Hello!
My name is Eric.
In this video about van conversion,
I will explain technics that I used
to secure my cabinets and bed.
This video is part of a series about van conversion.
The securing technics that I used are not intrusive to the van.
This means that I did not drill any holes in the van.
When the day comes that you will want to sell your van
this will be quite anadvantage!
The van will be intact,
and you will be able to keep all your cabinets and your bed,
to transfer them into another van!
To see how to build transferable cabinets,
just click the link.
Another important aspect in securing correctly cabinets and bed,
is to avoid rattles.
There is nothing worst than traveling,
even driving for a short period of time, with rattles!
In my van, there is no rattle.
It is completely quiet!
To avoid rattles,
it is preferable to protect some surface contact.
I put rubber insulating tape on the edges of my cabinets
that touch the van’s walls.
The spongy product gives spring back
and will absorb any possibilities of rattles.
To secure cabinets and bed,
there are many options.
Here are a few:
U-bolt
lashing strap
ratchet strap
tie rape
Velcro
nuts and bolts
wedging technic
and framing technic.
The idea is to use every possible and acceptable possibilities
that may offer the van’s interior to secure cabinets and the bed.
When you look at the interior of a vehicle,
there’s plenty of items that you can use
to secure cabinets and bed.
It is important that you secure an element in every possible way:
lengthwise,
widthwise
and up and down.
Lengthwise is certainly the most important.
There will be situations on the road
when you will have no choices but to push the brake really hard
to avoid accidents.
Overall, the more you secure, the best it is!
Here’s how I did this on my van:
The U-bolt is the strongest option.
Here’s some applications:
I used it at the bottom of a cabinet with a seat anchor.
On the left picture you see under the cabinet.
The u-bolt is looped to the seat anchor.
The right picture shows the inside bottom of the cabinet.
Here, I used a buckle that was part of the van.
I passed a lashing strap into the buckle
and into a U-bolt fixed to the vertical rear panel of the cabinet.
On the left picture, outside of the cabinet,
you see how the lashing strap links the buckle of
the van to the U-bolt.
On the right picture,
you see how the u-bolt is fixed in the inside of the cabinet.
The u-bolts inside the cabinet.
I also used U-bolts to secure my solar panel.
To know how I installed my solar panel and its wires
inside without drilling any holes,
I invite you to click that link.
The Wedging technic:
I used a cup holder insert with a piece of wood cut to fit into it.
That piece of wood can be made with a jigsaw and a simple file or
with the help of a wood chisel.
The left picture shows that piece of wood in the cup holder insert
assembled to a shelve of the cabinet.
The right picture shows the assembly from the inside of the cabinet.
Here’s another view of this key feature:
The nuts and bolts:
I used this technic to linked my 2 cabinets.
The rear one is strongly secured and the second one is attached to it.
I used 2 bolts to link the cabinets.
Using wing nuts will make it
easier and faster to install and uninstall the cabinets.
The left picture shows the wing nut inside the rear cabinet and the right picture
shows the upper bolt in the front cabinet.
For the front cabinet,
I also used the framing technic.
I used a floor transition molding
to make it impossible to the cabinet to move sideways.
Also
the front cabinet is framed with a van’s piece,
the second row of seat’s trolleys.
For the bed I used 2 technics: lashing strap and framing technic.
The framing technic comes from the fact that the bed structure
is pressed against the door frame body of the van:
For the lashing strap it is installed in a way to
give a backward tension as well as a downward tension.
That way, the bed cannot move.
This strap, properly tightened,
will avoid any movement of the bed in any direction.
The lashing strap is attached to the bed frame with a screw eye.
The other end of this lashing strap is fixed to a seat anchor.
Using a ratchet strap would have been also a good idea.
As you can see,
there are plenty of non-intrusive ways to
secure the bed and cabinets.
Don’t worry if you don't have the same van,
every vehicle will have features that can
be used to secure cabinets and bed!
My van is just an example that it can be done.
If you did not notice,
everything that I just showed you is pretty easy to disassemble.
I did not drill any holes or modify anything in the van!
Here’s a playlist of some of my van conversion video technics.
I can think of plenty of videos on Van conversion that I can do,
based on my experience of building my van,
and traveling in it over so many miles and trips.
There are also a lot of van life tips and travel tips
that I would like to share.
Please let me know what topics you want me to focus on
in my next videos....
As a gift to me, let me know where you are from!
I love the feeling of being connected to you all,
from every corner of the world!
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See ya soon!