biv box

[zildjian]

Cool hacksawing story Bro'
that's the way to get a return on your tax-dollars making the bin man work up a sweat!!

Was wondering how you were getting along lately but the paragraph on buying an axe was a bonus frankly

can we have some more pictures too please (Camper)


Zildjian

[wonkywheel]

Aww,
I want to see the axe

[404]

Sorry, i have to wait a week til i get in the welding zone for pix. Welder got a mjr job making exterior stair set for a regular customer... and I am decidely irregular

I can throw in my dog's instagram @bikky_box and my Landy @perentie_lrcv

[404]

New photoshoppe with a rough of a basket for empty jerries, muddy maxtrax, hi lift or whatever. Sits on the exo skeleton frame.

[zildjian]

Does this mean jerries are no further back than here still?

[404]

Yes, the jerry posn is original to Army. The exo subframe for the camper sits entirely in the tub.

I was in Transport Corps (Reserves) for 5 or 6 years after 9/11 and the simple jerry has advantages over fitting larger in chassis fuel tanks. Grandad was in RASC in ww2 when every engine was petrol..

I think the reasoning was ...
If the vehicle has to be abandoned, the jerry fuel is quickly man-handlable to another vehicle.
If a jerry is holed the only fuel lost/leaked is fuel in that jerry. A large tank risks a lot of fuel if holed and can disable the vehicle/crimp the mission.
If the vehicle becomes bogged, jerrys mean weight can be manually unloaded with other items to aid movement past the obstacle (in my experience seems most often climbing out of a creek) and then re-loaded afterwards.
If you needed to trade with locals to get something you needed....

[wonkywheel]

I like the reasoning.
I am thinking of two smaller 2-gallon cans on the nose of the camper (cab-over front wall) The Pro's and Con's are:
Keep the weight as far forward as possible
Will the top heavy extra weight increase the body sway too much. Also that would mean another 18Kg on the overall weight.
With the small diesel heater I am installing I could do with more than the small 10 litre fuel tank.

[404]

Hello Wonky, your summer soon... is the heater just for winter where you are? I have a little cooker which can burn diesel or metho or shellite. In the end I have got used to Shellite and gone all oldschool -a shellite lantern and even the coleman 2 burner stove (with mods). I will sell off the little MSR dragon fly. Maybe. Diesel's problem is the smell, worse than kero...

Bad news.
No framework pics - today the welding was postponed due to an extra shift. Seems a few people around calling in sickies.

Good news 1.
I got a load of parts for the Land Rover delivered. Genuine parts too.
...but you know what its like with a bench piled up with tools and parts and then the old axehead sharpening guy rings back and says 'come get it - its done'.... and then you spend the afternoon on that toy fitting it with a new aussie spotted gum handle that came in the mail last week... and you the get the rasp out and get the handle on... then waste an hour -with no result- searching for the little metal wedge from the old broken handle.. "Right! I told you! "[cue Basil Fawlty rage thrashing the Metro bonnet].
So I took a photo. Can anyone date that axehead? The markings were under 3 layers of ancient enamel, hard and thick like on a 1930s train carriage.

Good news 2.
Calculations on the fibreglass poly board for the floor, the lower section of the camper that sits in the Land Rover tub (more or less unseen) - the sheets are 17mm (3/4in) thick, 2440x 1220 (8x4ft). I have to check weight of these ideas for such things as the legs. Well, even if I used those 17mm sheets to do the whole camper they would be ok. The roof could be done in that stuff but in 12.7mm thickness - 12.7mm board is supplied in the same dimension - 3sq metres at 5.5kg a sqm (16.5kg a sheet). The roof is about 2600L by 1800w. So.. say 19kg (under 20kg anyway).

Good news 3.
Talking of thinner board for the roof, the pop top "scissor" lifters arrived here as well -well, 3 out of 4 anyway (backorder for 1 more). Yesterday. Each scissor weighs 5.5kg. Flat bar type, long spring in the lower channel, 1200 long channel, the attraction is that they can pop up 900mm. The lift cap. is 35kg. Now, yes, the roof is 2600 on the sides and 1800 front and back ...the 1200 scissor is overkill, but we camp in some areas with gales in the Snowys. And if its not a strong breeze it unusual in my experience. I want less shake rattle and roll in the pop top. One of my favorite camp spots gave us a nasty 2am wake up - out of a calm and balmy night all of a sudden a gale came thru and blew our camp gear down the paddock. Stuff all around the place.

Good news 4.
While I was in a weighty frame of mind I made a gear list and weighed items too. The farm jack and cast iron mess gear and stove and lots of items. Some items I guessed. Good to know the options if it comes down to the last 100kg - the target GVM is 3200kg. This LR does have 4 wheel discs and uprated springs from the Defender 130, new bushes, new big shocks, all the running gear is very sound. Its a 30yr old chassis but it was galvanised from the factory hence worth the upkeep and prep.

[wonkywheel]

It will be interesting to see how near you are when you put it on a weighbridge.
As a shell, 25mm ali box with sheet fibreglass outer, it was only 400kg. Near completion I reweighed it and it was over 620 Kg.
My old Ford Ranger pickup is over its best before date. Uneconomic for the garage to repair. I thought about having a go myself but enthusiasm is greater than my energy levels these days.
My son says he is coming up with one of their company trucks that is to be sold off. It looks like being a 2016 Ranger Wildtrack. I will have to remove the mountain top and the cab roof bars. If the bars won't come off easily it will need a packer under the demountable for the cab-over bed nose to miss the roof. I'm a bit worried about the extra weight a packer might be.
We will see.

Elwell axe:
a very old company started in the 1500's with the name disappearing around 1960's when it was taken over.
I would guess your 1930's is not far out.

[404]

I looked over spec figures for the various panels and extrusions and updated the weight spreadsheet.

Two panel choices - either we go all solid grp 18mm and 12.7mm board
or we go composite grp skinned styro board on upper panels and mix with solid grp 18mm thermolite panels for the lower sections (tub/floor etc - see http://www.ccaboards.com.au/thermo-ligh ... range.html ).

I am no math guy but I spent hours incl double checking the figures I came up. I began with writing a list of walls and their dimensions and trying to fit them into the 2440 x 1220 boards [3 sq metres] with the least offcut etc, the stuff and CNC program does in under a minute probably. Figures make my head swim.
I ended up going trusty old school graph paper again.
I did the rectangles for sheets and drew the cuts needed for pieces and seeing the off cuts, turned out much better to visualise and calculate. Then I counted the sheets and their respective density figures.

Now my weight zigma is getting in the nitty gritty zone. Do I save ~ 50kg and go with mixed walls or just go with solid walls that can take waterblasting to get rid of mud and insect splatter... and have a box where pinstripes from tree scrapes do not concern. Also less combustible.