Caravan Blog

Me and my fiancee recently bought a cheap caravan on the worlds favourite auction website: eBay. It is a few years old and probably past it's prime (when we got it anyway) and was in great need of some love and attention, in fact almost a complete renovation was required.

One reason we bought one in this condition was as a nice project for both of us to work on in our spare time which would be lovely to take away on holiday probably next summer. The sense of achievement that we will both have when this project is completed will be amazing, and to show all you people around the world what it's like, I am setting up a small blog and as many photos as I can which I will take along the way to give you an idea of just how much work this caravan requires.

The chassis on it is immaculate - no rust at all and most of the exterior is in good condition, just rather green where it has been sitting outside for a few years, nothing that a good wash won't sort out. The interior on the other hand is where we will be focusing most of our efforts which I will detail in the daily diary below.

Ideas/Planning

We didn't really start out with a specific plan for this, but we had decided that we wanted to do it up in a way that would be useful for us to use in the future, not to sell. This enables us to add things which may seem a bit out of the ordinary in a caravan situation but they are all things we would find very useful ourselves. Most of these ideas were thought up as we went along or as we did certain things while stripping out the insides of the caravan. Here's a taster of what we eventually hope to do, bearing in mind that we are both avid film, music and anything-that-lights-up fans:

• As this caravan is 19 feet long, we've got plenty of space for some special treats. There will be an LCD TV on one of the walls connected to an old laptop in a cupboard which will serve as means to watch tv, movies, listen to music and go online.
• We have had some interesting thoughts on what to do about beds and a seating area. We have now decided to have a small table on the front-right of the caravan with a seat on the end of it, and a double bed at the front-left alongside the table, so 2 or 3 people can sit along the edge of the bed to eat at the table and one person can sit on the end. We are also planning to have an oil-filled panel heater on the wall about a seat where the wardrobe used to be, there will be a cupboard above this for storage.
• We weren't really sure what to do about the toilet and bathroom area as currently, one of the walls had been removed by the previous owner and the remaining walls had a rather horrible patterned finish which we want to get rid of. For this area, I have been offered some waterproof wood from a friend (I can't remember the name of the wood) so I'm tempted to line it out with that, either this or to get some Fablon and cover the walls which will smarten it up and also be waterproof.
• With the electrical system (my favourite part), we will be getting quite sophisticated (well compared to the average caravan anyway). We have sourced a 2000 watt power inverter. For those who don't know, an inverter is a device which is connected to a car battery, which allows you to run mains-powered devices from the battery. 2000 watts should be ample for us when we are away from campsite power which will run devices such as a small fridge and energy saving lights (either LED or CFL bulbs) and also one oil filled heater and the laptop/LCD. When finances allow it, we will be looking to invest in an automatic switch that will switch over to campsite power as soon as it plugs in without any interruption to the power, and it will also charge the car batteries at the same time.
• With the lighting, so far we have fitted 4 colour-changing LED downlighters, one in each corner of the sleeping area to act as mood lights when watching movies at night. These do look very nice, I will soon have a video of them to put on here. For main lighting, I'm thinking of getting some slimline fluorescent link-lights to put along the top of the side 'shelves' (the bit which goes from the cocktail locker along the wall to the front cupboards), I think this would look quite nice as it wouldn't be too bright, it would have an uplighter effect which I have tested with an old fluorescent tube and it works and lights the room very well.

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Day 1

This was the first day I started working on it, I took a few of the pictures after I started working so they may not be in any particular order or show all of the original condition. Part of the interior has been removed by the previous owner as they had used it for storage while they were building their new house, mainly the upholstery and the bathroom walls are missing but I have decided to remove almost all the rest of the interior due to its 'old fashioned' look as well as because bits are missing - such as one of the drawers.

Some of the window seals and air vents leak which has caused a great amount of rain to enter the caravan and rot the floor in some areas so I had to start by taking up as much of the vinyl and carpet flooring as I could to see how badly it was rotted. This was easier said than done as the various cupboards and kitchen units had been built on top of this so I was faced with two options, either cut around the edge of the flooring which would leave a rough edge and result in not being able to remove quite all of it, or to take out all the units and walls and remove the flooring from under them. I decided to go for the latter. This would involve a good few days to strip it all down but would enable me to get a better idea of the condition of the floor boards underneath as well as it being a good opportunity to replace those old cabinets! Here are some photos from the day:

Day 2

On day 2 it was time to start removing the old seating as some if was damaged and very weak due to the weight of whatever had been previously stored in there. This was more of a hammer and wrecking bar kind of job, whilst trying to preserve any bits of wood and hinges etc which may be useful for the rebuild later on. The caravan was also fitted out with a gas-powered water heater which is shown in the following images. I don't yet know if this works but it will be great to test it when I get a spare moment (and some gas) as this will be very useful later on. The pictures also show some of the gas pipes and taps which I will be replacing for safety reasons, as well as some of the wiring which is currently present in the caravan. Surprisingly, all the light fittings, both inside and outside, work fine (apart from 2 missing bulbs which were easily replaced) so after a good clean I may be able to salvage some of these but if I do, I will replace the bulbs with LEDs due to their considerably lower power requirements and choice of colours. Here are some pictures from the day:

Day 3

Day 3 was a chance to remove the wardrobe, gas-powered heater and the vinyl and carpet flooring beneath it. This was easier said than done as we wanted to keep the two end walls of the wardrobe intact and just remove the front, shelves and heater without damaging the ends or heater too much. There were screws, nails, and staples holding it all, and I don't mean one or two - nope, someone went berserk with the screwdriver when they built this one and put in approximately 20 screws down each side, plus a combination of nails and staples everywhere else. Eventually I managed to remove the innards so I could get to the flooring under it all, which was nicely glued to the floor instead of stapled like the rest of the caravan so this was a challenge to remove. We are planning to put a storage cupboard above the wheel arch where the wardrobe used to be and build a seat over the unsightly metal wheel arch to hide it and put a flat panel oil heater on the wall behind it all which will pose as a nice warm place to sit when returning from a day out in England's finest weather (you guessed it, rain), as well as drying any damp clothes in the storage cupboard above. Here's the usual round of pictures:

Day 4

Gave the caravan a good wash today, a friend of mine le me borrow his pressure washer which worked a treat. Also did some more work on what will be a seat shown in the pictures below as well as fitting up a permanent light (the small one in the pictures) to cover up a hole which was left by a previous light so that the whole panel would not need to be replaced. Also re-used one of the strip lights which was fitted in the caravan and hung that in the seating area temporarily to help me see in that gloomy corner. Eventually I may mount it permanently in that area as it seems toilluminate it very well.

Day 5/6/7

The project has been on hold for quite a long while now due to lack of money, but recently I have aquired a lot of caravan parts from a friend who was scrapping their caravan. In total, I got 2 sinks, a gas cooker, all necessary pipes and pumps for the sinks, a consumer unit for the electrics, several other cables and pipes as well as some hinges, door stays, various pieces of wood and fittings. this has helped me a lot as now I can start working on it again. Also, one night I was having problems sleeping and had a major brainwave with how I wanted the interior of my caravan to look. I decided to have a table on the front right side attached to the remains of the wardrobe, with a steel pole (like a wardrobe hanging rail) to hold up the non-fixed corner and with the remaining space on the front left of the caravan would be the sleeping area, this makes it so much easier than my original plan and it would also give me space to have a seat at the end of the table and space for 2 people to sit on the edge of the bed and easily be able to reach the long side of the table. I have also decided to fix a 19 inch LCd monitor on what used to be the end of the wardrobe above the table to watch tv/movies etc - a laptop will act as the sole entertainment system. I purchased some pretty decent car parcel shelf speakers from a car boot sale which will be fitted one below the monitor and one on the end of the cabinet on the opposite side of the caravan.  I have also started fitting some colour-changing LED downlighters in the 4 corners of the 'living room/sleeping' area for mood lighting, so far I have got 3 of these fitted and they look great especially in the dark and I plan to get the last one fitted tomorrow evening and get the wiring tidied up properly. We purchased some slimline light switches from ebay for a nice low price which will be fitted on the cabinet next to the speaker on the front left (or right if you were looking from front to rear). So far it is now coming on very nicely and it's great to see some progress with what has been the 'empty' end of the caravan for so long. I have also decided to purchase some 'Fablon' which is basically sticky-back plastic, this is available in various colours and designs. I will use this to cover the existing wood with to make it look more modern, doing this will save a lot of money as I can now keep the original wood and make it look great. I will probably use the Light Pine Fablon for most of the caravan with some areas of a different colour or pattern to give it some contrast.

Update

I've recently come across a website called UKcampsite.co.uk which offers a lot of help and advice regarding caravans. I specifically asked in the forums for help identifying my caravan, thanks goes to IainM on my thread here who recognised that my caravan was a Churchill, a not-very-well-known company from the early 80s. After an hour of trawling the internet I found another website here where a user has posted the sales brochure, price list and manual for the 1981 range of Churchill caravans. Please see the images below for more info. Credit goes to Pugwash from CaravanFacts.com.

Power Usage

I will soon be measuring the power that each item in the caravan uses to give you an idea of (hopefully) how much electric it would save compared to other caravans. One of the main reasons for stripping everything out and redoing all the electrics and gas is to make it more energy-efficient, so when I buy electrical items for the caravan I always try to go for the most low-power items.

 

[   ] LED Downlighters
[   ] Laptop
[   ] LCD tv
[   ] Fridge
[   ] Link lights

[   ] Total wattage