Van-go: Sportsmobile!

Well, the biggest event lately has been that we (Adam) got down to Sportsmobile in Fresno again and got the penthouse top installed as well as the seat/bed! Check out the photos:

The top pops up easily, you just unlatch the latches and push up on a padded area with your shoulders. To take it down, you have to pull down fairly hard (Liz doesn't quite have the bodyweight to pull it by herself...). The windows have screens that open, plastic covers for when it's rainy/windy, plus there are roll down shades to keep light out.

The seat has three sets of seatbelts (2 lap, 1 shoulder) and folds down into a bed. It's 68 inches long and about 49 inches wide when reclined into the bed. The seat slides forward when it reclines flat, and meets up with a cushion that's not installed yet (cushion will cover the back portion of the van and be over a storage area--not shown yet!).

We are very excited to have these new amenities, but we did have some problems with Sportsmobile:

1. The bed was advertised as being 53" wide and 71" long--which is small but we thought we could make it work if this was the minimum size. Turns out their website doesn't match reality, and from what we heard from the folks at Fresno, no one had ever brought this to their attention! Weird. So, this is really small for us so we decided to pursue the bed that is up in the penthouse sooner than we had originally planned (Which can be at lest 76" inches long--much better for us tall people).

2. The penthouse top doesn't fit quite right on top of the van. See this photo:

The tops sits flush on all other three corners, but here it pops up and wobbles a bit. This hasn't been fixed yet.

3. The tie-downs for the fabric walls of the penthouse top were secured too tightly, so that the fabric ripped a small hole! Adam made patches which should solve the problem:

You can barely see it but there is a diamond of fabric now behind this bolt.

Other than those problems, we think we will really love the new situation and we hope Sportsmobile will help fix the issues. Last weekend we put the first coat of paint on the top (it came bright white and we painted it a grey to match the van):

It looks great with the grey top. Due to inclement weather we couldn't put the second coat on, but that should happen this Sunday I'd guess. The paint (Interlux Perfection 2 part epoxy in "Platinum") was scary at first but went on really nicely with a special roller.

Right now Adam is out working on the wall panels! (And I walk out occasionally to give him a hand...and I made dinner..and I'm blogging....and I do the laundry and keep house...) He's making the wall panels out of 3/16" hardboard.

This weekend we are going to a special plywood store to look at Appleply, a high density plywood to use for the wood base for the bed that goes up in the penthouse. Also, we are looking for wood to use for our cabinets. We are considering baltic birch because it looks good with unfinished edges, but we're not sure. Adam likes a medium stained wood, and Baltic birch looks weird with a colored stain on it. Liz likes plain baltic birch but Adam insists this will be too light a color..... So we're considering either a different kind of wood or paint! (No idea what color though!)

Also started looking at Corian for the countertops--our project is so small we can use scraps so it will be less expensive. Adam likes the color called "Silt". (http://www2.dupont.com/Surfaces/en_US/products/corian/pr_corian_colors.html)

Obligatory dog photos: