a whole bloody week has gone!
I better get on with it . . .
Despite the economy going to hell in a hand basket it is still hard to get materials. Everyone carries less stock, some things aren't made as often/much and you end up waiting for things so it's a case of do what you can.
There are things which were assumed to be of certain sizes in the initial design but now it's time to check the actual components and/or the size of one piece depends on the finished size of another.
A case in point is the seat / door / bed / lockers combination.
It's hard to determine which bit depends on which.
First things first I guess is to draw out the locker door sealing arrangements - a far more complicated arrangement than I would like but I have been thinking about this one on and off for about three months so I better go with what I have now.
Then decide on the bed frame size and structure and make that as it will determine the seat length which will determine the door position etc. etc. etc.
It's the top layer of tubes. . .
I ordered some rails and wheels, at unbelievable prices, from a local supplier without knowing definitively whether I could use them successfully for guiding the bed up and down and for guiding the motorbike carrier frame on the outside of the back "wall".
They have turned up now and there may be a few small problems that I overlooked.
The rails for the bed version are very thin gauge metal but as they don't support any weight and only supply guidance I am pretty sure they will be OK but I will have to make separate structures to support the actual lifting components.
The wheels however are "hard plastic" and will work nicely.
The larger ones for the bike rack seem to have an anti-sideplay wheel mounted on "top" which means they can't take any force in the opposite direction to normal, which I inadvertently had been relying on for their intended use. Hmmmm. More thinking required.
I am still waiting for details of small 24Vdc motor-gearbox combinations which I hope to use for lifting the bed and bike rack; and I'm waiting for a quote from a custom water tank supplier
before I start fitting too many brackets.
So a small diversion was quite welcome.
I moved the truck out of the way, which is sometimes a little tedious due to the air bleeding from the brakes while parked, to start work again.
This time however when parked I heard quite a distinctive air hiss from somewhere in the brakes. Hoping it was nothing to do with the work I had done on the compressed air saga I had a hunt around.
The culprit was found to be the pressure safety valve leaking.
So out with that one, it does look a little the worse for wear,
and down to Major Motors for a new one.
$29 later.
It seems to have reduced the leak problem about 75% so that's a significant improvement.
Now I have to wait for more tubing to arrive so I think it's time to do one or two of the paying jobs.
EEuuwwkkk!!
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