It's been some time since my last update (again) but work has continued apace. I bought a complete set of curtains from Van-X in black and after a bit of head scratching managed to make a reasonable job of fitting them. They come with short lengths of aluminium track for the top and bottom of each curtain that need to be bent at each end to fit the curvature of the door window frames. I spent ages getting the first track just right, padding it carefully in the vice while bending it etc but managed to speed things up by roughly bending the others into shape, fastening them in the flat middle section to the door frames and then tapping a piece of wood with a hammer at each end to form the curvature required. They come with all the fastenings and end stops and look neat now they're installed. They also block out a lot of daylight and at the price it didn't seem worth making my own.
I also had some cushions made up for the seating and for the single bed. They're comfortable to sit and sleep on and the back cushions were split in this way to allow easier access to the storage behind. The seat is fairly high and there is only just enough head clearance if sitting upright but since I slouch a lot it's not a problem!
The idea with this van was to make it as flexible as possible in how it could be used. Most of the time I have the double rear seat in and can make up the single bed by folding the back seat down and putting a piece of ply over it. I also have the option of removing the long storage box by the O/S sliding door quite easily and putting the single rear seat in as well. I can also remove both back seats as shown in this next picture.
However, this left me with the problem of supporting the piece of plywood that normally rests on the folded back seat. I made up a short leg from some more of the old racking which is held onto the ply with a couple of roofing bolts and with a stud to locate it on the floor.
It's probably worth mentioning here that in order to maximise living space in what is a relatively small van, I designed the bed such that when the drivers seat is pushed fully forward I can make up a 6ft long bed and still have storage space at the back of the van for another storage crate etc..
Having done all this work it was time to test it out so we went to France for a week to do some bouldering and cycling with my partner. The van was well loaded up with two Mountain Bikes on the left hand side, two large bouldering mats and all our other gear. We hired a mobile home but I slept in the van several times to test it out of course. On the way back we stopped for a brew near the Channel Tunnel as you can see. The use of the plastic crates for storage works really well by the way, you can take them into the house to pack then just slide them into the racking, the same is true for unpacking when you're back. I have similar ideas for the kitchen unit I'm building as a) I want to keep the van as useful as possible and b) there's no point lugging a load of stuff around all the time that you don't need. Watch this space !