out with the old in with the new

[westyss]

door and windows

I had about a week to wait before picking up the door and windows, so I got onto making the brackets for the electric actuators.

Then once the windows were ready I made a little road to to pick them up, I still had my westy at the time, And seeing as its fishing season, I stopped by the lake for the weekend for a little fly fishing. Once I got them back to the shop,I set them in place to see how they would look.



So I set to work installing them, about ten minutes each, easy. Cut a hole, make sure it fits, goop it up, screw into place.




With the windows in I finally got brave enough to cut out the door, you might notice the thickness of the base wall, three inches thick to get the step for the roof. The wall was made out of two pieces, and glued together.

 

[westyss]

roof

I had bought an under body tool box and I mounted it, I thought it would hang a little low but it sits at the same height as the transfer case, and it was a cheapie so i dont care much if it gets abused.

Back to the box, once the walls were complete, I set to getting the roor structure done, the big roof piece was set in place on top of the box (what better place to build it than where it is going)


And started mounting the alumimun bits onto the sides pieces.



And connecting all the roof sides onto the roof. The roof top is the biggest piece of composit, it is 80"x 162"x 2" thick, a big slab. At about this time I drove my truck over my camera, so no pics of the aluminum going onto the roof.





Where did those windows go??

 

[ersatzknarf]

Hi Yves,

WOW ! What a great job and doing it by yourself ! Fantastic work.

Did you use Rhinokore ( http://www.rhinokore.com/ ) for the wall material ? I have heard of it, but not seen anything built of it, yet. It looks like you made a great choice.

Thank you very much for posting the photos and describing the construction. This is very helpful.

Thanks for all the comments, to answer a couple of questions; Yes its for 2 people and a dog, I removed the third seat and installed 2 national air seats.
;The top to bottom seal is done with brushes, Fuller Brush Co.
;Its not Nida Core, its a composit made in British Columbia to specific sizes.
; The lift is done with 400 pound 12 volt 18" actuators.

<snip>

 

[westyss]

roof

I bought a new camera and got a few pics of the roof structure with a couple of cross members for tie down and support. At this time everything is sealed up, the door is ready to install.

The next step was to get the unit onto the truck, I had a date with a fork lift but had a few days so I continued with some of the actuator brackets.

I had all the brackets ready to go, installed them then got busy finalizing the big mouting day, first step, get the unit on some wheels to move it out of the shop. The wheels had to be on a bit of a cart that would leave space for the fork lift tines, and be left behind once lifted.

This made it easy to move, too easy as it got away on me and smashed into the John Dear, oops.

From there i prepped the truck, It was raining so I backed it into the shop and cut out the space for the steps.

 

[westyss]

move

After cutting up the deck, I moved the truck out and positioned the unit in the door way ready for the move.

Just to prove it was raining, funny pic, dark clouds but sun on the hangar

 

[westyss]

get it on

I had some folks come out to lend a hand but we were all too busy so no pics of the actual fork lift episode , but all did go extremely well. I moved the unit out into the road, next to the truck, then lifted it up and set it onto some dunnage on the deck so that the tines could be slid out from under it, then we lifted the back end high enough to get the dunnage out from underneath, to do this I had to tilt the cab so they wouldnt touch, then once the dunnage was removed, we slid the unit forward into place.All this lifting sure showed me how stiff the cabin is as it did'nt flex at all. It was a very snug fit, I could have probably had a little more space between the deck and cabin, I must of had too much Sika somewhere. The big plan was to have the unit removable with some camper jacks if need be.

I threw some big straps onto the whole thing and got it home into the drive way, but not before I took it onto some rough terrain and bounced it around a bit, pretty silly really as it wasnt even very secured, oh well.

 

[Greggk]

man this thing looks awesome. what is the projected inside height of this? to me it looks a little short...

 

[slowtwitch]

Freekin sweet. Any estimate on the weight of the box? Serious inspiration.. please keep it coming. I'de be curious about material costs as well, but understand if that's mum.

-Mike

 

[spencyg]

What is the plan for roof drainage? It seems like you've got a flat surface up there that will want to pool water. If planned right, this might be used well with a rainwater collection system.

Interested in your plans up there...

Looking super.

 

[matthewp]

Absolutely wonderful build! I love it! I can't wait to see the interior pics.

 

[Overland Hadley]

Great build! Keep the information coming.

 

[westyss]

lift

Wow, thanks for the nice comments, I appreciate it. To answer some questions

1) The walls were made by Rhinocore, and they were mostly all the people from Big foot I believe, and I recently heard that they are reopening Big foot so I am not too sure how available the wall product will be, I am very happy that they worked with me, good folks, there is another Co. that says they supply the same stuff , Canadian Commercial Vehicles. I tried to work with them but was not successful, they quoted me double Rhinocore's quote and it only took them seven months with constant calls to give me that quote, so good luck with them.

2) The height inside when the roof is up is 6' 6", down is 5'.

3)Weight, well let me tell you a story about myself first, I have this problem of over building things, it stems from my childhood so I cant help it, like I said before , it is strong, probably too strong, I am sure one could lighten it up alot, but as it stands, the deck came in at 900 pounds and the cabin just under 2000 pounds.

4) Water collecting, well that is a bit of the plan, right now it just dumps on the ground, I put my dogs water dish there so it fills up, but someway I will collect water, it just makes sense, as for pooling, in these next series of pics you will see a 4 toggle double throw double pole switchy thingy, so I control all the actuators individualy, so if it rains I tilt the roof any way I want, which is usually to the side without the door.

There is just a temporary interior, I am trying out locations before I commit, so not much inside.


Next step in the process was to install the door. My dog was complaining that she wasnt in enough pics so I had to put one in, for the install I had to get the truck as close to the shop as possible due to rain and wind. It was not too hard as the hole in the wall was already there, just had to cut out the aluminum corner that was conveniently left unglued.

This is the one I call, door to no where.

Up til now I have not tried raising the roof, so its time, I wired up the actuators to give it a go,

So away we go, half way, sooo exciting!

All the way.

 

[slowtwitch]

Thanks. 2,000 lbs just for the shell with no interior, or complete?


-Mike

 

[westyss]

steps

Once the door was in, it was time to finalize the step plans, and get them made.

And installed.

From inside.

 

[westyss]

???

Finishing up the steps with a frame around the part where the door screws onto. And some non skid.

I needed some air, so I picked up a VIAIR system, I really wanted an engine driven compressor, but didnt have the time to make up a mounting bracket etc. so I went with this, my National air seats were arriving soon so I had to get on it. I mounted the tank between the frame rails, and put the dual compressors into my under body tool box. There is a remote switch with pressure guage mounted in the cab of the truck.

Needing to get this thing on the road for the May long weekend, I had to get the roof a little more done, so I picked up some stainless heavy duty sliders and installed six of them. These are needed to keep a set distance between roof and wall to keep the brushes working right.

And installed the enviromental seal brushes. These work surprisingly well, no noticeable air flow through it.