Camping one night in camper

We planned to sleep one night in our camper in a place 20 km (12 miles) from Żyrardów, on my piece of land. We have national holiday tomorrow, so I don't have to go to work.

The idea was simple: to go there, grill something to eat, sleep, wake up, do something and come back. But two difficulties arised when we thought about it in detail:

• we don't know where the quilt and blankets we had in camper are -- we used it when we went to holiday last year (T3 had to be left behind) and now we don't know where they are,
• it's raining tomorrow and the temperature at night is going to be low -- I don't want to freeze my butt off just to sleep one night away from home.

I have to complain...

I am not satisfied with today at all. So I'm going to complain here, maybe I'll feel a bit better. ;)

Somewhere around the 12 PM we went to Jeruzal, where I own a piece of land I want to build a house on. Nothing worth mentioning. We visited my future brother-in-law and then to my future parents-in-law. As last time -- to eat and to work on my camper.

I planned for today the following:

• install the CB-radio speaker,
• install the lighter plug sockets (the one I mentioned in april),
• check the tire pressure,
• check why the camping water pump doesn't work.
  

During this trip my gearbox lever broke. Before I finally found out how this mechanism works I wasted more than 20 minutes. I thought that the lever disconnected itself from the horizontal rod that changes the gears in the gearbox. I lowered the box that holds the spare wheel, didn't see a thing, went back inside the camper and finally was enlightened! It is held by some spherical hinge: a ring with spherical inner surface is fitted to the floor, two halves of a sphere (and a spring between them) are attached to the lever.The upper sphere half had to be pushed against the spring to touch the lower half, then both of them had to be pushed inside the ring.

When I arrived at my destination, I started to work on the speaker. The amount of work is difficult to describe. First I had to find a hole to put the cable through. Then find a good spot to attach the speaker itself, using three bolts. I drilled 3 holes, screwed on one bolt, the second broke. I decided to use 2 bolts instead of 3, enlarged the third hole and broke another bolt while trying to screw it on! So I had to make another 2 holes, this time big enough. I broke only one drill... The cable was put through the hole next to gearbox lever.

The speaker does work very nice, especially when I turn up the microphone gain knob.

The lighter plug sockets were attached almost immediately. I cut the plug, removed the cables from solar charge controller, connected the cables with the ones from the socket, attached again to the controller. I had in mind connecting a long cable that'll be later used to power additional stuff in the back of the camper, but left it alone for today.

The work with the pump was even easier, 'cause it wasn't broken. When I turned the faucet knob, the water flushed from below the faucet. So I thought that I have to find this leak and seal it with something. I decided to remove the entire sink / stove plate from the drawer, to take a look from below. I removed 8 bolts that held the sink / stove. I couldn't lift it. So I removed two nuts that attached the gas valves to the metal plate, bolted to the drawer, and eventually the metal plate itself. Nothing changed. I tried to disconnect the metal pipe that fed gas to the valves, but unsuccesfully. Then I took a good look inside and found out that the faucet itself prevented the sink / stove from being moved! So I tried to disconnect the metal element that secured the water hose on the faucet. When I removed it I still couldn't remove the hose.
And then I saw where the water came from. The faucet's arm was made a hollow pipe and one of the holes was closed with some plug. This plug was missing. I made a temporary plug out of pencil rubber.
I didn't have to waste an hour to see where this water comes from...

And of course I forgot to check tire pressure.

Photos will be posted later.

Yesterday we (me and my camper) had a very busy day.

First of all we went to visit my piece of ground, I had couple of things to do. The most important was to plant the christmas tree we had in a pot on our balcony since christmas. It had to wait so long because I wanted to carry it with my VW T3, not with my Daewoo Lanos...


Then we went to my future parents-in-law home to eat some lunch. But as I arrived there with my Bus I thought that I might do something with it.

I started with the right mirror. Since I bought the bus I wanted it to have spherical mirrors. I just didn't want to wait to get them from my second, red Transporter. (The VW T3 multivan I want to sell). Since I already had the mirror glass itself, I decided to change the glass only.

It wasn't difficult, it just needed a little work with the help of screwdriver and glue.

From Volkswagen Tr...

We removed the front frame that holds the glass to the back of the mirror. The glass was replaced with the spherical one. The notch in the back part of mirror casing was filled with glue, the front frame was attached and the entire mirror was left in the sun to dry the glue. Of course with proper weight to hold it all together.



Then it was time for the CB radio. My future father-in-law wanted to sell his CB and I needed a new one. I didn't want to spend the money he wanted to get, but somehow we managed to deal. I paid for it PLN 300 ($135) and promised to mow his lawn twice. ;) I wanted to buy a CB with PA (loudspeaker) function. The speaker itself I already purchased, I just need to get it from the near post office. ;)



I also looked into the engine compartment and saw that one of the vee-belts is broken. I wonder if it is used for any important feature... Now the T3 has only one vee-belt. ;)



I found some oil spots under the camper. I made two photographs to find out where it's leaking from. I suspect it's leaking through the turbocharger...

I got my camper back!

Yesterday I got my camper back. When I called the mechanic in the morning, he told me he was repairing it till 2 AM the previous night and had to do some stuff. After work I went to his shop and got the van.

I was told that the metal part that holds spare wheel below the car is not compatible with five speed gearbox. For now I have to carry the wheel inside or replace that part. I don't know it's name, but in polish it's called basket.

The new gearbox caused me a lot of trouble. The first gear is far left and back, second is in a place that you just have to push the lever forward, third: pull the lever, fourth: push right and then forward, etc. To use the reverse gear you have to pull the lever to the far left and then push it to front.

There is one thing that may be broken. On low revs and on idle the red light that indicates insufficient oil pressure ligths. The mechanic told me that he checked the pressure with some external gauge and it was in the proper range, so this is probably caused by some failure of the indicator or pressure gauge.

We'll see how it will work. Tomek told me that I have to expect some small failures to be noticed. :)

Zobaczymy co będzie dalej. Tomek mówi, że teraz "będą wychodzić pierdoły"... ;)