There Are Rules and Rules . . .

All the sub-floor boards in and sealed. Hooray. Finally able to get the mess off my fingers - have been too scared to touch anything valuable for days.

A phone call from Sich tells me all went well with the shower base and I should (maybe) have it for Thursday. It will be nice to concentrate a bit in that area for a while.

That end is where all the (non-electrical) services go - gas, hot water, toilet, air conditioning, heating, water pump etc.. so there is a little bit of detail to work out yet.

In addition there is not a lot of hanging space in this camper (not that I think I will need a lot) but there is the opportunity (I think) to create a tall cupboard around here which might come in handy. This is all part of the last framing to be done and then I can start installing all the underfloor items like tanks etc.

Have been also doing a little bit of regular work (repetitive machining) and while (not) concentrating on this I have been considering the generator a little more. As if I haven't spent enough time here already but it will be the key to civilised existence once on the road. I need to make it quiet and convenient enough that I can run it even when it says "NO GENERATORS ALLOWED". To do this it needs to be fitted exactly into a position where I can duct hot air and exhaust out the back of the storage bin through weather protected vents.

The lifting hoist I made earlier works "OK" (with quite a bit of jiggling for exact final positioning) for getting it in and out off the ground (if and when that's necessary) but really the most common operation will just be putting fuel in it. That can't be done in situ. (Well it could be done by lifting up the dinette seat and doing it inside if I was really stupid - but I'm saving that to a last resort. Just Kidding.) And when it is lifted out on the hoist the lifting point is EXACTLY over the centre of the fuel cap. So it has to be put all the way down on the ground and unhooked so it can be filled.

Eventually I couldn't resist any longer and made up some two way slides for holding and moving the generator into exact final position.

Which is tucked right against the back wall like so :


















When required it can be moved slightly forward (about 100 mm) to clear the back edge of the bin . . .


















And then slid out to the side where it can either be conveniently fueled and pushed back in or conveniently lifted off the slides (which are pushed back in out of the way) and lowered to the ground.


















I know it all seems like overkill (and I was accused of just that by someone who saw it today) and I could have just gone out and bought some super-duper triple extension ball bearing slides. But, I have used these in a previous off road camper I built and discovered that because they do move so easily, that in itself, can lead to other problems. In the last camper a complete kitchen was built this way - on road : no problems - off road : slamming backward and forward eventually broke the restraining catches and eventually the door as well. After several alternate attempts to solve the problem with quite complicated devices the most satisfactory solution was just like this - one piece of tube sliding inside another. Enough friction when you don't want it sliding about and slippery enough when you want it to slide .