Wandering Time

New Wheels

2026-03-24T16:17:00.002+11:00

Disaster struck: the ebike died. Rather than repair it, I decided to stop using an ebike all together.

Current state of affairs

2026-01-18T16:03:00.010+11:00

Been a while since the last blog post, but progress hasn't stopped. If anything it has been in a bit of a frenzy of late. The current state: caravan still not 100% finished, but I don't think it never will be. It'll be continual tinkering.

The painting is finished. Pin striping is on. The original tape didn't stick. I vastly underestimated how long spraying the stripes on would take. Though, it wasn't the spraying as the masking that took so long.

Pin stripes done

Electrical panel was wired up and installed. Solar panels mounted and connected.

I've been sleeping in it since 19th December. That day was a 40°C. The house (brick and timber) heated up and retained the heat. The caravan heated up with air temperature, but as it has zero thermal mass, as the sun went down and the air temp dropped, the caravan cooled. The house was much slower. It was cooler in the van. I do have a ventilation fan on one window, but just having the windows open was enough breeze to feel cool sleeping.

By sleeping inside it each night, I've opening/closing the door a lot. Some of the discoveries from this:

Three wheels would have been a better choice. Anything I can't reach from the open door, that needs me to step inside needs the back legs down. If I need anything from the front, the front legs need to go down too. Even for just putting them down once, there is an amount of fussing. I added a bubble level to help with leveling.
Two locks on the door got old fast. Two locks on the outside and two catches on the inside. The door needs it, but one would be much more user friendly.
The door opening upwards seemed a good idea. It does double as an awning when it showers. The door doesn't have support struts, but I do have some supports I can put under it to hold it up was an awning. But that doesn't happen as often as it is get in/get out, or open and get something in/out and close it again. I lift it enough to slip in/out from the side. Or if I need to get rummage a bit, it rests on my back as I do so. In the future I may redo the door to a barn door configuration with one lock.
I made the van a little too short. 30cm more would have been a bit cramped getting in and closing the door without being on the bed.
I thought I'd sleep with my head at the door end, but ended up liking the other way around. This meant the shelf that my feet were to go underneath was too low. I banged my head on it a few times. It was the first change next day: cut the shelf out and the repaint the wall. I've come to thinking that the shelving I have would be better as soft bags or nets hanging on the walls.
The bed is 630mm wide, but with the wheel wells and shelving beside it, there is no room to push off the sleeping bag to the side. The bed is effectively in a well. The sleeping bag is either stuffed to a side, pressing against my back or pushing over my legs/front, or, pushed to the end of the bed. Lately I found that stuffing it in a bag is better. Keeps it bundled up taking up less room even if its down where my legs are.
The electrical panel has a surprising amount of lights: blue, orange, green and red. So bright, I haven't needed an inside light. New to me the first night was that some of them flash. All night. I'd never noticed in the day, but at night, it's very noticeable. I'm still using the temporary fix of hanging a shirt over it each night. One day I'll make a better cover.
It seemed a good idea to have the electrical panel face the bed. Sit in bed, turn the switches on/off, see the voltage/current/power meters and plug in devices to the USB and cigarette lighter socket. Reality is that I don't need the switches very often. Most things have another switch closer to the business end, or it doesn't matter if they are turned on/off. eg. the ventilation fans, USB devices. I leave the fans on 24x7. The meters, I looked at often on the first few days, but rarely look at them now. The battery drain is so low, and I've so much solar, that even on overcast and rainy days, under the trees, the battery fully recharges. The UBS/cigarette access was a major pain point. I couldn't leave anything plugged in over night as the plugs in stuck into be bed space. Turning over could catch the lead or plug and break it. Anything plugged in really wanted to be on the bed. I still use the sockets when I'm awake, but I installed a cigarette lighter socket and USB plugs on the forward and backward sides of the panel for when I want to leave things plugged in over night. There is shelf space in front and behind to leave devices, rather than on the bed and the cables are out of the bed.
The roof was extremely loud in the rain. Light rain was okay, but heavier showers, it was unbearable. I'm parked underneath some trees and larger water drops drop from the branches. They manage to make a loud cracking sound. The raised solar panels are okay, so it was only the strip around them that was the problem. With testing, a piece of fabric is enough to break up the drops to deaden the noise. I wanted green velvet but type I got was too thin. I found a piece of cream corduroy. It works to deaden the noise, but I'm not sure if it will remain. I'll leave it on for now and monitor how the water drains and if it drys enough to not become mouldy.
The bed! So many problem with the bed. It was terrible for storage underneath. When I cut the original height down, I thought I was clever by making it 110mm high - the height of a tin of beans. I was thinking that tinned food could be also be the bed top supports. But too many things are taller than 110mm. So I had a storage problem for stuff I had planned on going under the bed. The bed creaked a lot. I laminated it with paper rather than fabric like the rest of the caravan foam. But the paper with glue/paint become very stiff and hard. No give at all. The polycarbonate bed top and floor creaked when it rubbed on them. I could have fixed this, but I made the base a tight fit between the wheel wells and shelving. More creaking points. and as the fit was so tight, no space to put anything to stop the rubbing. New bed base fixes all these and more.

New bed base under construction

Cheap Solar panels

2025-02-11T17:35:00.000+11:00

When I planned the caravan, I took a quick look about on online for solar panels. I saw that a 100W panel was about 1m long. The next size up was about 1.5 or 1.6m long. That was the basis for the caravan. If I'm committed to 1.6m, when my tent is 1.9m long, why not sleep under the solar panel?

A few months ago I looked quickly on Ebay and saw 300W and 400W panels. Small sizes too. Wow. This is great. Cheap too! I could get 4 panels on the roof. That's an amazing 1200 watts! I'll be swimming in power. Solar must have improved a lot. I was happy for weeks.

Then I went to order.

Money on the line, so I really dug into the details and specs to compare panels. A huge face palm moment. How did I not notice earlier!

I won't put a link here, but search Ebay and you'll find a lot of examples for cheap solar panels. I'm looking at flexible panels, but this also applies to rigid panels.

Taking one example on Ebay, advertised as 400W for $136.99. Looking through the nice pictures, lots of claims of high efficiency. High conversion rate. Panel size is 960x670mm. Nice and small. The seller has a lot of sales. High ratings and good reviews.

Scrolling down to "Item specifics" to get more details is the first hint of something not quite right.

Power: 201-300W Charging Mode: PWM (Pulse Width Modulation)
Connector Type: MC4 Wattage: 300-399W

Power versus Wattage? What's this about? Both given as a range, but it is advertised as 400W. What would I really get out of it?

The panel is using monocrystalline cells.

Solar Technology: Monocrystalline

Googling, the top result: Monocrystalline cells are rated at 15%–24% efficiency. Looking at other results, 15%-20%, 15%-23%. Note this is for the cell. After you encapsulate it in plastic the rating will drop. But then searching for solar panel efficiencies, I also find 15%–24%. Cheap Ebay panels are unlikely to be 24%.

How to compare solar panels: using Standard Test Conditions.

Standard Test Conditions (STC) are the industry standard conditions under which all solar PV panels are tested to determine their rated power and other characteristics. When a panel is advertised as having a capacity of 350W for example, this is the power it is expected to produce under STC.

It tests a cell at:

Cell temperature: 25°C
Irradiance: 1000 W/m²
Air mass: 1.5

This is the cell, there are other measurements that give a more real world data for a panel.

But taking STC, and using the 1000W/m² and a low and high efficiency value, we have:

The panel size is: 0.960x0.670m = 0.64m²
Panel Wattage = Solar Irradiance x Area x Efficiency

Low efficiency: 15%
= 1000 W/m² x 0.64m² x 15%
= 96 W

High efficiency: 24%
= 1000 W/m² x 0.64m² x 24%
= 154 W

96-154W is a long way from the advertised 400W. Not even close to the 201W power rating either.

But I might not get even that. That was at 1000 W/m². Using the solar radiation in Sydney. On the day I was doing the calculations, the maximum was 961W/m² at midday. The average of 10am to 3pm was 833W/m². The day average was 569W/m².

Running the numbers again this time using 15, 17, 20 and 24% efficiency for the hours of the day. How many watts at the different hours at an efficiency.

October 28
----------	------------

Sunrise	06:00

Sunset	19:18

Total	7398 wh/m²

Panel m²	0.64


		Watts


Time	W/m²	15%	17%	20%	24%

07:00	144	14	16	18	22

08:00	376	36	41	48	58

09:00	594	57	65	76	91

10:00	777	75	85	99	119

11:00	901	86	98	115	138

12:00	961	92	105	123	148

13:00	826	79	90	106	127

14:00	771	74	84	99	118

15:00	763	73	83	98	117

16:00	612	59	67	78	94

17:00	445	43	48	57	68

18:00	213	20	23	27	33

19:00	15	1	2	2	2

What time you test and the efficiency of the panel matters. In the real world, that 400W panel is only going to give a maximum of 148W on that day if (and that's a bit if) it is 24% efficient and the temperature of the panel is 25C. Spoiler: It won't be 25C in the sun and it isn't 24% efficient.

All the high quality brand name panels I checked had Monocrystalline efficiencies of 17%, so using that, the 400W panel might give 105W at midday at most. Real world will be less. Flexible panels also degrade faster than rigid panels.

But all is not lost.

I created a spreadsheet of all the solar panels I was looking at. On and off Ebay. The off Ebay panels were by Renogy, Sunman and ATEM. Their specifications as advertised. Price, size, advertised watts, panel type, Voc and Vmp. I then calculated the watts at STC for all panels based on its size. No surprise, most Ebay panels were way less than advertised. But not all. All the non Ebay panels I included were better than advertised at STC.

I also calculated $/watt at STC for all panels. If area wasn't a concern this would be one deciding metric, but panel size was also important to me. I only have so much space on the roof. How could I get the maximum use of it?

With the different panel sizes, I could get between 1 and 4 panels. In the end, I decided on three Ebay panels advertised at 400W, but by my calculations are more likely to be 90W each. I got lucky that the seller was having a sale, so each panel ended up costing $70 delivered. There was a Sunman panel I really liked with watt output only slightly lower than the combined three I panels I ordered. But I could only get one on the roof and it's price was significantly higher. Annoyingly a couple of weeks later, they had a 60% off sale. At that price I would have purchased it. But too late by then.

I'm happy with the three I did order. All the reviews of flexible panels show they don't last as long as rigid panels. Flexing cracks the cells, lowering output. Over heating is a problem if they don't have an air gap underneath. As my caravan is insulating foam, I intend to mount them raised. So having cheap panels for a first go suits me. I think of it as an experiment to test the mounting system. When they fail, I'll know more about my usage and the mounting system. Then I might look at a more expensive options.

The Year of the Caravan

2025-01-05T05:42:00.002+11:00

This year the caravan will finish! Well, finished enough to be in use. I'm not sure it will ever really be finished. Already I have a list of fixes, changes and improvements. But not now. The focus is on getting it done. Changes can happen later.

December was looking promising. I had lined up time with my welder friend to get some chassis fixes done. The brake caliper mount. Strength the draw bar attachment. Make the disk brake handle mounting seen in the previous post. I also lined up another friend to help with the electrical wiring. The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.¹ I caught COVID. There are no quarantine rules anymore, but I wasn't going to share the infection.

I did end up getting the welding done. And over the Christmas - New Year time, got the disk brakes mounted. The cabin got another coat of paint on the outside also. I've still more to finish and look forward to the Men's Shed reopening.

The delay for the electrics turned into a good thing. It was going to be two ebike batteries: one on the ebike, one in the caravan. Charge the one in the caravan, swap with the ebike when required. But the caravan battery needs to provide power while it is charging. The BMS in the battery I have doesn't allow that. If it is charging, discharge stops. A work around was to charge it via the discharge port, but I wasn't keen on that solution. I thought to have a small 12v battery for caravan supply, and charge that from the ebike battery or solar. Eventually I decided to have the caravan just use a 12v battery and skip the second ebike battery. I'll charge the ebike battery when I'm stopped.

Well, that's the plan.

¹: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/the-best-laid-plans-of-mice-and-men-often-go-awry

Brakes

2024-11-30T07:41:00.000+11:00

Been thinking about brakes on and off for as long as the caravan has been going. A lot of the European caravans use inertia brakes. I wasn't keen on that option, preferring to have direct control on the braking. Some of the caravans had no brakes. Madness! I can't think of a time when you'd think "Gee, I glad I don't have brakes!"

So, I need to activate two brakes on the caravan from the bike. And it needs to be able to disconnect. I've flip flopped between mechanical and hydraulic, one lever or two. Even considered electrical. Stressed over if one or two cables from the bike all the way to the caravan wheels would be able to activate brakes. Would there be too much play in the system? Do I need a booster system. Do I need pulleys in places to smooth the action?

I decided to use hydraulics at the calipers. Mainly to avoid having to adjust them. So then it turned into how activate them. One lever to activate both? They do make such a beast, but besides the eye watering price tag, I didn't find any quick connectors for bicycle hydraulics. So have to use two levers. I did consider making new levers, but using the existing levers would be simpler for the future.

The previous post with the caravan hitched to the bike was to see how much clearance there was for the brake lever mounting. Heaps of space. phew!!

Deadlines focus the mind. Tackled the brakes. Cobbled together this test setup. Dowel, wood clamps and scraps.

The full test setup for dual brakes from one lever

I used a kids cart brake lever and cable. The garden rake had the right handle size to fit the brake levers on.

Close up of the cable to lever (front)

Some scrap metal with the right size hole for the front. Adjuster is needed to tension the brake cable. There is one also at the lever end.

Close up of the cable to lever (back)

A lucky piece of aluminium with just the right bend in it for the back. I don't think my test would have worked so well if it was flat. I used an old V-brake to pinch the cable so it wouldn't pull through.

Levers mounted on dowel.

It worked! Very happy with the it. A few refinements will be needed for the final design. Needs more clamping. The cable could jump off too easy otherwise. The final will be out of aluminium rather than wood.

Hitched up!

2024-10-31T16:45:00.000+11:00

It's so white!

First time hitched the bike. A new hitch, and of course, you can't miss the cabin. Hadn't realised I didn't paint the wheel wells until now. Will paint them black. The mass of white will be broken up with pinstripes.

A short pedal about the street. Rolls easy on the flat. No motor needed for the short, small incline I tested it on.

How not to hang a door

2024-09-21T05:56:00.000+10:00

The door took much more work than I had thought. A common occurrence during this build. Everything seems so simple and easy, until I start doing it. Then I find all the things I hadn't thought of. Learn that my plan isn't working out. And blow past my expected finish date.

It seemed like a good idea to position the piano hinge on the door and lintel while they were both flat on the floor. Drill the holes in the holes in both. Then they would line up straight. Did that, then glued the lintel to the caravan body. And then I bolted the door on and groaned.

Notice a problem?

Look closely at the bottom of the door. The gap on the left compared to the right. Not even close.

I experimented with moving the holes on the lintel, but wasn't happy with how that was working out. Too many holes for the piano hinge would be too close to the edge. The basic problem was that the roof is not 100% level. There is a 5mm difference one side to the other. Unnoticeable looking at the roof, but hanging a metre long door off it and the slight slope is amplified. Gluing the lintel to the roof really wasn't a good idea. I did consider just ignoring it, but I would look at the gap every time I opened the door. And I'm sure I'd quickly grow tired of people telling me it was crooked.

Decided to remove the lintel. Wasn't easy. A lot of cutting glue and foam with a knife.

Working on a solution

I had thought to glue a thin triangle wedge on top of the lintel to space up one side down. But as I was setting up to cut the wedge, I realised that I could also cut off a wedge from the lintel.

A test with the door on and holding it all together with clamps to check the door would hang straight this time. Marked out where the lintel would have to go. Undid all the set up. Coated the lintel in glue and clamped it on.

Can't have too many clamps

And after the glue has set, the moment of truth.

Worth the effort!

Yes!

Wiley Windows

2024-09-15T14:14:00.001+10:00

Been a while since the last update. Work on the caravan has been happening though.

I thought making windows would simple. A couple of weeks. Easy. No surprise it didn't turn out that way.

My first window didn't get finished. The timber I used was too heavy. After looking at using aluminium, I settled for three ply at a bad time. At the two nearest hardware stores three ply was out of stock and on back order. I waited for orders, but no three ply. Tired of waiting I recycled cupboards and boxes.

I settled on four windows all in landscape mode. The door has a A6 sized (105 x 149 mm) window, just to see out before I open the door. The front would have an A4 (210 x 297mm). And the sides would have an A3 (297 x 420 mm). I'm not certain on the A4 window. It may change to an A3 in the future. But at the time, I didn't have enough three ply to make it larger anyway. Also, I decided to just get it done. Improvements can happen in the future.

Different colors for the different recycled wood.

Wiley Windows are what I wanted. I liked all the options they provided. They can be full open, partially open, even when raining, fit block out screens and mossie screens.

Weights while gluing the front edging on

The three ply was not marine grade, so I coated it with epoxy to waterproof it. At the time, the weather was cold. So cold that the epoxy was like peanut paste and wouldn't pour from the containers. When it warmed up a bit, it would flow, but found that the low temps, the set time was extended by a lot. Unless the surface was flat, it slumped off, or set on the way to slumping off. I was also surprised to find the wood soaked up the epoxy. It took multiple coats to get a layer of epoxy on.

The idea was that a piece of perspex A4 or A3 would fit in the window. A small error. I was 3mm off on one dimension for each window. I think it was the kerf on the saw on the wrong side of the marking line. Didn't pick it up until I went to fit the perspex. But okay in the end as can cut down the perspex to fit.

Cutting the holes in the cabin was a bit nerve wracking. I used the perspex sheets to mark with so that they would be level compared to the roof line. I marked out around the perspex and cut the laminate with a utility knife. I peeled it off, then drilled a large hole in the four corners. Used a hacksaw to cut roughly between the holes. Then I used the hot knife to smooth cut close to the marked edges.

Did you pick up my mistake in that list of steps? The windows are larger than the perspex. Back to marking out the difference onto the walls, cut the laminate off, cut the foam with the hot knife again. Now the windows fit.

Windows in the cabin.

Epoxy isn't UV resistance, so needed painting. Black on the outside, white inside.

Painted waiting for the cabin to be ready.

Windows aren't installed yet, as the cabin interior needs to be laminated.

PMF (Poor Man's Fibreglass) Time

2024-05-13T17:34:00.000+10:00

It was time to attach the roof to the walls, and then start the laminating.

I removed the cabin from the chassis. Checked it all over and filled any gaps or holes. I used a foaming polyurethane glue. Using a plastic spatula to spread it into and over any holes, then tape over with masking tape. Without the tape, it was sometimes too bubbled to give a smooth look when sanded. As it was setting, pressed with the spatula to pop the bubbles and force into the gap/hole. After it set, removed the tape and sanded it smooth.

After all the gaps had been filled, it was flipped it on its roof. I wanted to start from the base and work towards the roof, so any seams would overlap downwards when it is upright. I cut the fabric to fit the base. It overlaps 90mm on all sides. I marked the edges to help line up the fabric when replacing it over the paint.

Was happy and a bit miffed to find the fabric is 1140mm wide. I had in my head that it was 1000mm wide. That's great as less seams needed. The side laminate is one piece of fabric wrapped from the back, down the side, across the front, down the second side to the back. Over five metres. I'll have to cut 10mm off all of it. Miffed, as when I lowered the roof, the height from the bottom of the floor to the top of roof is 1130mm. I'd have made the roof 10mm higher if I'd known.

I had decided to just use paint to attach the fabric. Applied paint on the foam, press the fabric into the paint. I put a plastic bag over one hand to smooth the fabric. The plastic slides. The other hand, I could grab and stretch the fabric to help pull out any wrinkles. Another coat of paint was immediately applied over the top to wet the fabric fully. It was important to get the fabric saturated, else it didn't stick well to the foam.

I had a few bubbles appear after it had dried. To fix them, I used a pin and punctured the bubbles. Keep pricking the bubbles to make a lot of holes. Can't have to many holes. Some of the bubbles deflated with this. But if they didn't, I smoothed them flat and apply more paint over the top. They stayed down after that.

Everything went pretty good. Only worry for me was that the fabric was soaking up the paint.

Finally I flipped the cabin on the base and to laminate the roof. And this is where I stuffed up. For reasons that escape me now, I decided to use Titebond 2 rather than paint. Big mistake. It was harder to apply. It was tacky and the plastic bag trick didn't work. I had to pull the fabric tight. At the end, it looked good wet, but as it started to dry a lot of bubbles started to show. Then the weather turned to rain, and humidity was high for two weeks. The glue didn't want to dry fully. It was staying tacky. I read about using an electric iron, but lacking this, I boiled a saucepan of water and used that. I put baking paper down first and sat the saucepan of boiling water on top. The good news was that the tacky glue hardened after it cooled. Bad news was the the flat looking bubbles actually bubbled upwards. So many bubbles. Some returned to flat when cool, some didn't. What would happen in the sun? I didn't want to find out. And it looked terrible.

I peeled the fabric and glue off. Need to pull it in a peeling motion. Filled in any patches that needed it and sanded the roof again. Now I'm waiting for more fine weather to redo the roof fabric layer with paint.

Gluing the roof on

Used straps and weights

Fabric ready on the base

Applying the paint

Smooth it with hand in a plastic bag

Base all attached

Fabric and paint on the side

Side all attached

Marking the roof fabric

Flat bubbles on the roof

Bubbles getting worse

Removing the roof fabric

Bed Done!

2024-04-21T06:13:00.000+10:00

Built a bed base with storage bins. A raised bed with storage underneath.

Bed box in!

But, sitting/lying on the bed and it sagged more than I liked. I experimented with more supports under the lids, and with thicker lid options. Either would have worked, but I eventually decided that the the amount of under the bed storage I had built wasn't needed. Too much storage and it's tempting to fill it. I would use the beside the bed area, and shelving. I could then cut the walls down for a lower roof height. A lower roof is better as it will catch the wind less,a and be less prone to tipping over.

Bed base was 200mm high. This was to give height to sit up on the bed. Wheel base is 800mm. Roof was 1200mm off the floor, 1500mm of the ground.

I wavered on roof height when I went to cut the walls down. It wasn't just the sit up height on the bed. The door opening height is important to me. A lower roof = a lower door opening, or a thinner lintel over the door. The door will open upwards under the roof, and I want it to open more than 90°. I want to be able to sit in the doorway and not hit my head. Decided I wanted to keep an under bed storage option for the future in case I really did need it, so rather than lowering it 200mm, I cut 130mm off. Roof is 1070mm from the floor.

Bed box out and cutting shelving.

Assembly Time!

2024-03-23T18:30:00.001+11:00

More sanding and gluing. The door and surrounds. Glued the door frame to the walls. Found out later I made a mistake on the measurement. Door was too narrow. Forgot to add on the wall thickness. Lucky for me I was able to cut the excess off.

More laminating. More tries with epoxy. More tries with glue. Right now, I've delaminated more than I've laminated. Decided to give up with both and stick to using paint. Laminated the underside of the roof while it was flat on the floor. Figured it would be easier than upside down.

Moved the chassis to the garage and assembled the walls and roof on it. Finally it's starting to look like a caravan. Glued the side walls to the floor. Going to hold out on the front wall and the roof until after some of the internal fit out is completed.

Looking from the front towards the rear doorway. Roof is on to help stabilise the walls.

Corners

2024-03-03T05:13:00.004+11:00

Doesn't feel like a lot was achieved this week. Other stuff happening, meant less time for the caravan build. A few stuff ups also sent me backwards.

Lots of cutting foam when mistakes where made. The door was glued up. I cut and glued up the wheel well sections. I cut a lot of triangle sections to frame the corners as in the image below. They'll be glued in today and then given a light sanding in preparation for the fabric coating.

Squaring Off

2024-02-25T09:09:00.002+11:00

An exciting week. I gave up bashing my head trying to square off the panels. The 1200x600 XPS panels when I started weren't very square. I should have squared them all before joining them together. But it seemed a good idea to leave that until later. Now, being later, I wish I hadn't. Trying to square up the full panels was a lot harder than I thought it would be. After countless tries, with string, straight edges and not so straight edges, I gave up and asked for help.

Tom arrived with his van. We loaded it all up and took it to the Men's Shed. The plan was to use the table saw to trim off the edges. No edge being straight stopped that idea. We ended up clamping a foam panel to an MDF panel set up on a table. Line up two edges of the foam at a corner of the MDF. They had to be some overlap, as the edges weren't straight or square. Check that too much foam was not going to be removed. Then I then sanded the two sides to match the MDF panel edges. I used a right angle to check the edges as I sanded. Done! Two edges (more or less) straight and at 90 degrees to each other. Undo the clamps, move the foam, line up one of the now straight edges with an edge of the MDF. Use the a tape measure to check the dimensions. (The walls needed to be the same height. The roof needed to be 960mm wide). Clamp. Sand the edge that isn't straight to match the MDF. Unclamp, move and get the last edge lined up. Clamp. Sand. Quicker to describe than to do. Several hours of sanding to get it all done. Tom then dropped me and the foam back home again. Thank you Tom!

I did another epoxy test this week. A small test piece. I used a paint brush rather than a scraper to spread the epoxy about. This test went a lot better. For one side of a 1 sqm piece of foam, the added fabric and epoxy weight would be 280g. I also did a test with PVA glue, that was right on 200g. Both are acceptable. Using a roller or scraper might get the epoxy weight lower.

PVA glue is so much easier to use.

Door Locks and Epoxy

2024-02-18T15:05:00.001+11:00

Epoxy doesn't mix with locks.

I started the first epoxy pour on the front panel, but wasn't happy with how it turned out. The weight was higher than planned.

The fabric overlapped the edges so I could trim it later. Pulling on this, I was able to peel the epoxy impregnated fabric off.

It only pulled a small amount of foam off. Checking the weight, I was right. The epoxy impregnated fabric weighed 535g. So I was right with 100g fabric and about 440g epoxy. Way too much epoxy.

The 1200x960mm (1.152m²) piece of foam with some epoxy still on it is 1200g. I weighed some spare pieces and 1m² of foam weighs 1.027kg. This is heavier than the 900g I was calculating on, so the panel should weigh 1184g. There is a little epoxy in the join and on the edges where the fabric wasn't.

Need to do more epoxy testing. I'm reluctant though. Thinking to change to using glue and paint only. Thinking about it. I started some test pieces. It's much easier to use. Still deciding how I'll go forward with that. I'll get the foam pieces squared off first, then coat them. This will give me more time to decide.

I cleaned up the chassis, support legs and drawbar removing rough edges. These were on the inside of the tubes. I used rags to clean out any aluminium filings. Also marked up the support legs to cut the adjustment slot. Need to wait for a teacher on that. They'll show me how to safely use the lathe or milling machine.

The door locks I had ordered ended up being a "captured key" type. These are for mailboxes, or cupboards where you put the key in, open the lock, but can't remove the key until you close and lock it again. Easy, I'll just drill a hole in the right place to let the key out. It worked!

Until I taped the lock. Small brass pins fell out. Locks aren't meant to do that: drop their innards out. The lock jammed up. As I had two locks, I decided to try drilling between the pins. But that didn't work either. Pins still fell out. Two locks stuffed.

First Epoxy Pour! Is it the last?

2024-02-10T19:29:00.000+11:00

Doesn't look much, but it's the first panel to be laminated on one side with fabric and epoxy. I've been thinking and mildly stressing about it for a while.

I was nervous mixing and applying. Worrying about the ratios and measuring them accurately. The "clock is ticking until it goes off" from the start of mixing makes it feel like it's a rush. Don't delay. But measure and mix well. I mixed two batches. I didn't want too long a gap between the batches in case the first poured onto the fabric started setting before I could finish.

It's easier to coat the foam, place the fabric over and then add more epoxy to the top. I did this at first, but once I had started, I didn't have enough hands to keep the clean fabric off the coated fabric. So I lay all the fabric down and poured the epoxy on top. Much harder to get even coverage. I was getting dry spots. I could force the epoxy through from the top, but it's more time and work. The clock is still ticking. I used a plastic scraper to move the epoxy about and push it through the fabric. Used it like a squeegee to spread the resin out as far as possible.

Start to finish took an hour and used about 440ml of epoxy for about 1m².

The epoxy is mixed by volume. Very inconvenient. I wanted to calculate by weight as using a scale is easier than eyeballing clear liquid into measuring containers.

I got a packet of 250ml and 350ml(?) paper cups. Wooden knives held by the blade with the round end of the handle cut off square (to get into the corners) were used as stirrers and scrapers. I used water and a scale before hand to mark 20ml increments on the out side of a 250ml paper cup. Then transferred the measurements to the rest with a ruler.

With a light positioned above the cup, you can see the liquid level as a shadow on the outside to mark it read measurements.

I poured 80ml into a cup, weighed that, then poured it into the larger cup, scraping out as much as I could with a knife scraper. 3g remained in the cup. Poured another 80ml and emptied it into the large cup. 3ml remained behind. That's 2x part A. Using a new cup and knife scraper, measured 80ml of part B and poured it into the large cup. Again 3ml remained behind.

By the weights, that would be 87+87=174g Part A with 77g Part B. Total weight 251g

(For the second batch I used only the large cup and measured 90+90=180g part A, 80g part B. Total weight 260g.)

On pouring part B into A, I started a timer and using a new knife stirrer, started stirring for two minutes. Then scrapped the edges and bottom and mixed for another two minutes. Called it ready. That's 4 or 5 minutes of the 30 minute working time gone.

Total weight of the two batches: 511g. Not all was used on the fabric, but at least 400g was.

That is way more than I thought it would be. 100gsm fabric, I was working on about the same weight or maybe double, of epoxy. Did I apply it too thick or did the fabric soak up when I was forcing it through? The fabric is 80% polyester and 20% cotton.

I'll have to think about this. Besides the increased weight, I'll need a lot more epoxy. The epoxy was originally purchased to use as a glue for the foam, and as a bonus, in the smallest volume I got, seemed enough to coat the panels as well. I didn't end up using it for gluing, as a one part polyurethane glue was easier to use.

Not sure the epoxy it's worth it. I will still need to paint the epoxy to protect it from UV. It might be better to simplify and skip the epoxy and just use paint and the fabric: also known as "Poor Man's Fibreglass".

The Rational for a Bicycle Caravan Build

2024-01-31T17:10:00.002+11:00

I would need a trailer to have enough surface area for sufficient solar panels. I thought of mounting a tool box on a trailer and then attaching a solar panel on the lid.

Problem. The size of solar panels. 100 watt solar panels are about 1 metre long. To get higher output, the size increases to about 1.5 to 1.6 metres. I wanted more than 100 watts. My tent is 1.9 metres long. If I was going to have the length about 1.5m, I might as well go longer so I could sleep on it.

I like sleeping in my tent, but finding a test site is hard. It has to be reasonably flat, no rocks, roots, prickles, grass clumps, dips, water, etc. A trailer has its downsides on the size of it, but it would be an advantage to sleep on top of it and be above all the ground problems.

I spent weeks looking at different designs from western wagons, fold out and pop top trailers, and caravans. Drawing up paper plans and examining how to build them, and the weight, and how they would work day to day. The size to tow behind a bicycle and sleep in or on it added to the challenge. Every decision has consequences and trade offs. Size, weight and cost.

The solar panel on the roof, so I'd have to sleep under it, or have it moved out of the way to sleep where it was mounted. I did consider sleeping on top of it, but couldn't get a working idea. If to move it out of the way, how and where to put it.

Ideally, I'd sleep low down, not very high off the ground for stability. One set of wheels near the middle with a metre on either side doesn't allow a lot of ground clearance going up inclines. I'm using 20" wheels. Can add more wheels, but that increases the weight. Removable wheels and having the trailer sit on the ground is possible, but I decided against that. Without single sided axle wheels, it would be inconvenient to remove and replace the wheels daily. To sleep low, it is between the wheels on the floor. Wheels axles need support. Wheel is 100mm wide at the hub, 25mm for the supports. That is 300mm of the width just for the wheel spacing. Wheelchair wheel hubs are only supported on one side, but this only saves 50mm for significantly increased wheel costs. Ultralight sleeping mats are 520mm wide, but more comfortable is 600mm. Already the trailer is 900mm wide. I'd like the trailer to be thinner, but 600mm for the bed needs a bit extra for movement, say 100mm each side, 800mm is the lowest width that I was happy with. The width of my tent interior. This is without considering the wall thickness or...

The height. Too tall and skinny and the trailer will tip easily. I liked the western wagon design as it allowed the canvas to be raised letting the wind blow through.

A width of 800mm has the wheelbase in contact with the ground at 700mm. 20" wheel axles are 260mm of the ground. The floor would be above that. To sit up in bed needs a minimum of 950mm height. This totals 1210, but ignores the floor, bed and roof thickness. The axle mounts add a bit of height as well. Don't stretch up or move upwards without ducking the head.

I really liked the western wagon design, but settled on a more conventional caravan look. Flat roof for the solar panel. The walls would be 30mm thick laminated foam panels. Plugging this into the constraints, the caravan ends up:

Outside
Width: 960mm
Height: 1500mm
Length: 2200mm (Not including the drawbar and hitch)

Inside:
Width: 900mm
Height: 1200mm
Length: 2160mm

The ground height ends up at 300mm to the top of the floor inside, and 1500mm to the top of the roof.

Western wagon example But my design had two wheels only. No sheep.

Folding bicycle caravans A lot of different folding and opening options.

Peter Petersen The one that I settled on for inspiration.

Not Dead Yet

2023-10-14T10:59:00.000+11:00

Been a long time since the last post. In the way of life, a lot has happened, but not much really. The New Plan Time didn't happen. It started well, but, then I injured my back. 🙁

There's a joke that goes something like this:

One day the different parts of the body were having an argument to see which should be in charge.

The brain said "I do all the thinking so I'm the most important and I should be in charge."

The eyes said "I see everything and let the rest of you know where we are, so I'm the most important and I should be in charge."

"I should be in charge," said the heart, "I circulate oxygen and nutrients all over."

The hands said "Without me we wouldn't be able to pick anything up or move anything. So I'm the most important and I should be in charge."

The stomach said "I turn the food we eat into energy for the rest of you. Without me, we'd starve. So I'm the most important and I should be in charge."

The legs said "Without me we wouldn't be able to move anywhere. So I'm the most important and I should be in charge."

"I should be in charge," said the anus, "I am responsible for waste removal."

All of the other body parts laughed at the anus and insulted him. So he shut down. Within a few days, the brain had a terrible headache, the hands were all shaky, the stomach was bloated, the legs got wobbly, the eyes got watery, and the heart pumped toxic blood. They all decided that the anus should be the boss.

I think the spine was watching with amusement.

Anyone with a back injury knows, when it's bad, everything is painful. Standing, sitting, lying, moving the arms, even waste removal hurts.

When the pain lessened, a new plan was hatched. I didn't think I'd be able to move my bike and gear about without help. Assistance was needed. I decided to dip my toe into ebikes with a "cheap" upgrade kit. This ended up not being the cheap option it first appeared. I could have bought a new ebike for less, as various components on my bike needed upgrading or changing. Still, I'm happy with the learning experience and I like the frankenstein look of my bike.

Now, I need some way to carry my gear, and power the ebike.

Panniers for a Pack Rat

2022-03-24T07:50:00.002+11:00

One Ortlieb Back-Roller Classic pannier is 20L. These panniers are approximately 60L each.

It's not my design. Thank Ken. He created the template, and provided the instruction and materials from which my yellow panniers were made. With those, the seams were heat welded - 100% waterproof. The panniers here are sewn, and the seams waterproofed with silicone.

Front are Ortlieb Back-Roller Classic. The rear: Ken panniers

The pattern has minimal seams, and therefor minimal sewing. The basic shape is a rectangle with one corner cut out. The corner cut out provides heel clearance. If the size is scaled down, this might not be a problem.

Order of operations:

Test fabric seam sewing to determine seam allowance required.
Measure out the template with seam allowances.
Fold and cut the fabric.
From the outside side, fold top edge to the inside and hem.
Sew inside sleeve in.
Turn inside out and sew the side seam.
Sew in the bottom.
Turn right side out and sew buckles on top edge.
Insert the plastic reinforcener and mark hanger holes for your rack. Check forward-backward for heel clearance.
Drill and bolt on the hangers.
Bask in the glow of finished panniers.

The template

The basic shape the pannier

It is 550mm wide and 800mm tall.

The triangle cut out is about 380mm tall and 110mm across the base.

Don't forget the seam allowance around the edge. It will vary depending on the fabric and seam type. I used 30mm for a thick canvas (the green material), but 20mm for thinner fabric (beige material).

Fold the fabric in half. Template straight edge goes on the fold. Mark and cut out.

After template cut out and folded out.

Plastic Sleeve

A plastic reinforcener will be held in place by this sleeve. It is to stiffen the pannier and give it its shape.

The plastic insert is 3mm plastic. It's 250mm long at the base. 340mm wide at the top, 340mm tall.

The sleeve is sewn inside the where the pannier will lean against the rack. Make the sleeve material the same size as the insert plus a seam allowance.

Remember the panniers are left and right sided. Sew the sleeve on the correct side of the material.

Base

The base is approximately 300mm x 250 mm including seams. Round the corners. It's worthwhile to check the size of the base against the pannier before cutting it out.

Hangers

Mine are 3mm aluminum flat bar bent into hooks. I used 6 x 30mm hot dipped galvanized bolts with a large washer on the inside. 5mm bolts would have been sufficient.

Use a large washer on the inside.

The bolts go through the sleeve, through the plastic reinforcener, the pannier, then the hanger. I left the bolts long. By sizing the hook length, the bolts protrude and stop the pannier jumping off the rack. Else, attach a elastic loop lower down from the hangers to hook on the rack.

Hooks closeup

Hooks from the side

Buckle

Buckle sewn on

Completed

Back view completed bags.

Note the seam from the inside sleeve.

DIY Seam Sealer

Mix Bunnings Silicone sealant with Mineral Turps (Turpentine). A ratio of about 1:5 silicone to turps. Thinner is better as it soaks into the fabric and doesn't peel off. Mix well, until the silicone disolves in the turps. It should be fluid, like milk. If it is too thick, add more turps. It will mix - keep stirring. Brush on the seams. It will soak into the fabric. Allow to dry - outside.

New Plan Time

2022-01-28T19:26:00.005+11:00

A new year, and another new baby brushturkey. Mostly at this size they are scratching around in the garden. But occasionally, like the grown ones, they sit on the railing and watch me.

Keeping me company.

COVID lockdowns are over, but I'm still in Sydney for now. But I have a plan. 2022 will be return to cycling. I'm giving up on walking. I keep injuring needing weeks to recover. Enough of that.

Work is in progress to get a bike ready. And I've been riding more to get some cycling fitness back.

On a local fire trail.

End of Lockdown

2021-11-08T08:40:00.000+11:00

Was a roller coaster of a time with the COVID lockdown. I wasn't isolated alone. I had many visitors. Some more regular than others.

Keeping me company

Not a conversationalist though. I'd walk each day. Sometimes my mate would follow up the street.

There was a large uptick in people walking or jogging. Very noticeable in the afternoon. Only the keen are out early on winter mornings.

I hatched another plan. Build a new cart. It did help keep me busy.

Supervising

Lots of thinking on the design, drawing plans. Then the actual work. "Measure twice, cut once." says the proverb. Great advice. Doesn't help if the measurement is wrong. Mistakes were made in the plan. But harder to fix mistakes were made in the building. But eventually it was together.

Awaiting painting

And it seemed like suddenly, lockdown was over.

I'm busting to go places. But, I'm laid low again. Sore feet. Why? I don't know. Nothing changed one week to the next, but something did. Walking or cycling both affect it. I'm doing the standard protocol for recovery: rest, anti inflammatories, stretching and hoping that it heals soon. Feeling "up" on the days I wake and it feels improved. Trying not to feel "down" when it is worse.

And more sad news: Omelet and Dinner have departed. After the last post, I was patting myself on the back for taking good care of them. And then a magpie attacked them. Just one magpie of the couple that visit was paying them a lot of attention. I thought I had them safe in their cage. But the magpie proved smarter than me. It waited until they were close to the wire and managed to spike both of them in the head. Dinner passed on first, Omelet about a week later. I decided not to try again.

Sydney COVID lockdown!

2021-09-01T06:21:00.000+10:00

I've never had my own pet before.

Growing up there was the household animals - cats, dogs, chooks. And a group of brief visitors vaguely remembered like the freshwater turtles that only lasted a night, before they baffling escaped? Or not remembered at all: A cow and some goats. I have idea of their fates. In a family story recounted often, the goats only lasted until they ate the sheets off the washing line.

The cats came and went as they wanted. Sometimes, looking healthy, other times beat up. They got fed when there where about. Their appearances grew more and more infrequent, until one day it was noticed they hadn't returned for a long time and clearly they were never coming back. Did they move to a better place, or did they meet an untimely end. We never knew.

The dogs were more mum and dads pets. The inside dog was mums. Spoilt rotten. Outside dogs - dads. We kids were involved, but incidentally so - taking food out at times, or cleaning up after them. The chooks where more of our responsibility. Our, as in "all the kids" - a group commitment. Like all groups, it was an uneven commitment. Some doing more of work to avoid punishment. Collect the eggs, check the food and water, close the chook house door at night. The chooks weren't thought of as pets. They were the egg producers, and looking after them was a job that had to be done.

I had always wanted pigeons, but our drinking water was collected off the house roof into a rain water tank. Having pigeons, who would be sitting and pooping on the roof was never going to be allowed to happen. I thought to get pigeons now, but with COVID lockdown that option was blocked. None of the Gumtree pigeon sales were close. But there were Quail about! So I've joined the group of people getting pets while in lockdown.

I was to have been gone from Sydney, but... COVID. I figured the lockdown is going to go for months, so long enough to have some pets.

Meet Omelet and Dinner.

The names are not suggesting anything. They just happened to spring to mind when I was carrying them back. Omelet does lay an egg a day. Four or five quail eggs equals one chicken egg, so any omelets are going be small, or also infrequent. Dinner, he keeps Omelet company. I wanted more, but the seller only had the pair left.

They have two homes. Nights are spent inside. Days outside in their larger holiday home. It's not suitable for overnight stays. Not build to a high enough predator proof rating. Cats, dogs, foxes, snakes, rats. Too many critters that would love an overnight snack. This one came past early one morning:

I wonder if it was the scent of quail that attracted it. I've never seen one in the yard before. Only fleeting glances when bush walking.

New Racks

2021-05-12T06:46:00.000+10:00

The local council cleanup was on. I found two camping chairs.

A bit of work with a drill.

And a lot more work later:

The "basket" on the front is a "Garden City Plastic Grow Plant Pot - 410mm Black 28L $6.50 " from Bunnings. It won out over the "Tactix 25L Black Collapsible Crate $9.98 " by the sleek aerodynamic shape, lighter weight, increased volume and being slightly cheaper. Time will tell if it is up to the rigours of life as a basket.

But for now, I love the space it provides. The old K-Mart wire basket was miserly with space. A bicycle lock and my backpack with shopping was always a tight squeeze. I needed to give it a bit of encouragement to fit and even then, I didn't always succeed. This new basket it voluminous. The shopping and the bicycle lock vanish inside with ample room for more goods. A good sized basket is essential in my opinion.

The Final Cart

2021-03-09T18:14:00.003+11:00

I finally finished building my PVC cart. It has three modes

Long mode:

With the handles extended. They clip to a waist belt for easy walking.

Medium mode:

With the handles stowed for short indoors trips.

Short mode:

The shopping cart look. For indoors and on public transport. It is easier to handle compared to Medium mode.

All great and wonderful. Took it for a few short walks while I was working out the bugs. Then set off on a 20km shakedown trip.

Few days later I started developing sore knees. I'm not sure why. The walk was easy. Nothing hard, no big hills. No rush. I took all day for 20km. So lots of resting, reading, and watching the world go by. 20km wasn't an unusual distance. My daily morning constitutional was 12km at a brisk pace. Then the days activities were on top of that. Usually a lot more walking, but some cycle rides.

A physio visit later and the diagnosis was "tendinitis". Treatment: Nothing surprising. Cut the activity levels right down. Cycling is preferable as it's low impact. Only about two or three months to recover. 😦

So, here I am, recovering, again. Starting to feel that the idea of walking with a cart is jinxed.

Walkability

2021-01-31T18:06:00.000+11:00

One of the surprises about my recent holiday was the how interesting walking about the inner west is.

Walkability¹ is one of those concepts that sounds simple, and that you don't notice, until there is a large change, and then suddenly you wonder how you didn't notice it before.

There is a lot of information about walkability. A brief video about what makes a city great. And more on urban planning.

Using this map I have been staying in a Red Zone. Not walkable. My holiday was in a Green Zone. Very walkable. The difference was eye opening. I'd become habituated to blandness.

Presently, an hour fast walk is about 6km. Most of that is along a busy road. Off that I'm passing cookie cutter style housing. The type were every front yard is manicured to the peer accepted level. There are a couple of cafes along the way near a train station, but otherwise shops are clustered inside a shopping center. Blank boxes, designed to trap you inside, where the layout is confusing and disorentating. Everything planned to encourage you to buy more.

It's not very interesting walking about the suburbs.

More information on walkability ↩

Holidaying

2020-12-15T05:49:00.000+11:00

"A change is as good as a holiday"¹.

On that: I've now had a holiday. It was to have been a week, but unexpectedly extended to over two. House sitting, well, more garden sitting. Normal stuff. Water the plants. Try not to kill anything. Easy enough. I mostly succeeded. Some over 40C days and snails did in a few seedlings. Acceptable losses.

Meanwhile, I walked a lot. Checking out the sights:

I like the pictures. They are easy to relate to. Tags ² are harder to appreciate. They are in the same group as Pollock paintings³; some people love them, but to everyone else, it is just unintelligible scribble. I'd rate tags higher than Pollock paintings. Tags I can see mean something. There are letters there to be found like a Magic Eye⁴ puzzle. It's a code, a language, it means something. Pollock paintings just look like scribble. Something a toddler did.

Why is one is called "art" and put on display to sell for millions, while the other is called "graffiti" and costs millions to clean off or paint over? Listen to Malcolm Gladwell's Revisionist History podcast Season 5, Episode 1 Dragon Psychology 101 for some ideas.