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LPG Setup – Part 1 – Gas Tank

I was keen to fit an underslung LPG tank to our van to free up valuable interior space, and to me it seems safer keeping the gas outside the van. 

I opted for a Gasit 20L easyfit tank. This makes fitting the tank really easy as it comes with welded feet that simply need attaching to the underside of the van to ensure the tank is sat at the correct angle. This is the tank:

It comes with all of the fittings pre-installed and pre-tested, with a heavy duty plate covering the valves:

Gasit do sell mounting kits for other vans, and a generic mount designed to attach to the floor, but it seemed easier and cheaper just to make my own. I paid around £10 for a metre of angle iron and a meter of flat bar from my local fabrication shop.

I made the mounts out of 3mm angle iron with a piece of 3mm flat bar lap welded underneath the angle iron (overlapped by around 3mm). Both the angle iron and flat bar were 25mm wide and cut down to match the span of the feet (180mm):

 I opted to lap weld to give a bit of clearance under the floor supports that the mounts will attach to:

The mounts then bolt onto the sides of the 2nd and 4th floor support from the front with 4 M8 bolts:

Hopefully in this picture you can see how lap welding the joint allows the mount to sit inline with the bottom of the floor support:

The tank then gets gently jacked into position and bolted to the mounts:

As I still have the van on the rollover jig I also got some pictures with it rolled over:

Gasit also sell the fill point which I’ll be fitting just in front of the rear jacking point. 

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Heating ducting

I’ve finished up the heating ducting this week. Y piece welded in:

Repaired the piece that sits under the walkthrough, and welded back in:

Fabricated a tube to pass through the cross member as the original was beyond repair. I’d thrown the old one out so had nothing to go from, I kept it simple and just made two tubes of the right diameter to match the cardboard tube and metal pipe:

Hopefully we might get some form of heat into the cab now!

I also made up some brackets for our new LPG tank which will run our heater and cooker. I’ll be doing a separate post on how I installed this.

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The results of spending all weekend sanding out the engine bay and fuel tank shelf. Then getting some epoxy mastic onto it tonight! So worth it. 

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Rusty Lee Bed & Lap Belt

My rusty Lee ¾ width bed arrived this month, as I was keen to get the mounting holes drilled before I paint the engine bay.

It took me a little while to work out how it all went together, but it seems really nicely designed and pretty straightforward.

Once I’d assembled it I got it into the van on top of the Madmatz closed cell insulation, a piece of 9mm ply and the floor tiles I’ll be using to make sure it sat at the correct height:

And then drilled and fitted the mounting bolts:

While the bed was in I made up a large strengthening plate for the lap belt and 3 point belt I’ll be fitting

And a quick test to make sure it fits:

These are the floor tiles I’ll be fitting much later on:

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Final Rear End Repairs

A few minor repairs left on the rear end before I can get it into primer.

Welded in my new fuel tank strengthener and the repaired strap:

Removed a patch repair on the Rear wheel tub and welded in some neater repairs:

While I was prepping the fuel tank shelf for paint I noticed some rot creeping out on the chassis behind the suspension mounts so had to cut out a big chunk of the mount to repair it:

And while I had the welder out I made a new bump stop for the trailing arm using the old torsion bar cover plate:

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Fuel tank shelf repairs

Max came down on Sunday to start prepping the engine bay for a spot of paint. Lots of sanding to do!

I have a few areas on the fuel tank shelf that need repairing, the worst being the O/S strap and strengthener that sit underneath it. 

Chopped out:

This is what was left of the strengthening plate after I’d cut the rust out:

The rest of the metal on the plate was pretty thin so I decided to make a new one instead of repairing. I don’t have a bead roller so I rigged up a little jig on the vice instead:

to add some pressings to a sheet of metal:

I then folded over the edges and after some careful bending, welding and spot of etch primer ended up with a pretty decent copy of the original panel:

A quick trial fit too:

I also repaired the fuel tank strap and fitted a new bolt as the old one had rusted shut:

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Inner repairs made up and fitted to rear hatch, epoxied and then outer repair panel fitted. Just a few pinholes to weld up and one further repair to the aperture.

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Finally got some proper strip lights installed down the workshop so I can see what I’m doing!

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Tailgate repairs & O/S track cover mount

Onto the tailgate which needed some repair sections let in around the windscreen aperture and along the lower edge.

Both corners had rust holes, with the N/S corner having a crappy repair someone had previously made. 

All rust cut out:

And started making up some repair sections:

This corner is pretty much done, I just need to fill a few pin holes and grind a few areas down a little more. Much tidier:

I’ve also welded in the O/S track cover mount (the N/S needs some repairs in that area before I can get the mount welded in):

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Engine Lid Conversation

The new engine lid I bought for the van is for the later pin style hinge, and as I wanted to keep the earlier proper hinge I needed to convert the mounts.

The first step is to cut off the pin hinge and weld shut the hole:

Then cut the slots for the hinge:

I was originally going to fit rivnuts but I wanted adjustable nuts, and rivnuts would sit slightly proud of the surface so I had a cunning plan.

Firstly drill holes for where the nuts will sit, but additionally drill a secondary small hole next to it:

Then in an attempt to replicate a cage nut, fabricate a u shaped bracket with a tab to weld to which fits the nut with a small amount of wiggle room (I welded blobs to the corners of the nut too):

Then using a pair of allen keys coax the nut and bracket into position behind the holes and hold in place with a cleco clip (unbelievably faffy and very nearly resulted in me throwing the engine lid across the workshop):

Followed by a confident plug weld through the hole to hold it all in place. 

Repeat on the other 3 nuts and the job is done. The lid fits pretty much perfectly now:

And shuts with a satisfying thunk:

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