Sorry for the lack of updates, but I've been working hard on her to get her finished, today is the first day that she has felt like a caravan for a while as I added some finishing touches, including throws and a stereo.

I picked up a gas cylinder at the beginning of the week and spent Monday connecting up the gas and fitting a new fridge as the original one didn't appear to work. I managed to check everything except the water heater on Monday and the cooker, hob, fire and new fridge all appear to work fine on gas.

On Tuesday I pulled the water heater out, its a Carver Cascade Mk 1 and gas it a clean, drained the old water from it and connected it up. I fired it up and after about 30s it went to fail, it did this about 5 times until gas had got to it and then hey presto, I could hear it ignite and then start to creak with the heat, woohoo!

I also spent most of Tuesday putting the new water pipes in, I opted for the John Guest speedfit, 15mm, its an absolute doddle to fit, unlike the 12mm flexible stuff it won't kink and I opted to run it inside the caravan to prevent and problems in winter with pipes freezing.

I spent a couple of days last week covering the walls in the bathroom with vinyl to create the wet room,  I need to seal all the edges with huge amounts of sealant, but apart from that its done, the Thetford C200 toilet is also fitted. Photos to follow.

For one reason or another I didn't manage to get as much done yesterday as I hoped, but today I have caught up. The Bed is now complete, bar a piece of Oak trim and screwing the ply that covers the supports down, I'll do that once I've put the plumbing in as it will run under the bed.

I had a scrap piece of Oak so I decided to have a go at making a light fitting to replace the fluorescent tube that used to be above the bed, the tubes consume 8 Watts of power, as opposed to the 1.8 Watts that the LED downlighter I used, the downlighter throws out a huge amount of light compared to the old tube.

I will get a couple of chrome dome headed screws to mount the lights just to add a touch of bling, I'm pleased  with the affect, they look contemporary (another will be made for the front), but don't look too modern so they don't change the character of the caravan. I have a piece of the plastic beading to cover the seam behind the light.

I finished making the cabinet for the fridge today, its oak supports with plywood side panel and the original lid.  I also managed to reused the old draw front for the access panel. To keep the weight down I remade it using the same methods as most things are made in a caravan, glue, strip wood and ply.

I decided mentally and also with some simple sketches how I would rebuild it, I then started assembling it, building the supports first, then the tray that the fridge sits on and making the rest of the cabinet around it.  The fridge just sits on some strip wood supports (12mm x 36mm), this will mean if there is a gas leak it will just vent through the floor.

I will cut an access panel through the wardrobe to access the gas pipe and 12V supply, which should make removing it a lot easier in the future.  I'll pop into B&Q at some stage and get some mesh to cover the air vents that you can see above and below the fridge.

I need to test the fridge over the next couple of days and give it a good clean down with some disinfectant before reinstalling it.

To be honest I'm very happy with how the cabinet has turned out.

I started papering the inside a couple of days ago, but following the recommendations online I have had to redo it. The advice appeared to be to seal the ply with PVA glue and then to use premix paste on the boards, I just ended up with too many air bubbles and ripples in it. I'm not the best at hanging wallpaper, but I normally do a better job.

So  I stripped it off this morning and redid it this afternoon, doing it the old way, bucket of water and make your own paste in a packet. Hey presto, a lot better looking

I looked for a paper that was similar to what was already up,  but there was nothing suitable so having looked at all the options, including blinds etc, we have decided on going for the pale browns that were already there, but accenting it with purple/aubergine. While looking through B&Q I came across the above paper that covers all the colours and also goes well with the oak of the cabinets.

While waiting for the paper to dry I decided to start work on the cabinet that holds the fridge, the original one was rotten and I couldn't salvage it. Looking at its construction though I appeared to be strip wood with a think oak plywood on the front, I couldn't get a thin oak faced ply but Beers sell oak strip wood the right width to make the cabinet with. This means that I don't need to worry about facing it with anything.

The cabinet is being held together using polyurethane glue, that way I don't need to worry about nail holes or screw heads.  For something like this, you really need a lot of clamps until the glue dries.

 

Its been a week since my last update, I was away for the weekend so lost a couple of days working on her, plus had man flu for a couple of days so progress was slow, however I've managed to reline the inside of the main door, built the new walls for the bathroom and starting construction on the bed. I've also striped half the wallpaper off ready for papering next week.

   

The door was a pain to dismantle and redo, but it looks a lot better than it was

Widget was keeping an eye on my work :)

Most of the cupboard that housed the fridge was rotten, you can see the only bit that remains, next weeks job is to rebuild it out of oak stripwood

One of the other tasks I've managed to complete was fitting new reading lights and down lighters, plus wiring them all in.  The down lighters are 1.8W based LEDs that throw a huge amount of light out, I'm going to use them in the bathroom and also the front room, bedroom and also the hall. I'll take some photos next week when its dark showing how much light they give out.

After a couple of days hard graft the rear of Kitty is now complete and all glued, all the new panels are in and everything is screwed/glued together.

I had to take the rear window out to put the new panel in and I'm glad I did as it would appear that there is no sealant around the window, I suspect this is the case for all the windows, so I'll add that to my list of things to do when I seal her back up.

I won't be able to work on her for a couple of days, but the first task next week will be to prepare the walls by striping the wallpaper off, then while she is drying out as I'll use the steamer, I'll build the new walls for the bathroom and remount the door and assemble the frame for the bed.

My goal by the end of next week is to have the bathroom built and her redecorated inside. I'll be visiting the chandlers tomorrow and will hopefully pick up 7 new LED downlighters, they are only 1.8w but put out a huge amount of light, way more than the 8w fluorescent tubes that were installed on her. I'll also take a look at their reading/spot lights and see if there is anything that would be better than the 10w ones that she already has. 

I finished the front off yesterday and today, you can see the 4 new panels that I put in, I'll also insulated behind the front panel using the proper insulation and the new floor section is bonded in place.

I reglued the furniture yesterday and clamped it together allowing it to dry overnight, an hour or so this morning and hey-presto, the front is back together ready for decorating. I'll be papering the walls sometime next week and replacing the plastic edging strips with some oak ones that I picked up from Beers they were only a couple of quid for an 8ft length, bargain.

Now that the furniture is back in at the front I can finish off the rear and start building the new bathroom and bed.  As you know I've already replaced the floor in the rear so all that is left is to do is fix the last of the rotten timbers and then cover the foam with new ply, then I can build the bathroom and remake the cupboard for the fridge.

One of the side timbers at the rear was further gone than I had realised, I poked it with a screwdriver and it felt spongy all the way up. I decided to take off the edging strip and remove all the staples etc so I could replace the timber easier.  You can see day light in the seam in the following photos where the seam has been separated:

 

In the following photo the black stuff you can see is the timber or what is left of it, all I had to do was split the seam and poke a screwdriver in and it all fell out, completely rotten.

I've cut the new timber to go in and I'll fit it tomorrow as I'll need to get some more sealant/adhesive from the Caravan shop.