I photographed it, some tidying was obviously needed!

Once it was all done, though, we could box it in  and sort out the lounge bar!

The seat base is an old cushion from a Series Landy....doubles as a seat back, too.

The seat back folds down and the fridge carrier can still slide over it.

I think the sink is a bit of a  triumph!  Having wasted a lot of time trying to find one that will fit into the space and find someone who's prepared to sell me one without ridiculous delivery charges, we changed tack and looked at simpler solutions. Well, not simpler, exactly but cheaper, a bit easier, outside the influence of the courier's charges and with a little bit of imagination applied.

This is a folding washing up bowl. Collapsed, it takes up little "vertical" space so doesn't take up space underneath that would otherwise be needed by a traditional sink.

Most of the commercial items are about 145mm deep - quite a lot of space for something that just holds air most of the time. This bowl unfolds upwards, and doesn't need to project below the worktop, so avoids that wasted space. All it needed was a waste outlet. The 12mm ply carrier allowed enough of a lip to secure the bowl's feet so when the Soup Dragon pulls it up, it won't take off!

The bowl is inset. A bit of carving to provide a flat surface...

..for the 90 degree 3/4 inch outlet,

..for the waste. 

The sink is aligned with the tub capping, so with the truck sitting normally it isn't horizontal and the water won't drain towards the plughole unless we've set up on the ramps, which is what we normally do anyway. If this becomes a nuisance I'll have to adjust the worktop a bit to compensate.

The waste water catch tank is in the wheel arch. I made a cradle to support it, bolted to the crossmember, and moved it as far to the rear as possible to give more room to fit a storage box in future. 

Looking aft

It's a semi-permanent fixing using a bungee and a rubber strap rescued from the garden. We've got dozens of these which were used to tie our young trees to stakes years ago. They seem to have a half-life of about 500 years, so should be ideal as underbody lashing! Routing and spacing everything around the exhaust for the hob was a challenge, as the tank is plastic, but we now have a simple system with no expensive bits to maintain or break. 

A right Lash-Up!Works, though...so far.

I'm still considering moving it to the rear corner, over the exhaust, where we had a storage box in the previous truck. This would allow us to make another storage box to match - almost - the one on the driver's side, but given that the hob hoses have already compromised the space under the wheel arch, it might not be worth the bother. I'll make some measurements and see what can be achieved - it's a valuable empty space which we don't want to ignore.

The kitchen is now almost finished, so when it stops raining and blowing the leaves about we'll pop the roof and check it all works....

In goes the Wallas.

The hob'n heater is out of the box and into the kitchen.

 

With the whole kitchen now redesigned to accommodate this expensive machinery, it's satisfying to find that everything fits in the way I planned it should.

The challenge has been to squeeze all the components into the minimum possible space without making it difficult to adjust and maintain and not set anything alight with the exhaust. The installation instructions are pretty comprehensive although there were some things that could've been better explained or an amendment included. For instance, I spoke to the supplier about the problem I was having in getting the fuel pump to draw - see my later comments. During the conversation he suggested not fitting a master switch as the instructions stipulate as "a lot of people fit poor quality switches which cause problems". Given the cost of this kit and the instructions in the manual, would it be a terrible erosion of profit to include a suitable switch to avoid the problem? The alternative to the switch - which is necessary to recycle the system logic if it "locks out" - he suggests, is to pull the fuse. OK, that works, but I'd prefer something a little more sophisticated.
 

The hob control panel needs to be "reachable" from the sleeping platform for the heating option. This is the best I could do....place it too high and the thermostat won't sense any cold air and won't switch the heater on.

The NAAFI flap can still provide some ventilation and a view of the World.



The hob is as high as it can go and still have room for the cover to open, but only just.

The hob lid only just clears the mounting for the gas strut- not visible in the photo - so that was a little tight on the tolerances I worked with. There's a bit of wasted space under the hob, which is necessary for ventilation and to allow some clearance for the table to slide out but I could have  - should have? - pinched a few millimetres of that to guarantee the rest of it would work...lucky! 
I didn't need to move the main aux power switch panel, though, which was a bonus, and the power for the hob controller - as opposed to the hob fuel pump and ignition - comes off the old radio switch and cb.

Routing the fuel hose took a bit of working out since there's a filter which has to be both accessible and vertical. If I put it inside the cupboard it'd be difficult to service, so it's had to go on the outside.

This is the wiring and plumbing before it was all protected with sleeving.

I 'm not too happy with the upwards bend in the hose but there's little option other than an elbow fitting, which is probably just as bad from the fuel flow point of view. Not the neatest of arrangements but at least it's easy to get at by lifting the NAAFI flap, as is the fuse. I did have this tucked away but since it's now the "master switch" it has to be easy to access.

There was a similar problem with the air intake hose and, more importantly, the exhaust. Luckily the hoses are flexible enough for them to be pushed right back against the side of the vehicle, but even so, things are tight as they have to be routed behind the front storage box and clear of the water tank. The outlet-cum-balanced flue head has to go a minimum of 300mm ahead of the rear wheel - at least that's the recommendation for a VW T5, and that's all I had to go on.

As you can see, it protrudes a little below the rock slider although I've kept it as far "inboard" as I can. given we don't want exhaust fumes coming up from under the floor. Unfortunately the maximum hose length only allowed this minimum clearance and has effectively blocked one of the hi-lift jacking points. Nothing I can do about that.

This is the view underneath. The bracketry etc is provided in the kit but, again, optimised for the T5 so needed some inventive thought to convert the bits into a frame to work under the Defender. It is a pretty solid mounting now, though, and all the bits are, I think, galvanised. All this metal and hose does take up some of the space we freed up by removing the water tank and which I wanted to use for storage, so we'll have to come up with something other than the stock solution if we want to put a box under the arch. Everything was tucked away as neatly as possible using stainless steel tie-wraps.

We put the end of the Wallas fuel hose in a jar of diesel and fired her up. Eventually. The aux battery was a bit down and the Wallas needs a few more amps to start than it had available, so I had to run the engine to overcome that snag. Then the fuel pump wouldn't draw the fuel up the pipe. After messing about for an hour we just connected a pipette to a short bit of pipe and fed the hob by gravity to get it going. Once fired up, all appeared to work as expected although we couldn't get enough fuel feeding to keep the hob running for the recommended 2 hours of "burning off". Actually we could only get it to run for just over 4 minutes. It was a bit windy, which can, according to the manual, affect things a bit so I put a shelter around the flue but this made no difference at all. The hob fires up as expected but we're getting an indication of a flameout after 4 minutes or so. Hopefully we'll have better luck once everything is connected in the way it ought to be.

"The Snow Gates are Closed"

In the same way that the first sound of a cuckoo signals Spring, hearing on the radio that "The A939 Cockbridge to Tomintoul road is now closed." is, for us, the first sign of Winter.

A wake up call for me, too. Having spent several weeks messing about with plywood and glue, I'd neglected to sort out the snags that made the drive back from the AO Show more interesting than it should've been. I refer to the windscreen wipers that don't park, the puddles of rainwater on the floor - and likely as not inside the dashboard - and the lack of a blower motor for the heater/demister. It wasn't helped by the delay in getting the right bits to do the jobs - thank you, Craddocks - so this week's frosty mornings have called for a Reassessment of Priorities, as they say.

Fixing the wipers was easy, once the replacement park switch arrived. Once the wipers had dried out they worked normally but wouldn't self-park, so a bit of on-line research suggested the switch as the likely culprit. It took longer to get at than to change, but the result is as predicted.


The sealant in the wing panels seems to have worked, too. Elisfor has been out in the weather for 3 weeks now and hasn't moved, and there haven't been any new puddles, so perhaps....the final test must wait until she's driveable again. I've got new seals for the windscreen vents as well, which may help to solve another part of the problem as I'm sure they don't do their job properly at the moment.


The blower motor fuse is blown and the motor is seized solid. I found that out by taking the intake cover off, reaching in and trying to turn the fan, which refused to budge. A few days of soaking in penetrant had no effect, so it was a "box out" job. Getting the unit out and stripped down wasn't too much of a job and I was pleasantly surprised that the area of the bulkhead that was previously invisible is in excellent condition.

 I did find a few more reasons why the heating hasn't been particularly good....


The resistor that provides the 2-speed option isn't in the best of health. In fact, I'm surprised it's allowed the blower to work for as long as it has.

 None of the local electrical factors have a replacement so I'll have to rely on mail order again.

The motor was pretty sick, too. The seals had clearly broken down enough to let water into the housing and even though the drain hole in the motor appears to be clear, the inside must be totally messed up.

I'd already found that a replacement "original equipment" blower motor - the obvious way to fix the problem - was outrageously expensive, so some creative thinking was needed. Again.


More internet searching suggested this as a neat solution.

It does seem that it'll do the job so I got one and the fitting wasn't difficult. I don't know how much air it'll push through the system compared to the original if in top condition, but we've got so used to feeble heating and demisting it'll have to be an improvement anyway. Certainly considerably cheaper.


I thought that this would be the end of it, but a look inside the box was interesting. The foam, or thin sponge, that provides the seal to the various flaps had completely crumbled away. So, combined with the useless seals on the air intake and box-to-bulkhead join, any warm air was just leaking past the flaps and doing little good. I replaced the sponge with pieces of 5mm Silent Coat rubber sheet that was left over from the previous soundproofing work. Being self-adhesive, this was tricky to position accurately but will work much better than the original stuff, I hope.

While doing all this, I actually read what the Haynes manual has to say about the heating system and discovered, for the first time, that the left hand lever on the binnacle that I thought just controlled the blower actually has another function - it allows me to vary the opening of the flap that allows air from the box into the cab. The blower is only switched on when the flap is fully open. Tracing the operation of this cable lead me down to the hole in the bulkhead that the flap should cover...

See the screw? This holds the air outlet to the lower part of the dashboard. There are 2 of these but the other one is hidden. By some masterpiece of design and planning, these screws both come through the bulkhead almost exactly in line with the edge of this flap. At some stage in the past either these screws have been renewed or have been in place since the truck was built. Either way you can see how, because they're too long, they prevent the flap from closing completely. In fact, at some stage the driver must've had to force the blower switch enough to overcome the tenuous grip of this screw - you can see the "witness mark" - but clearly didn't ask himself why. 

Screw removed, normal service resumed. Flap can now close.

A bit like the buggered bolt in the transfer box..."What was that clunking noise? Ahhh, never mind, everything seems to work fine. Drive on!" The length of this screw has meant the flap has never been able to properly close, which might explain a few more things regarding the lack of warmth...


One of which might be the state of the matrix that holds the hot water for the blower to work with. Actually, it doesn't seem to be in bad condition but I'd bought a replacement anyway since, having gone to the effort of stripping everything down it made sense to renew it. Pulling it out revealed yet more crumbling foam but, more interestingly, the rivets that ought to have been holding the matrix cover onto the box had been replaced with screws. This can only mean that the heater box had been overhauled sometime in the past but the state of the seals didn't match the condition of the matrix so presumably they hadn't been replaced. A bit of a false economy since this might have led to the water getting into the blower motor. 

Anyway, all sorted, sealed and repainted ready for the new resistor before I can refit the fan housing. This had to be removed to get access to one of the inner flaps and will need re-rivetting, or maybe I'll use screws like whoever did the job last time has done on the matrix panels.