The Ultimate Upgrade?

As followers of the Stone174 blog will know, this is a long-term project - very much a 'save a bit, spend a bit' approach - and whilst the quality and attitude is that of 'no compromise' this is certainly no 'open chequebook' project.

Followers will also be all too aware that money seems to be getting tighter; diesel costs are going ever upward, insurance has almost doubled in the last two years, and road tax simply never gets cheaper.

So after much debating and looking over our current funds (including a savings account devoted to buying, painting and fitting a pop-top roof) we've decided to go for the ultimate upgrade...

'What is this miracle?' you ask.

Well, it will increase the life of the van.

Cut our weekly fuel bill.

Halve our van insurance costs.

Guessed what it is yet?

Yep, it's another vehicle!

A ten year old, 1.4 Lupo with 72k on the clock, pretty spotless in Soft Blue; cheap to tax, insure and run. It seemed crazy to keep commuting in the van; sat in traffic, drinking diesel, making little use of the 174 engine (and as I've said before - who's rushing to get to work?!). We've been searching on and off since last October and then finally, after test-driving a few others, the right car came along.

Having a second vehicle and switching the van insurance to the Camping & Caravanning Club's insurance has literally halved the price we were paying with Adrian Flux. There's even a section on there to say it's a self-converted motorhome - with an agreed valuation of like-for-like replacement should the inevitable happen.

Our journey to work gives us little opportunity to hit 60mph, so the smaller petrol engine is fine.

And road tax is £125 for the year - that's a few night's out on the beer that we need to cut back and it's paid for!

Finally, regular readers will also know that it probably won't be staying stock for long - coilovers and some retro rims could well be on the cards in the not too distant future, maybe a mini-blog of it's own...
What was that about trying to save money again?

UPDATE: Rather than fill this blog with Lupo stuff when you're here to read about the T5, I've started another little blog here.

New Year's recharge

Happy New Year to all Stone174 readers!

I've taken the opportunity during the seasonal time off to clean the van thoroughly - Stone Blue isn't a colour that works well when filthy!

After cleaning the van over I put the stereo on whilst shammy-ing off and decided to take advantage of 'hooking-up' to the mains to top up the leisure battery. It was at this point that I realised that I never really went into detail about the van's electrical system that was fitted at the same time as the interior.

So here's how it all works:

The mains hook-up point is discreetly located under the rear bumper - I was keen not to have anything in the sides of the van.

The hookup is then linked to a mains distribution box (1) where the input is fused and distributed to the 240v sockets within the van.

Mains electricity is also fed to a battery charger (2) which charges the van's leisure battery and main vehicle battery (after the leisure battery is topped-up).

The final box (3) is the CBE 12v distribution box where all the 12v sockets, audio and lighting are fused.

Other items in the electrical cupboard are:

A big 50amp fuse (4) which sits between battery charger and leisure battery (there's another one next to the main vehicle battery under the bonnet)

Eberspacher fuses (5) for the heater and control panel.

Leisure battery (6). This is an 85aH unit that I'm hoping to upgrade to a larger unit later this year.

Earth point (7) on the vehicle body.

All these elements are linked up to the CBE control panel:

More details about the functions of the CBE system are here in a previous post.

One of the best features is the 'at-a-glance' monitoring of battery condition:

Here's the leisure battery condition - reading 13.9v

...and the van's battery voltage reading 12.8v

The CBE kit came from Rainbow Conversions and so far it has been faultless.

So all we need now is some great camping conditions, I'm recharged and ready to go!