Hi everybody,
My name's Steve and I'm in the process of having my bay restored by Beetle Bank in North Devon. At the moment it's in Etch Primer so not much to see and living in London means I only get to see the camper and it's updates about once a month.
In the mean time I have started making my interior and these photos will show what can be acheived working in a spare bedroom with just a Router, a small bench saw and a bag of hand tools.
I'll start with the overhead locker. I was fortunate enough to have a spare roof cut from a wreck which I cut the back section off so I could use as a template to fit the locker to. I wanted to keep it roughly to an original look with a few twists. My original locker had the table top which slid underneath the locker, this was fine but I decided I would do something different and would fit the table inside the locker so when put away it was completely out of sight.
I started by buying two sheets of 12.5mm oak veneered plywood. All other material is solid oak which is just left overs from hardwood skirting. It's designed in a way where there is no pins, screws or fixings on show in anyway at all.
In the pictures you will see, after I made the locker I made the table top by using a piece of scrap 12mm ply and bonding a piece of 4mm ply to it then laminated in white Formica both sides and finished with the devon trim.
Next was to make the replica Devon Caravette sway away unit. For this I had no sample to look at, so all dimensions had to be taken by looking at pictures in the Volksworld magazine and gauging the scale off the back of my seat. I did manage to see one in the flesh at the Ace Swap meet and the owner very kindly allowed me to measure it and I wasn't too far out with my dimensions which was a great relief. The cooker unit was purchased from Slough swap meet last year.
There will be some pictures added of my seat which I built which incorporates a flat screen t.v.
Hope you like what you see and any questions feel free to ask.
Here are the pictures:
After the initial design is worked out and I was satisfied that everything wass going to work, I produced everything in 12mm MDF and made sure all the edges were cleaned up properly by trimming with a router. This is crucial. After rough cutting the oak ply allowing myself approximately 4mm extra all the way round to allow for splintering. I then clamped this on top of my MDF templates which I then routered using a profile cutter with a bearing. The bearing runs off of the MDF template which is underneath the oak ply which then gives you an absolute perfect machine finish with no splintering.
The front and the bottom board were plough grooved into the front solid oak section paying attention that you do not start the router and run right the way through as you'll show the joint on the ends of the solid oak so I had to plunge in and then plunge out when I got to the other end.
Note how tight the clearance is between the top of the table top and the front section of the locker where the draw slides out. The back of the drawer had to be relieved to allow for when the draw was fully opened you can push the table top up from underneath the drawer through a 20mm hole and that allows the table top to tilt through the back of the draw and give it enough clearance to get it over the front of the draw. This works perfectly every time. Eventually this draw will be lined in black baize by the trimmer to give it a really nice internal finish.
My name's Steve and I'm in the process of having my bay restored by Beetle Bank in North Devon. At the moment it's in Etch Primer so not much to see and living in London means I only get to see the camper and it's updates about once a month.
In the mean time I have started making my interior and these photos will show what can be acheived working in a spare bedroom with just a Router, a small bench saw and a bag of hand tools.
I'll start with the overhead locker. I was fortunate enough to have a spare roof cut from a wreck which I cut the back section off so I could use as a template to fit the locker to. I wanted to keep it roughly to an original look with a few twists. My original locker had the table top which slid underneath the locker, this was fine but I decided I would do something different and would fit the table inside the locker so when put away it was completely out of sight.
I started by buying two sheets of 12.5mm oak veneered plywood. All other material is solid oak which is just left overs from hardwood skirting. It's designed in a way where there is no pins, screws or fixings on show in anyway at all.
In the pictures you will see, after I made the locker I made the table top by using a piece of scrap 12mm ply and bonding a piece of 4mm ply to it then laminated in white Formica both sides and finished with the devon trim.
Next was to make the replica Devon Caravette sway away unit. For this I had no sample to look at, so all dimensions had to be taken by looking at pictures in the Volksworld magazine and gauging the scale off the back of my seat. I did manage to see one in the flesh at the Ace Swap meet and the owner very kindly allowed me to measure it and I wasn't too far out with my dimensions which was a great relief. The cooker unit was purchased from Slough swap meet last year.
There will be some pictures added of my seat which I built which incorporates a flat screen t.v.
Hope you like what you see and any questions feel free to ask.
Here are the pictures:
After the initial design is worked out and I was satisfied that everything wass going to work, I produced everything in 12mm MDF and made sure all the edges were cleaned up properly by trimming with a router. This is crucial. After rough cutting the oak ply allowing myself approximately 4mm extra all the way round to allow for splintering. I then clamped this on top of my MDF templates which I then routered using a profile cutter with a bearing. The bearing runs off of the MDF template which is underneath the oak ply which then gives you an absolute perfect machine finish with no splintering.
The front and the bottom board were plough grooved into the front solid oak section paying attention that you do not start the router and run right the way through as you'll show the joint on the ends of the solid oak so I had to plunge in and then plunge out when I got to the other end.
Note how tight the clearance is between the top of the table top and the front section of the locker where the draw slides out. The back of the drawer had to be relieved to allow for when the draw was fully opened you can push the table top up from underneath the drawer through a 20mm hole and that allows the table top to tilt through the back of the draw and give it enough clearance to get it over the front of the draw. This works perfectly every time. Eventually this draw will be lined in black baize by the trimmer to give it a really nice internal finish.
