The great white fun hog (another white GM awd build)

boardrider247

boardrider247

Weekend warrior anarchist
Spent most of the morning today wasting away drinking coffee and waiting for the temps to get above zero before heading out.
Ran some errands and picked up the necessary wire to finish re routing my taillight wiring. Also grabbed a new interstate battery for the wife's toaster, but that is another story.

The way I routed the factory harness meant I needed to ad some length to the taillight and door connectors. Nothing too interesting to see. Lots of heat shrink butt splices and heat shrink wrap followed with plastic wire loom. After I was finished I realized I made a rather large mistake in my thought process. By adding to the taillight side of the connectors I succeeded in not cutting the main van wiring harness. However this places the connectors behind my future walls where they will be essentially useless if the taillight assembly needs to be replaced. What I'll end up doing is replacing my butt splice connections (nearest the taillight)with another set of factory connectors when I can snag them from upullrparts.

A couple shots of the wood ribs I'll be stapling my insulation to tomorrow


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

Wiring tucked up out of the way

Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

New wiring routing

Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr



Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr
 
boardrider247

boardrider247

Weekend warrior anarchist
I've been able to put in about ten hours insulating over the last couple days.
This is the material I am using between layers of reflective bubble wrap. (1.5" foil faced duct wrap)

Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr



Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

I removed the fiberglass from the edges so the majority of the material would fit into the space between the ribs, not on the face of the ribs.


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr



Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

To install I stapled through the edges where there was only the facing paper. Then foil taped over all the staples to create a solid vapor barrier


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

All the material I have been using for this build comes in 48" wide rolls. This works out pretty well as the roof of the van is about 48" wide and the walls are about 54" tall. Of course on the walls this left a 6" tall area to fill at the bottom. I chose to use 1" thick closed cell rubber armacell in this space so it would be impervious to any water that would end up there. I used spray adhesive to stick it to the wall of the van.


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

And here it is mostly finished up and covered with another Layer of foil faced bubble wrap.

Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr
 
boardrider247

boardrider247

Weekend warrior anarchist
Anyone who is still reading this, here are the layers I used going from outside van wall in.
-1/8" foiled faced bubble wrap attached with 3M super 77 spray adhesive to van walls
-1 1/2" foil faced duct wrap (R 5.4) stapled to wood ribs then sealed with foil tape
-1/8" foil faced bubble wrap stapled to woo drive then sealed with foil tape (and super 77 on the ceiling)

Right now I'm waiting for the hulliner I ordered to show up. Then I'll be working on gluing that over the insulation.
 
boardrider247

boardrider247

Weekend warrior anarchist
My fabric for the walls showed up earlier this week. It is a "hulliner" fabric which is woven with no grain/direction or backing. Very flexible and it conformed to the surfaced extremely well. I would use this fabric for any type of interior finish again in a heartbeat. The only downside is there is not many color options.


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

I also covered the wheel wells with some more closed cell foam. I'm using scraps leftover from jobsites so they don't look the best as I have to deal with whatever shape scrap I have at hand. It doesn't matter in the long run as they will be covered with storage boxes.


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

Final project this weekend was installing the "Mullet" headliner to add a bit of color. The business section will eventually be removed when I cut the opening for the pop-top


Untitled by boardrider247, on Flickr

Next on the build agenda is building the wheel well storage boxes. Then things will slow down for a bit while I pour concrete countertops for my home and work on fixing up the fiberglass VW top getting it ready to fit onto the Fun Hog:wings:
 
boardrider247

boardrider247

Weekend warrior anarchist
I've been wafering over what to do about tires/wheels for this van over the last week.
My original plan was to use a set of stock 16" silverado wheels with 265/75 tires. Giving me about 1"+ over the 245/70/17 tires which are stock on these vans. I liked idea of having 16" wheels to open up more tire options.

Well I found out after buying a set of wheels off CL that 16" wheels don't fit my van.

So....... Plan B I was going to stick with the stock size in a BFG TA/KO. This was a decision made partly because they were in stock locally and I had planned to be taking the van north this weekend ice fishing. I trusted the BFG reputation.

Well then I was letting the van warm up before heading out to my tire appointment, and I looked at the van again.
The stock tires just looked so sad and little after lifting the van. My fishing trip had been canceled so there was no longer a need to have tires installed today. And I changed my mind again. Yes I may be the most indecisive person in a ten mile radius:coffeedrink:

Plan C is now to have 265/70/17 cooper ATP's installed on Monday :wings:

Hopefully there won't be a plan D
 
mortonm

mortonm

Expedition Leader
245 75R17 is the same height (roughly) as the 265 70R17 ..... Just to further muddy the waters
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Forum statistics

Threads
188,249
Messages
2,904,496
Members
229,805
Latest member
Chonker LMTV

Members online

Total: 614 (members: 30, guests: 584)
Top