Sleeping Space - A Quest

If you saw the earlier post about making a window flare you know we need to use this feature to increase the width of the van, for my 73 inch tall self.

Well, the first attempt at a flare failed pretty badly.  After a few weeks of thinking, I decided I could use the failed flare as a mold and lay-up a new flare inside of it.

First we fill, sand, fill, sand wash and repeat...



Once we have a smooth enough surface mold release wax and polyvinyl alcohol are applied.



I then sprayed gel coat into the mold to seal the yet to be laid fiberglass.



The the lay-up starts.  This consists of cutting various types of fiberglass (cloth/mat) to fit the mold.  Then the layers are applied with catalyzed polyester resin.  This is a time limited process as the resin is curing as you are applying it.  In addition air bubbles must be removed!  Needless to say its not the easiest work.

Here is the flare about half way into the lay-up.



Once the layup is cured, the edges are trimmed and the flare is removed from the mold (at least in theory).  It only took me an hour and a half to separate the 2.  You can see on the left of the photo below where i did not apply enough wax and the mold stuck.



Here is the now flare-less mold.



This is the flare's surface after de-molding and water clean up.



I then proceeded to fill, sand, and paint the flair with van matching paint. (sorry no photos...)

I applied the flare using 3M window weld adhesive.

In this photo you can see the complete bed platform.  

I am a bit proud of the design on this platform. It can be hinged up from either end for storage access.









And to wrap things up the spare tire has been moved to the back door.  The reason is to allow mounting the batteries under the van.









Here is a shot of the rivnuts that hold the battery frame in place.



That's all for now.  We just received the last of the galley components, so we are going to start building cabinets soon!