X2!!
C5500 TopKick 4x4 Crew Cab Build
- Thread starter NeverEnough
- Start date
X2!!
NeverEnough
Adventurer
Thanks, guys!
I was moving the big slide in and out today to check clearances for the cabinet doors and drawers, so I snapped a quick shot from about the same perspective as the post above. This shows the roof with the big room in travel position. The cabover is still open, however.
And again, room deployed:
Ford Prefect
Expedition Leader
Wow, what an amazing difference that makes!
I REALLY REALLY hope you are planning to attend the Overland Expo this year! SO many people will want to see this thing!
I REALLY REALLY hope you are planning to attend the Overland Expo this year! SO many people will want to see this thing!
NeverEnough
Adventurer
It definitely tranforms the living space. In travel mode, there's 17' of camper behind the cab. With the slides deployed, there's 25'4" of camper behind the cab. There's 44 square feet of usable space behind the center "galley" wall in travel mode, and 94 square feet with the slides deployed.
Looks like Expo is a little closer to home next year, and May is a better month, so I'll do my best to get the rig down there, hopefully with some fun along the way- assuming it's actually road worthy! My wife's father made a Spruce Goose comment the other day....... Oh well, I've always got my trusty GS and a tent! (way better gas mileage, and more fun to get air with).
A shot for the day, pretty boring, but just to show what's going on.
That's Gerard rolling on the first of three layers of urethane coating for the shower and the insides of the cabinets. If you've been following the build, you may recall that the cabinets are also made from the same PPE honeycomb panels as the body, just thinner panels.
All the joints and seams were glued (butt joints) and then glassed (inside corners). We learned a lot from the trailer build, including which fillers, primers and coatings worked best. We use Z-Grip to fill gaps and smooth seams, then apply 2-3 coats of industrial primer directly on the PPE skins. The first coat makes the polyester "hair" stand up, which is then knocked down with the first sanding. Here's the shower and some of the bathroom cabinets:
The small horizontal ledges in the shower are shelf supports, which allow the shower to double as cargo space.
Once the primer coats are built up to the desired finish, the two-part urethane coating is applied- first rolled, the sprayed for the final coat.
Anodized aluminum u channel will be used to close out the edges, as well as the cabinet door edges, and the shipment finally arrived today.
It would've been far faster, easer, and cheaper to just have a shop build the cabinets and screw them in. However, in the spirit of making everything take twice as long and expenive as possible, I decided it would be best to make the cabinets integral to the body itself. So they're very light, very strong, and add to the overall strength of the build. But it's been far more labor intensive than I imagined.
Colorado Elk hunter
New member
WOW that is the best build I have ever seen. Your skills and the skills of your team are mad. My hats off to you.
NeverEnough
Adventurer
Thanks, Colorado. I'm glad you like it, but there are some amazing rigs on this site and others. And I've got some great guys helping out, otherwise, I'd be screwed! I've ended up learning far more on this project than I ever imagined, which also means I've had to rely on the knowledge of dozens of experts that really know their stuff.
For example, how to best seal a slide out room. Standard industry practice is rubber wipe seals. But having experienced seal degradation first hand, especially when slide out rooms have uneven surfaces, (windows, extrusions, etc.), I started looking at brush seals. Turns out some of the super-pricey class A coaches have moved away from rubber wipes to nylon brush seals. I ordered up some samples and did some testing, and decided to go with dual brushes (inner and outer) for all three slides and the cabover "pop up". Here's a shot showing how nicely the brush seals adapt to irregularities in the surface, in this case, the extruded upper guide track for one of "side" slides:
We're still trying to get all the details wrapped on the inside. The built-in appliances are all set for permanent mounting, which meant making sure there is NO slop for each opening. Everything has been shimmed to make sure the fit is right-on. The Contour microwave:
The cabinets are ready for their doors, which should be delivered and installed in the next few days. The anodized aluminum edge close-outs are covered in masking tape to protect them until the doors get installed.
The refrigerator is a Norcold 1095, selected for its size. It's a propane/110v unit. The door skins will matche the cabinets and are being made by the same guys that are making the cabinet doors and drawers (Park City Woodwork). Since it's the most fragile of the appliances, it mounted on a .5" high density foam cushion, which should provide a little extra dampening.
Another fun appliance is the Dirt Devil central vac system, complete with the automatic dust pan. It's being mounted beneath the refrigerator. We did a dry fit tonight to make sure that it will work as anticipated. The hope was to have enough clearance to mount the unit on a pair of slides for easy removal and replacement of the canister bag. I had to leave before it got mounted on the slides, but it looked like I'll have about .5" to spare with the floor build-up.
The location is approximately in the center of the rig, which will make it possible to easily reach everywhere with the 25' hose (stored in shallow drawer under the shower).
The Spinflo Triplex is to the right of the Silgranit kitchen sink. The pots and pan drawer goes underneath, which will use 500lb-rated Accuride slides so it can double as a pull-out step to reach the upper cabinets. You can also see dual 4" heat ducts for the ducted Atwood propane furnace. Even though I've got radiant floors, I wanted to have a) a redundant heating system, and b) something to warm up the room fast when needed since radiant is a slow response system. Under the sink you can see the accumulation tank and the cold water distribution manibloc. In the lower left you can see the fresh water fill hoses for the three potable water tanks that are beneath the floor.
A wastebasked drawer is being made for under the sink, as well as a cool pull-out rotating kitchen accessory drawer cabinet for the far left. With any luck, I'll be able to show it off within the next week.
Wish I had more pictures to share. Time is short these days, but I'll post what I can. Thanks again for all the support!
K2ZJ
Explorer
Another fun appliance is the Dirt Devil central vac system, complete with the automatic dust pan. It's being mounted beneath the refrigerator. We did a dry fit tonight to make sure that it will work as anticipated. The hope was to have enough clearance to mount the unit on a pair of slides for easy removal and replacement of the canister bag. I had to leave before it got mounted on the slides, but it looked like I'll have about .5" to spare with the floor build-up.
The location is approximately in the center of the rig, which will make it possible to easily reach everywhere with the 25' hose (stored in shallow drawer under the shower).
Wish I had more pictures to share. Time is short these days, but I'll post what I can. Thanks again for all the support!
I have been quiet but still watching this closely. I love it. I must say, I have been impressed by all of the time taken to figure out paint, seals, slides and corners. But the one thing that caught me by surprise was the vacuum! Awesome, a great addition and clever. I know it is just a vacuum, but I can honestly say I wouldn't have thought about it for one second. Bravo and keep the updates coming, we are still watching.
westyss
Explorer
Thats all looking good, the brushes that you are using are good for preventing most air transfer, but I have found that it doesnt prevent sound from entering, I recommend using some type of foam in addition to the brush to dampen the sound, I use a 1/4" foam strip on top of my brush seal.
NeverEnough
Adventurer
It would be great to get a photo of how that's mounted. Here's drawings of how the seals work for the smaller slide rooms (top cutaway). When the room is retracted during travel, the T-molding compresses a bulb seal around the perimeter, in addition to the double wipe seals and the brush seal.
When extended at camp, the facia of the slide out room compresses a bulb seal against a "stop" angle, in addition to the wipes and brush seal:
The larger slide out room seals in a similar fashion, except the the rubber wipe seals are replaced with a brush seal attached to a different extrusion and the vertical facia panels are hinged. The wipe seals for the smaller slides are part of the factory configuration and extrusion that house the slide motors and drive shaft. That type of assembly was not powerful enough to drive the big room, so I needed something to replace the double wipes and extrusion. I did that with a piece of aluminum channel and the brush seals. In both situations, the T moulding or facia compress tight against a bulb seal.
We got the central vac configuration finished up. The hose port is the cream-colored plate to the right. The "VacPan" is the black plastic assembly even lower to the right. A "Y" connects the two, which is connected to about 18" of flexible hose into the Dirt Devil central vac unit.
The unit is mounted on slides, making it much easier to change out the bag and perform routine maintenance, including far simpler removel of the entire assembly, if needed. A simple hinged door, still in the works at the cabinet shop, will serve as the cover.
I also got the fold-down counter for the kitchen installed. During travel, it folds flat against the wall to accommodate the slide out room. There's also a nifty little cabinet that travels under the sink counter during travel configuration.
In camp mode, the counter folds up (Sugatsune brackets) and the cabinet slides forward (Accuride slides mounted on a custom axel assembly and a heavy duty rotary plate bearing assembly typically used for kiosks), rotates 90 degrees to face "user". One of my biggest gripes in previous rigs is the complete lack of food preparation space, so this was my solution.
Still working on the cabinet doors, but getting close. I messed up a few measurements, but hopefully all that will be fixed and installed early next week.
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Ford Prefect
Expedition Leader
Very nice, very cool.
Your poor kids are still going to have chores even on vacation though... haha, that is great as a dad, would stink as a son.
Regards,
Your poor kids are still going to have chores even on vacation though... haha, that is great as a dad, would stink as a son.
Regards,
trailrunner
Observer
NEED UPDATE!!!........................... Please?
