The Beginning

So this will be back tracking some from the present moment, April 21st 2019. I’m not the best planner in this relm of building and blogging about it. My life is full AF so making time to do the writing and video editing – which by the way I completely suck at the video editing – might prove a little difficult at first (also I haven’t written in a year, crazy emotional roll-a-coaster with woman and existence got me on the ropes and shut me down). I thought I would epic in front of the camera, like Fred Astaire, words dancing off my lips like the way he moved across the floor. Elegant, swift - with puns and anecdotes, mixed with wit and charm. It’s been nothing of the sort, I sound like Eeyore on a good day and look like I’m stoned. Maybe this blogging account will balance the scales for me some so’s I don’t look like a complete moron.

Anyways, insulation! For the floor I used vehicle carpet padding, it’s about a 1 ½ in thick, laid down some spray glue and voilà insulated with a little sound deadening to boot. On top of that I put down ½ ACX plywood, easiest part of the insulating by far. Held it down with 1 ¼ inch self-tapping screws. Should have marked the ridges in the floor, woulda been easier to screw it down, there were more then a few times where I tried to screw into a valley instead of the hip and sucked to ply too deep or couldn’t get a grab. Hip and valley are terms used in construction for roofing, the hip being the high point and valley being the low point where 2 pieces of roofing meet up. Another way of explaining high and low spots in the van floor. I’m using 2 inch Thermashield Rmax Polyisocyanurate, it has a R-13 rating and is fairly easy to work with. 2 inch on the walls and 1 inch in the ceiling. I want to keep as much head room as possible being 6-foot-tall and wearing boots most days. I might try to squeeze in another layer of 1 inch, although as I write this I am sitting on the bed in the van leaned up against the wall and I have no room for 1 more inch. I held the Rmax to the sides of the van with Loctite Power Grab Express, it works hella good. Adhears the material in an instant, much easier then spray glue. I started filling the gaps between the insulation and the framing of the van with expansion foam – foam is foam. I did fuck up by insulating prior to running the electrical, luckily I didn’t fully insulate so running the wires hasn’t been too hard. Right before I put up the paneling I am going to put a layer of Reflectix double sided insulation – it’s only like a ¼ inch thick at best and I will use spray glue to install that. A buddy of mine was trying to grow The Weed and had a ton of it left over, lucky me.

So that’s pretty much it for the insulation. I cut the 2 inch Rmax with a metal blade ina jigsaw, made a hell of a mess. Cut the 1 inch with a razor knife and it was much cleaner and just as fast. I have little precision in the cuts and the install of all this as you can see in the videos. So long as I can keep out the heat and cold and keep in the heat and cold I could care less what it looks like behind the paneling.

I wrote this while sitting in the back of the van, on the bed as I had mentioned. I took a trip to LA and had some free time to write. It’s the second time I have gone somewhere during this building process. The first was a 6 day trip to Utah – god’s country. I mean that place is so peaceful and beautiful, takes the wind right out yer gut. We went from the low lands of the desert floor to snowy peaks, rain, hail – as ya all know the winter/spring of 2019 has been quite wet for our normal here on the Westcoast. None the less in taking these trip I am finding what I want to install in the van and how I want to set it up. We can get these ideas off Pinterest or YouTube but until you have actually experience in it, they are just good ideas. I need a hamper, I have yet to see a hamper in any video or on Pinterest, yet I only parous those sites on occasion.

While driving home yesterday I stopped at Vons to grab some dinner (dinner being between 3 and 6 and supper being after that) I had got a bottle of water and thought I cant wait to have a fridge in here and then realized I never ran the wires to power a fridge. Simple overlook, lots of wiring was going on 2 weekends ago, but I might not of noticed till after I ran the paneling then it woulda been try and hide a wire. Also learned on that trip to Utah that I need a closet of sorts to hang jackets and maybe a smart looking shirt. I need a trashcan that isn’t out in the open. So yeah small stuff but going out in it helps me see it a little more clearly. The next long trip is back to Utah, Hurricane, Utah to be exact. Going to camp and ride my mountain bike for 3 days then go to St. George for an NA convention. Hopefully by then I will be fully insulated and paneled, solar system hooked up and running a fridge. Water would be grate, especially a hot shower but there is no rush in doing this.

I strive for discipline, patients and precision in my life and also in this build. It’s not an easy life style to practice living in, it takes a lot of care to be in the moment and sit still. You let gratification go by the wayside and live in what is happening. You practice not running through your project to experience the end result cause the high of that moment only lasts for that moment, then you are back to looking for the next high, maybe adding more to it or changing it, doing everything but being still with it.