Campervan Build - Not My Work

[Pirahna]

I've had a couple of people ask about the campervan I'm having converted, so thought I'd post about it here. First off, I'm not doing the work. I want it done properly so have engaged a professional. The chap doing the work is Richard Hales, I saw a few of his vans before getting him involved, the craftmanship and attention to detail is exemplary. A link to his site: https://www.rhalesconversions.co.uk/

The van is a VW Crafter, it's a long wheelbase with the extended (maxi) body and comes in just shy of 7.4m in length. Engine is 177hp with an auto box, the box is torque convertor not DSG. It's got a pile of toys, adaptive cruise, lane departure, that sort of thing.

The base van.







The top half of the bumper should be white, it's a £75 option when speccing the van but has been missed off. The dealer will rectify this before the build is complete.





A rough sketch of the layout.



Windows are in.





Awning, solar and skylights. The awning is a manual wind out, the cable is for the LED light strip. The rear skylight is just that, the front is a Maxxair (has a fan). Both have been cabled for either the Maxxair fans and air con to give me options in the furure. The small skylight in front of the right solar panel is the bathroom.



Now to the interior. Insulated, ply lined.





The next lot of images start to show the interior colours. There is a bewildering array of choice available. When choosing for say a cupboard you can have a different colour on the outside, inside and edge. Ours has a very light grey ceiling and some of the walls. The cupboards have a dark grey carcass, white faces and mustard yellow insides. The dark yellow is used for the blinds, window lining bits and headboard. The blue edges are just there to protect them.

The inside taking shape. Behind the drivers seat is a small sofa with storage above and below. To the right of that is a small space to store the tables. To the right again is more storage with space for the fridge above. To the right again is the bathroom and then the bedroom.



The kitchen window looking back towards the bed. Storage next to the bed.



The bedroom showing a small cupboard on the left and bedroom window, storage on the right and the height of the bed.



The back. On the left is the slide out for the bikes, the bathroom sink is on the right. Storage for the front wheels at the top.

[DefTrap]

Sweet.
What'll it set you back in total you reckon?

[Pirahna]

Sweet.
What'll it set you back in total you reckon?

High £80k, maybe up to £90K, at the moment I'm £78k into it. The base van was just under £46k, the only way I could have added more cost was to have a cost option paint and extra high roof. The high roof is a plastic pod with a rubber sealing strip. It would have been nice for the extra headroom in bed but having seen it in the flesh I wasn't too sure about it's longevity.

I'm just about to have a chat with a man about wheels and tyres. I like the look of the Oz Rally Raid which are load rated for the van. There's a bit of a trend for fitting BFG All Terrain tyres which I'm not too keen on, the worst it'll do is a muddy campsite.

[weeksy]

£90k.for a van!!!?

Yeah but, it sounds better if you say £90k for a 1 bed house!

[Taff]

I really like it and would love to trade in my caravan for a camper, but it wouldn't work for us at the moment.

One obvious question.... Why spend so much on a conversion when at this price you can get a really really nice camper of the shelf?

[weeksy]

I really like it and would love to trade in my caravan for a camper, but it wouldn't work for us at the moment.

One obvious question.... Why spend so much on a conversion when at this price you can get a really really nice camper of the shelf?

Embroidered revtothelimit logos?

[Pirahna]

One obvious question.... Why spend so much on a conversion when at this price you can get a really really nice camper of the shelf?

Good question. We're both very long term tent campers, we've hired motorhomes in the past and had a pretty good idea what we wanted. We both preferred panel vans to motorhomes which narrows the field even further, which was more or less why we finished up getting one converted for us. Find one with a fixed lengthways bed with enough storage for bikes underneath, it doesn't really exist. It is a lot of money but start speccing up a Grand California and it's quite easy to hit that sort of number for a van that doesn't suit.

I've been on enough campsites to see people driving an hour plus each way to find a gas bottle, or LPG. There's no gas on this, saves on space and weight. There's a Webasto diesel hob going in plus an electric oven/grill/microwave. Both the hob and the Truma combi are plumbed straight into the vans diesel tank. There were a few other small things but I'm having a mental blank at the moment.

[Druid]

Looks very impressive, nice workmanship.

We've got a 2013 MWB Crafter that I converted myself. Couldn't fit anything longer on the drive so we had to make compromises - there's no shower or toilet, and the only seating is two swivel front seats. But it's high enough to stand up in, and there's a full length double bed that we don't have to fold away every morning.

The only thing I'd question is the power, mine's 180bhp and it's adequate, but I don't know how much extra weight is in the XLWB van

[Pirahna]

The only thing I'd question is the power, mine's 180bhp and it's adequate, but I don't know how much extra weight is in the XLWB van

The 177hp is the most powerful engine available sadly, in the 3.5 and 5t versions. The extra body length adds roughly 200kg compared to a new MWB, payload is approx 1050kg. I've had air bags installed on the back (bump stop replacements) so it's a paper exercise to uprate it to 4.2t if I need to. Hopefully I won't.

Pic of the air bags, no idea what the foil thing is.

[KungFooBob]

My coach built 3500kg Transit has the 130bhp 2.2 and I've never found it lacking!

if I stick to the speed limits I can manage 34mpg too.

[weeksy]

It does look impressive.

I'm always comparing campers to yachts, because we started off thinking we'd buy a camper to go travelling, but then it morphed into a yacht - inside they're essentially the same with about the same room - except the yacht has the outside/cockpit which always makes them feel bigger, so if I was going to build a bespoke camper I'd try and do one of those things where the roof has fold out bits and a ladder, so you can go up and sit up there in the open air - I know you've got the ground all around the van and potentially as much space as you like, but I still think there is a trick being missed here and an elevated platform would be a nice thing to have.

Yeah but Mrs Potter can sit on the deck/bench etc as you're cruising along, with a van that's obviously not viable. I think that's where the boat beats the van.

The obvious downside is where you can drive both...

[Pirahna]

I'm always comparing campers to yachts

The chap doing the work learnt his trade at Fairline.

There's not much real estate left on the roof. There's 2 large skylights and one small, solar, wi-fi thingy, reversing and rear facing cameras. Many people will have a TV aerial or satellite dish, we're not big telly watchers so haven't bothered. If I swap one of the skylights for an aircon unit that's more space gone.

[Rockburner]

Good question. We're both very long term tent campers, we've hired motorhomes in the past and had a pretty good idea what we wanted. We both preferred panel vans to motorhomes which narrows the field even further, which was more or less why we finished up getting one converted for us. Find one with a fixed lengthways bed with enough storage for bikes underneath, it doesn't really exist.

I'll just drop this here:

https://weinsberg.com/en-uk/cuv-camper- ... /interior/

(yes - I know it's probably not quite right for you - the bed is pretty high up, but it's not far off).

It is a lot of money but start speccing up a Grand California and it's quite easy to hit that sort of number for a van that doesn't suit.

I've been on enough campsites to see people driving an hour plus each way to find a gas bottle, or LPG. There's no gas on this, saves on space and weight. There's a Webasto diesel hob going in plus an electric oven/grill/microwave. Both the hob and the Truma combi are plumbed straight into the vans diesel tank. There were a few other small things but I'm having a mental blank at the moment.

IME using a twin bottle LPG (fillable from a petrol/LPG station) solved that problem quite easily. (although I do appreciate the 'single fuel' aspect).

How much do the solar panels provide and how many leisure batteries are you fitting?

Have to admit, one thing I did appreciate about the van I had was that it was long 'enough', but not 'too long'. It would just fit into a car-park space.

[Rockburner]

There's not much real estate left on the roof. There's 2 large skylights and one small, solar, wi-fi thingy, reversing and rear facing cameras. Many people will have a TV aerial or satellite dish, we're not big telly watchers so haven't bothered. If I swap one of the skylights for an aircon unit that's more space gone.

Yeah you have to make choices of how you use the space I guess.

I remember when we used to race when I was a 17/18yr old and we'd go to the races in our sponsors big van - at some tracks if you got on top of the van in the paddock you'd have a cracking view of a lot of the track, so we all used to take deck chairs up there and half the paddock would be sat up there watching.
That's probably where my idea comes from.

Keep posting the pics of your van, it's a great build thread

I imagine most van manufacturers don't want to get shit loads of legal actions from people falling of the roof.....

[Pirahna]

I'll just drop this here:

https://weinsberg.com/en-uk/cuv-camper- ... /interior/

How much do the solar panels provide and how many leisure batteries are you fitting?

All the layouts have across the van beds, a huge no. One thing we've always avoided is one have to climb across the other to get out of bed.


There are 2 x 175 watt solar panels and 2 x LIFEPO4 lithium batteries.

[lostboy]

One obvious question.... Why spend so much on a conversion when at this price you can get a really really nice camper of the shelf?

Good question. We're both very long term tent campers, we've hired motorhomes in the past and had a pretty good idea what we wanted. We both preferred panel vans to motorhomes which narrows the field even further, which was more or less why we finished up getting one converted for us. Find one with a fixed lengthways bed with enough storage for bikes underneath, it doesn't really exist. It is a lot of money but start speccing up a Grand California and it's quite easy to hit that sort of number for a van that doesn't suit.

I've been on enough campsites to see people driving an hour plus each way to find a gas bottle, or LPG. There's no gas on this, saves on space and weight. There's a Webasto diesel hob going in plus an electric oven/grill/microwave. Both the hob and the Truma combi are plumbed straight into the vans diesel tank. There were a few other small things but I'm having a mental blank at the moment.

I had a California for three years before realising that it was a great day van and for the odd night away but the compromises were too great. I still haven't got round to replacing it and we're doing the rounds of the "hire" motorhomes so that we can get a good understanding of exactly what we want. There's a LOT of things to consider and most are still too much of a compromise. I'm liking what you're doing to get it right for you.

[Rockburner]

I'll just drop this here:

https://weinsberg.com/en-uk/cuv-camper- ... /interior/

How much do the solar panels provide and how many leisure batteries are you fitting?

All the layouts have across the van beds, a huge no. One thing we've always avoided is one have to climb across the other to get out of bed.


There are 2 x 175 watt solar panels and 2 x LIFEPO4 lithium batteries.

The one i linked to is a longitudinal bed. (the layouts diagram doesn't show it very well).
But I get the reasoning.

[slowsider]

I'm always comparing campers to yachts

The chap doing the work learnt his trade at Fairline.

There's not much real estate left on the roof. There's 2 large skylights and one small, solar, wi-fi thingy, reversing and rear facing cameras. Many people will have a TV aerial or satellite dish, we're not big telly watchers so haven't bothered. If I swap one of the skylights for an aircon unit that's more space gone.

You gotta think outside the box Potter could have a crow's nest.

[Druid]

I'll just drop this here:

https://weinsberg.com/en-uk/cuv-camper- ... /interior/

How much do the solar panels provide and how many leisure batteries are you fitting?

All the layouts have across the van beds, a huge no. One thing we've always avoided is one have to climb across the other to get out of bed.


There are 2 x 175 watt solar panels and 2 x LIFEPO4 lithium batteries.

Crafters and Sprinters are too narrow to put a bed across, especially after you've fitted insulation. Ducatos and Boxers are a bit wider and have vertical sides so you can just fit a 6ft bed across. Across the van beds save quite a bit of spavr but I've never thought about the downsides, my wife crawling across me 3 times a night to go to the toilet would get tired very quickly

[Demannu]

HOLEEEEEEE SHEEEEEET
90 large
For a van
I paid less than that for a 2 bed flat last year!
Apart from having a cross chassis bed, my moho pretty much does all yours AND fit a motorbike in the garage and you'd get 70 change!
But it's your money and spend it how you like!