Marooned in Paradise - Another Express AWD

[drsmonkey]

I had a hell of a time getting my torsion bars loose too. I tried everything you did, soaking, heat, air chisel, nada. Two things finally did the trick...first I used the oem jack to brace the crossmember the keys are in against something solid in front of it to keep the rubber cross member mounts from absorbing the force from the chisel.

I also noticed that the hex ends of the torsion bar were torqued into the key and the a-arm. I used a wedge in between the crossmember and the key to force the key down and lift the a-arm up, then beat down on the arm to twist the hex ends opposite the way they normally load while applying the chisel. That did the trick.

edit: I took the shocks off prior to "un-twisting" the torsion bars so that they did not limit the downward force.

 

[45Kevin]

Well, the days are getting warmer, the snow is gone and it stays light until 8:30 at night.
And I'm back at it.
Yesterday I went at the torsion bar keys again. SUCCESS finally.

Some one in another thread said he had frozen keys like mine and drilled the keys off.
So with my new purchased key removal tool I got the job done.
I drilled 5, 1/8" holes in the edge of the key. Then I redrilled three of them to 1/4" and finally to 3/8". Then a wedge and a bunch of pounding and some help from the air chisel they split and came off.

On the passenger side I had to jack up the exhaust pipe to fit the key clamp, and of course much pounding and banging to free up the A-arm end of the bar. I used the same drilling method on the key.

The result is about a 3" lift in the front end. Close to an inch higher than the old keys got me when they were fully cranked up. The adjusting bolt is near centered, with the wrench end about even with the bottom of the cross member. Lots of room for future adjustment if needed.


Unrelated topic. Does anyone know why those AC lines are cut and pinched. I think they should be feeding the rear air??? Is it a factory deal?

 

[45Kevin]

So after two years with the temporary bed platform we are ready to do a permanent build.

First order of bidness is to strip the interior.
Pulled the foot well liner and there is plenty of room to put reflectix behind them.
Then the carpet came out. The second, and last easy task.

Next came the seat rails.
Holy f$@k, what a b!t3h. The rails each have 12 lug nuts coming out of them going down through the floor.
The drivers side where all accessible with various extensions and u-joints and wobble sockets.
The entire passenger side rail was inaccessible. The front three lugs I had to drill out from the top. That cost me a half dozen drill bits.
The rest of them, except the back most one which was accessible once the spare was removed, were hidden by the exhaust heat shields.
Luckily (depends how you look at it) my tail pipe had fallen off and I wanted to replace the Magna-flow type muffler the PO had installed anyway so it wasn't a big deal taking it off.
I drilled the rivets in the rear pieces of the heat shield and cut and bent small sections of the other two shields to get to the nuts.
That took the best part of a day.
The rails themselves probably weigh in at close to a hundred pound and along with the carpet and seats, I'm sure that the new bed platform and mattress and fridge etc. won't increase the weight of the van by too much.

 

[45Kevin]

 

[45Kevin]

So, I got the seat rails out.
What about the 24 holes in the floor that I now have to deal with?
Well, I'll use 8 of them to anchor my new plywood floor and the other 16 will be covered with foil tape and spayed from the underneath with rust proofing.
I might use one of them for wires that will run from the engine bay to charge the house battery(ies) that will reside under the bed.

I used reflectix as insulation under my 1/2" plywood floor. I had planned to use 5/8" for the better holding power that screws have in it, but alas, the building supply place didn't have any 5/8th so I went with the 1/2". There are ways to get strong connection in the 1/2" as you will see later. I cut the reflectix first and used it as a template for the plywood.

 

[45Kevin]

I used 1/2" baltic birch plywood (same as appleply if you know that product) for the floor. Its has twice as many plys as regular plywood and comes in 60"x60" sheets. Spendy but a far superior plywood for cabinet making. It has no voids and is a very stable product, meaning it is very unlikely to warp, like regular plywood does.

I used t-nuts counter sunk from the top and bolted from underneath. The small 3/8th plywood strips you see are to keep the plywood from distorting down into the channels in the metal floor when the bolts are tightened. I used biscuits and glue where the plywood butted together.

The foil covered holes and the floor bolts were sprayed with rock guard.

 

[Ngneer]

Nice! Looks good

 

[45Kevin]

The floor took most of two 5x5 sheets. On the drivers side there was a small piece needed just in front of the wheel well to get the full width and on the rear most sheet I needed a small piece in the back PS corner where the jack is stored. I cut it about a 1/4" away from the walls and wheel wells. I went over the joints and filled in where the t-nuts were with a floor patching compound.

For floor covering I used some Luxury Vinyl Plank that was extra on one of my jobs. It's a good, durable water resistant surface that we can put an area carpet over in winter when the floor gets cold. It went on with some universal vinyl floor adhesive I had from a past bathroom reno I did.

The floor came in close to level with the wheel well inserts and I will cut the excess vinyl back to the edge of the insert and cover the transition with a piece of aluminum floor edge material later in the process. I could/should do it now but I'm not convinced there isn't a better way to do the transition yet.

I'm not sure why some of the pics are sideways. They show up right in the viewer.

 

[45Kevin]

So... Now for the hard part.

I'll use a similar layout to what we had for the past couple of years for the under bed storage space.
This time I'll build a pull-out kitchen in the rear, the house batteries will reside next to the DS rear wheel well, and what to do with the space at the sides?

I used a "shop grade" birch plywood for the two outside pieces of the bed platform. It is a lesser grade than the the baltic birch, but it came in a 4x8 sheet so was long enough for the sides. After cutting it I found that the sheet was quite warped. It'll work though.
The middle two platform supports are rough 5/8" plywood from the original set-up.

 

[45Kevin]

I reused the OSB from the previous bed platform again. I am a cheap SOB and hate to throw usable stuff away.
I left a removable top to access the batteries. I haven't thought about the wiring yet too much, but I will need to get two 2 ga. wires from the engine bay up into house battery compartment and a couple of 2 ga. wires over to the invertor (where ever that ends up) and several 10 ga. wires back out to some USB and lighter outlets that I'll put on each side of the bed. I got a TV, my fridge and maybe a microwave to get wiring to as well.

On the PS of the bed I built a long narrow shelf to store our collapsible aluminium table. On top of that I'll have a shallow shelf with access from the top, and some flat space for the watch, glasses, phone and maybe even a glass of something while we lay back and watch the telly.

 

[WVI]

Are you going to have access to the big boxed section on the right in the pic of the platform ?

 

[45Kevin]

If you are referring to the compartment next to the DS wheel well, the house batteries will be there, accessible from the top. You can see outline of the hatch in the bed platform in the second pic.

 

[45Kevin]

I decided to put the jack and rods/lug wrench back in their original location in the back PS corner.
They will be accessed from the top via a removable panel.
There will be enough room in there for a recovery strap as well. All things that should very rarely be used I hope.

The case with the rods/lug wrench sticks up a bit higher that the shelf height, but I'll neaten that up later.

View attachment 417339View attachment 417340

 

[45Kevin]

Moving on to the DS side of the bed platform.
I didn't make the wall beside the bed so high on this side. I didn't want us to feel like we were sleeping in a canyon.
I made several boxes that angled up towards the window.



I'll put a shelf on top that gives a little room for do-dads while stopped and makes a nice transition into the side of the van just under the window.

 

[45Kevin]

The woodwork part of the bed platform is done. I finished it with a couple of coats of satin polyurethane.

There is a little to do at the DS rear corner that I'll sort out later (when I figure out what to do there).




You'll notice at the back and front of the bed i added a rail. We fount that bedding kind of migrated over the edge so I have a 3" rail that is curved to match the back doors and a straight 2"
one at the front.
I have also added pull-outs underneath at the back. The PS side one will become our pullout kitchen. I haven't thought that far ahead yet.The drawer slides are 32" full extension with a load rating of 400 pounds. I found 3 used sets on-line for $150. They are almost $200 a pair new. Score.