The bits that have been attached over the years include:

• Nokia cradle
• Reversing Camera
• Reversing Camera Manual Activation Circuit
• Snooper Speed Camera Sensor
• Reversing Sensor Mute Circuit

All 0f the above tap off of the same ACC wire so increasing the load.

Here is the new circuit diagram to help clean up the wiring.

There is a new separate ACC fuse box specifically for all my auxillaries. This acc fuse box is powered from the main van battery, through a relay and to the bus bar of the fuse box. The acc relay is operated from the acc input wire on the radio loom (Brown with Red Trace). This method allows a larger wire to be used to help take a greater load. The operation of the relay only requires a small current and the acc source from the radio is ideal.

A bit of MS Visio work and out pops the latest wiring diagram for the van. I’ve laid out the wiring and components geographically within the van so to help get a feel of where things will be etc.

The only change I can foresee is the DPDT changeover switch for the 240v input (top right of pic). Instead of a manual switch, the option is to have an automatic changeover unit called a contactor. This has been suggested by VWT4Forumite – Upspex.

Below are some pics of the tent:

Like I said – Huge!!!

CBE Modular Components

CBE Modular Components

I cut the holes in the ply (51mm diameter), then lined the ply:

CBE Sockets

CBE Holes Lined

When I put it all together, I thought they were a bit shabby / lose fit. I mean that when you inserted a plug into the socket, the unit pushed into the ply. Investigation found that I had trimmed the lining away from two of the corners:

Loose CBE Socket	Gap behind the corners
CBE Socket corners packed out	CBE Socket Packing Fixed

So removed the sockets, put some little bits of carpet lining under the corners, refitted and all was well. With a lot of pressure, I could not depress the socket below the frame.

CBE Sockets Installed

The switches are going to be used for lighting – I think.

On the Friday evening, I connected a 12v cig socket direct to the leisure battery with an inline fuse. This was so that I could run the cool box and not worry about the battery going flat – the van battery that is.

CBE Sockets

CBE Sockets

The above CBE sockets, purchased from www.marcleleisure.co.uk have been installed in the top right corner of the rear LHS panel – out of the way of being knocked and damaged.

Anyway, cut a long story short, ran down to Lee On Solent for the weekend and let the van top up the Leisure Battery. Left the cool box on whilst away from the van and when I returned 7 hours later, the cool box was no longer running. Battery flat.

So with JUST the coolbox drawing 0.9A, the battery lasted 7 hours. Mmmm. Good enough? I don’t know. But it was a good test.

B&Q recyled plastic bottle insulation. www.diy.com Selected this because:

• It is safer / healthier than rockwool for starters;
• You get more for your money than the sheeps wool for B&Q;
• You can stuff it into holes better than polystyrene or celotex boards;
• It doesn’t make squeeky noises like polystyrene or celotex boards;
• Quicker and easier to install.

So after applying Dynamat to the bare metal, then Dynaliner or Camp Mat over the top, stuff the cavities with the insulation. I ensured I didn’t compact the insulation too much as it is the trapped air that makes the insulation work. Also had to make sure that the insulation didn’t stray into the moving parts of the locks and handles etc.

LHD Insulation

RHD Insulation

Now I’m not going to reinvent the wheel and copy the content from another website, so here is the link to the website www.sounddeadenershowdown.com I will however, give a little summary.

What I’ve Learned and What You Need to Know

Imagine you are driving on the highway and a very noisy truck is right next to you. Noise from the truck is coming at you through your vehicle’s door and it’s loud. There are three possible ways to stop the noise from reaching your ears.

The first thing you will notice is that the noise from the truck is making the door’s sheet metal vibrate – essentially turning it into an unwanted speaker that is right next to you. Apply a vibration damper like CLD Tiles to stop the vibration. CLD Tiles have been designed to work with minimal panel coverage. That means you will need to do less work and the project will cost you less.

After you have stopped the sheet metal from vibrating you have two possible strategies left to deal with the noise that is still coming through the door. One possibility is to absorb the sound. Unfortunately, absorption isn’t practical in a vehicle. The lower the frequency you need to absorb, the thicker the absorber needs to be. Road, engine and exhaust noise are deep (low frequency) sounds. To be effective, you would need an absorbent material between ten and seventy inches thick. Right, never going to happen.

Fortunately, the third option works perfectly in the space we have available. Block the noise. In exactly the same way the barrier wall along the highway is protecting the houses behind it from the truck noise that’s coming through your door and driving you crazy, you can do the same thing, on a much smaller scale, using Closed Cell Foam and Mass Loaded Vinyl.

It’s really that simple. For years, we’ve been going about this all wrong – using layer after layer of “sound deadener” and getting poor results. Use the right tool for the job.

Defining Some Terms

Before we can get anywhere, we need to make sure we are talking about the same things. “Sound Deadener” is a vague term that describes a range of materials and techniques. It has traditionally been used when referring to vibration dampers – a specific class of products designed to control resonance in panels. I’ll be referring to these products as vibration dampers.

Everything we are trying to do comes down to sound. Whether we are trying to quiet a vehicle, improve its ability to host a music system or both, it’s all about sound and controlling what reaches our ears. Sound is almost devious in its behavior so we need to understand a little bit about how it moves around before we can control it.

When it comes to noise control we are concerned with engine, exhaust, tire in contact with road surface, and wind – from our vehicle and from all of the other vehicles around us on the road. We may also be concerned with noise created by the music we play as it interacts with the vehicle around us. Some of this noise is transmitted directly through the structure of the car. Some of it travels through the air before it passes through the vehicle panels and glass on its way to our ears, often times exciting panel resonance that creates a secondary noise source.

The first step in any successful noise control or acoustic improvement project is minimizing panel resonance. It doesn’t really matter if the existing resonance is caused by vibrations directly introduced by the engine, exhaust and suspension or if it is being driven by airborne sound. Resonating panels are important routes for transmitting and reinforcing noise.

This is where vibration dampers come in. Your vehicle most likely came from the factory with at least some vibration damper applied. Unless yours is a luxury vehicle, or even if it is and you have added an aftermarket sound system that takes the vehicle beyond the original design specifications, you will want to add more vibration damper. OEM applications favor reducing weight and cutting costs beyond all else. In our zeal to quiet our vehicles, many of us took this too far in the opposite direction – applying multiple layers of vibration damper to every bit of sheet metal in the vehicle. I’ll tell you something that no one else selling vibration dampers will – this is wasteful and counter-productive. Put images of shiny silver vehicle interiors out of your mind. When it comes to vibration dampers, anything more than 25% coverage is excessive. Beyond that, you are wasting time and money, making it difficult to refit trim panels and potentially making the vehicle more difficult to service in the future – you are using the wrong tool for the job.

Ok, so I’ve copied and pasted the text above from www.sounddeadenershowdown.com I wasn’t going to but that text above explains it all so well.

So with all that in mind….. how to stop the vibrating panels…..

I was feeling flush with cash so looked into the cheapest supplier for the following and found www.caraudiosecurity.com the best. I purchased:

• 1 x Superlite Bulk Pack Sound Deadening £149.99
• 1 x Dynaliner – 1/4″ Thick sheet £79.99

The sound deadener covers 48ft² – ample for the van. Very easy to apply, cut to size using a sharp knife and shape, peel backing off, stick on. Next!

First piece I put on the roof was a big piece. Then realised I didn’t need to cover the entire roof as that isn’t what is required of the deadener, so later cut into strips as per pic 2 below.

Dynamat Deadening

Dynamat Deadening

That’s the deadening, now for the sound absorption  – Dynaliner: For what it’s worth, I think this stuff if flippin’ expensive for the amount you get. Ok it may be good due its density, but £80 for effectively this back panel and bits of the twin back doors is a bit much in my opinion. I opted to buy 3 x Karrimoor camp mats from www.Sportsdirect.com and stick them over the top of the dynamat and bare metal with the spray adhesive.

Dynaliner

I’ve been avoiding doing the carpet lining for ages, mainly due to the worry about not having enough material to go round the metal work AND do the panels seperately. But today I did it, I carpet lined the two rear door panels, both with bonus features! But with advice from the T4forum gusy of “line the panels first then when you line the metal work any joints can easily be hidden”. I thought, hey lets go!

Spotted a nice little touch on a couple of build threads during my research…. an ebossed VW logo on the  panels with lining (when I say lining from now on, I mean carpet lining, if I mean ply lining, I will say ply lining!) over the top.

Here are my efforts on the the lower rear door panels:

LHD Panel Embossing

RHS Rear Door Panel - Lined

I tried a different method on each panel, but due to the effectiveness of the spray glue, neither worked as desired. I wanted to be able to drag the lining into the grooves of the logo to make more of a definitive edge, but the glue just grabbed as soon as the lining touched the ply.

Method 1:

• Spray all the ply and all the lining;
• Drop / place the ply onto the lining;
• Turn over face up;
• Work the lining into the corners of the logo;

Method 2:

• Line the ply face up with the lining over the top;
• Spray just the logo;
• Spray the area on the lining that will touch the logo;
• Gradually work the lining into the corners as it is layed over the logo;
• Spray the rest of the ply and lining and run into place.

Niether were perfect, but I still think the effect is good.

How to emboss….

Print out logo to relevant size (Mine was printed on A4 with “Scale to media – YES”:

B/W Volkswagen Logo

Cut paper logo out:

VW Paper Logo

Draw round paper logo on a piece of ply. Well I tried to draw round it, but it was too difficult (paper kept moving), so I used the paper as a stencil and sprayed the logo on to the wood – four times.

VW Embossing Logo Stencil

Cut the ply logo’s out and PVA onto panel (and leave to dry):

VW Embossed Ply Logo

Cut a piece of lining out – slightly bigger than the ply panel:

Lining ply - All bits ready

Spray the contact adhesive onto the lining and the ply, then lay ply ontop of lining:

Sticking lining to ply.

Turn panel over and work material into the logo:

Sorry no pic

Turn panel back over and practice your wrapping skills:

Sorry no pic

Then that should be it:

LHD Panel Embossing 2

Nice work!

Dashboard area panels - stripped!

Front Cab Carpet Peeled Back

Now I know it looks very messy, the reason for this is…. that it is messy! I installed the mess about 4 months after I got the van in 2006. Included in the mess is:

• Pioneer Sat Nav wiring (below the gear stick);
• Snooper wiring;
• mobile phone wiring;
• wiring for 2 x rocker switches and relays:
  • one to activate the reversing camera when going forward – to check up on the boat I’m towing;
  • the other to switch off the reversing sensors whilst reversing with a trailer (Don’t the sensors know that I know I’ve got a trailer hooked up behind me?)

Next the carpet was peeled back – had to see what was under there after all. Last time I looked, I was installing the Sat Nav units under the passenger seat.

The route was eventually decided to go from the leisure battery under the drivers seat, to the middle of the van and up alongside the airbag unit. Up the center console, do a left behind the glovebox, and through the grommet into the space where the wiper motor and air intake sits.

So that was how to get the cable into the engine bay area, next was where to locate the VSR and Mega Fuses. I opted to put the Main Battery Mega Fuse on the battery tray. The VSR  needed to be out of the way, in a dryish area, not on a panel that was designed to be removed. Decided upon the inside front left wheel arch wall.

80-120Amp VSRInstalled.

Cables into Battery Compartment

VSR monitoring cables installed.

An easy option to get the cables (25mm & 2 x 1.5mm for VSR monitor) through to the main battery would be to drill through the removable plate (not in pic as it has been removed!). But this would make things difficult if needing to do work in there. So a new hole had to be made. This can sort of be see in pic 2. Hole drilled, painted and rubber grommet installed – same as used in standard domestic electrical backboxes.

Pic 3 / 3 shows the VSR monitoring cables installed and connected onto the battery terminals.

Big thing I noticed that could be a problem for most folk, was the crimping of the 25mm copper lugs. I asked on the forum and some people use pliers then solder! Fortunately, I work on the railway and we have hydraulic crimpers that can do this sort of thing. You can buy ratchet crimpers for this size lug – first result on google search found these from Farnell (not the cheapest). Whatever you use, make sure you test the crimp connection by giving it a good tug to try and pull it appart. Don’t want any fires!

Final engine bay pic showing the Mega Fuse installed on the battery tray:

Main Battery Mega Fuse

Right – Now the other end!

Leisure Battery in and strapped down

So I routed the 25mm +ve cable down the middle of the van passed the airbag control unit / sensor, then turned to the drivers seat. I had to a bit of jiggery pokery with the plug coupler bracket and the box of electronics (not sure what that is for), so I could squeeze the battery in. I didn’t take a before pic, but to the right is an after pic.

So seat box removed, drilled a couple of new holes to relocate the little box of electronics, one additional hole for the connector bracket, two holes in the bottom for the batten of wood to hold the battery down and the strap to wrap round. The wooden bar on its own will not hold the battery in place. You either need some metal brackets on the other side of battery – using the existing seat base bolts, or a strap like I used. Don’t want this puppy flying around.

Leisure Battery & Mega Fuse

Leisure Battery & Isolator Switch

The battery terminals need to have proper insulated covers / caps to stop any short circuiting on the underside of the seat. Temporarily, the +ve terminal has a piece of cardboard in place.

The +ve cable was brought up through the hole in the matting – with all the other cables, in its flexible split conduit – used for the entire length of the run, and curled it round onto the Mega Fuse located on the  wooden batten. From the Mega Fuse, curled it up and connected to one side of the battery isolator which is to be located on the back of the seat base. The other side of the isolator is connected to the battery +ve terminal.

The -ve / earth of the leisure battery, I connected to the earth stud just to the front of the hole in the flooring the cables come through in the seat base.

Lighting

The LED’s – very bright, and designed for decking / Kitchen plinths etc. I have a box of blue and a box of white. I doubt I’ll be using all of the LED’s, but the intention is to split them up into groups. They will be replacing the standard light units in the roof and door wells. They will go down both sides of the roof. The plan is to have them switched either on with the doors, off, or on. The transformer is 240v input and 12v 230mA output. So the transformer is not required, but I will utilise the connector units (I have one per set – see pic 2) where possible.

LED Lighting Box 1

LED Lighting Box 2 LED Lighting Box 3

Laptop

Not use it all the time, but it would be nice to run it.

240vAC input @ 2.5A. Output 19.5vDC @ 6.7A 130W

Drill Charger

Not use this a lot, but when away at sailing meetings, it may be required.

240vAC input @ 1.0A. Output 5-12vdc @ 2.8A (51W).

Mobile Phone Charger

iPhone – what more needs to be said. It needs charging. 240vAC 0.2mA. Or the DC cig socket lead – I pressume this is of similar rating?

Coolbox / Fridge

These take juice. I’m err’ing on the side of caution with 12vDC cig socket @ 1.0A. I stuck a meter in the fuse holder and recorded 0.9A.

Tunes

Then I thought that I may want to listen to the radio whilst parked up. And this leads to another problem. Whilst I’ve been working on the van I’ve listened to the radio. All be it for 4 or so hours, never the less, the main battery drained enough to not let me start her up again. So do / should I divert the main supply of the radio to the Leisure battery, whilst keeping the memory on the main battery – in case I isolate and remove the leisure bat?

I’ll have to look at the paperwork in the loft for this, or look at the stickers on the units. With the pop up screen, well, popped up, this will have an effect on the current rating. Also the Sat Nav is a seperate Din unit located under the seat. This is also on.

Calculations

The load for the auxillary circuit is not great. A few lights, coolbox / fridge, maybe the laptop for a little while, Most probably not (did you hear that Mrs L?) a hair dryer – well not whilst the van isn’t plugged into the mains!

The battery I opted for is a 110AH lead acid leisure battery. It says maintenance free, but I’ll take that with a pinch of salt. 110AH may seem big, but I think this is the biggest one around that will fit into the space I have allocated for it. Lets have a break down of our loads and see how long our 110AH battery will last.

There is a complication with the laptop and battery drill charger…… The Inverter. This adds other complications / additional loads to the system.

So ideal world, the battery will last:

(110AmpereHours / 6.2Amps) = 17.7 Hours.

BUT, assuming the battery is 100% charged, it has only a useful life until it gets down to about 40% remaining charge. Also, if a battery is run down past 50% regularly, it is unlikely you will fully recharge it again. So allowing for this:

27.5 Hours -40% = 10.6 Hours

Ouch! 10.5 hours constant with all things blazing. BUT as mentioned, the laptop would rarely be used, same for the battery drill charger, but we need to calculate for the worst case scenario. So taking them off to see what a normal weekend away would be, we get:

(110AH / 3A) – 40% = 22 hours

But, yes, another but…. At 6.2Amps being drawn, the battery will discharge faster than if 3Amps are drawn. Now I’m not complicating things, I am just highlighting the facts. Much greater detail about Peukerts Equation here… http://www.smartgauge.co.uk/peukert2.html

But we’ve calculated the time with everything on and in theory with a good condition battery, 10 hours will be more than enough for a weekend away. When away, do you really want to spend your time sat in the van on the laptop? Honestly? You sad person you!