First off I thought how useful it was knowing where all these roof joists are now I can see them, and how I will lose that information once the roof is back on and they are invisible, so I discretely marked the positions of each one above the runners for the horizontal blind below the moon roof (see the tiny black marks below). Now if I want to fix anything to the ceiling in this area I can see where the best place to screw them in is:
Next: insulation. On the right is the expanded polystyrene insulation that was previously fitted and on the left is the new higher-density insulation with reflective foil on both sides, in fact some of this is just re-using left-overs from when I insulated the compressor fridge:
With the new insulation fitted:
There were still some gaps where I hadn't cut the insulation exactly, and this reminded me of a conversation with by BIL at the weekend - he has refurbished several houses and explained how he was careless with insulation on the first house leaving gaps which left cold spots which then caused condensation and mold. So I bought some of that squirty foam stuff and filled all the voids:
Looks good enough to go on your desert . So once hardened I shaved off the excess and presented it to Sally as a pudding.
Before it got dark I wanted to get one step further, so I cut down one of the pieces of plywood. It is 5mm in thickness compared to the original which is about 2mm. How they thought 2mm was thick enough for the roof I don't know. The original was glued in a few places (not all) and stapled. I am gluing all over and using screws:
The first sheet on the roof:
Pretty happy with progress so far
Steve.
'07 Ford Ranger XLT Supercab diesel + '91 Shadow Cruiser - Sky Cruiser 1
'92 Suzuki Samurai 4x4 1.6
'09 Fiat Panda 1.2
'10 Citroen DS3 1.6 turbo
Really impressive. You are making an impossible job look very possible. You are doing a very good job. Better than new. And you are really making fast progress.
I repeat, very impressive.
Jon
Uh I'm curious about putting the horizontal seam in the middle of the vertical moon roof curb span?. Also could be pic but looks like edge of ply is over center, actually looks like it to edge of rafter?
You mentioned adding some wiring? Was expecting to see wiring before adding the ply?
I had measured to center all of my roof rafters etc, good info for future. Made a map-actually used it, think its inside the ceiling cause I havnt been able to find it since.
AnEv942: Re. the horizontal seam - I could have used the full 8ft length of ply and cut it to the nearest rafter, but that worked out that the joint would be in the same place as the joint for the aluminum that goes over it, and I wanted to stagger the joints.
The picture isn't really clear in 640x480, but the ply does actually go to the centre of the joist.
You are right about the wiring. I was thinking of taking the analogue and digital antennas for the radio out to the roof, they are currently inside a cupboard. However 1) I don't really use the analogue 2) the digital antenna works fine where it is and 3) I tried to find digital radio antennas to mount on the roof, but digital car radio is very slow in taking off here and there wasn't the availability of antennas that I had hoped for, so I gave up on that idea.
I will add some wiring for a TV antenna, and maybe for some extra lights, but I'll just take that up through the fridge vent (or if I eliminate that a smaller waterproof aperture). But most of the wiring will then be run outside once it has come through one hole since I don't want to make multiple cable holes in the roof.
I've taken the week off work to get a head-start on this rebuild because I know that unless I make good headway initially I will lose spirit and the job will seem too large. Sally isn't working at the moment, so I have had the benefit of regular feeding and watering, plus supervision from Smokey (though I don't normally let him into vehicles or the camper as he has a tendency to 'mark' everything as belonging to him
Very damp and misty this morning. Glad I am not starting this any later in the year. First added the opposite panel to the one I fitted last night:
I noticed some of the ceiling was hanging down around the roof hatches, so I glued and stapled the ply back into place:
Now time to cut the front panel - I had to get Sally's help to lift this up to the camper because it is large and has a lot of cut-outs so would be easy to break trying to get it in position:
Again I used glue, with screws really just to hold the panel tight to while the glue sets:
Looking good with all the panels fitted:
Oh, nearly forgot the little panel behind the moon roof:
Note that I did include the cut-outs for the fridge roof vent. As discussed in the other thread I am going for a side vent (I ordered one this morning), but will leave this hole there in case I change my mind in the future and to make it easier to drill a hole for cables to run through. I also ran some wood glue along the gap between the two panels:
Next I added a thin polystyrene layer to act as insulation (noise and cold) between the very heat-conductive aluminum which will go on top and the ply-wood below:
Here is me working from my convenient access hole - AKA the big hole where the moon roof normally lives:
In case any condensation builds up on the cold underside of the aluminum I added a moisture barrier - this is the stuff you normally concrete into the floor of your house (clearly the beer glass is only there to make sure it is, errr, beer proof too ):
Now time to order the aluminum diamond plate. There are several places I could get this, but there is a family-run 'black smith' / metal fabricator business in the next village. They have been very helpful in the past and even if I could get it cheaper on-line or at a bigger company in town, I would prefer my $$$ went to these guys. I drew up a little diagram with dimensions (in the great tradition of designing stuff on the back of a cigarette packet) and the boss Roger put me onto the guy who runs his metal store who said 'no problem' (in a strong Scottish accent) and he could have the diamond plate cut and bent by 11:00 Saturday for me to collect:
I had a look at the aluminum available and went for the 2mm thick - in my experience I need to look and and feel the metal, then I know exactly which is the right gauge; ask me to specify it in advance and I won't have a clue.
I also asked about extruded aluminum and again we looked through their metal store. They had a load of 50mm square x 1.6mm thick square section tubing, but it was too large and thin, but then we saw some 25mm square section tubing with 3mm wall - ideal in my mind for making rails to go around the roof to mount exciting stuff on. They didn't have enough in stock, so the boss said he could get the quantity I needed in for Tuesday.
OK, this is all costing a fair few $$$ in materials (though there is zero labor because I am doing it myself). When we bought the camper I wasn't ready to commit that sort of money because I didn't know if we would really take to it, but now we are so happy with it - it has changed our lives, and Sally has commented that despite looking at every camper that has come up for sale in England on eBay, she hasn't seen any she likes more than ours. So I am now prepared to sink much more money into our Shadow Cruiser.
With all this work my garage is looking even more of a mess than normal:
Collect the aluminum diamond plate tomorrow and Sally wants to go shopping for paint to change the interior from its interesting blood-red color.
Wow, under-slab vapor barrier; this stuff is at least 6mil thick. Very impressive. It looks like the underside of your roof has foam (inside ceiling of camper) ? So, that would block any up-saturation of moisture...
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. So once hardened I shaved off the excess and presented it to Sally as a pudding.
):
