Our biggest month yet - Ep38

Added: 2026-05-07

[00:00:00]Welcome back. It's now April and we got big plans. So, today is Good Friday and uh Luc and I have taken the whole week off. We've brought the power system down and uh we're going to try and kind of jerryrig some kind of mains power. Won't be the permanent install, but I think we can get the bus on mains, which would be cool. I've also ordered a load of steel and the idea of that is to start building roof of the bus. I did want to get that yesterday, but they couldn't deliver until Tuesday. So, I've kind of lost 4 days of work there, which is a little annoying, but you roll with it.

[00:00:32]We've also brought down some furniture, which will go in the cabin. What are you going to get done? Going to restore the furniture as he said. Going to give them a good sand um and stain with linseed oil. Hopefully get the curtains done.

[00:00:46]Going to fix up this side of the bus to sand that down and get another coat of paint on. We got a wedding to get to next weekend.

[00:00:56]>> My baby brother's getting married.

[00:00:59]>> So, we'll have to head back on the Friday and get organized for the Saturday.

[00:01:03]>> Yeah.

[00:01:04]>> What are you getting done?

[00:01:06]>> Nothing. You bludger.

[00:01:09]>> I don't think we can fit any more in this fridge.

[00:01:12]>> Right. Well, it's imperative now that we get power running.

[00:01:18]>> The stakes are high.

[00:01:22]So, as Luc has finished stuck in the fridge and I've finished sorting out the cabin, I'm going to get on with emptying the container and uh find a spot for this hour to go.

[00:02:07]Wow.

[00:02:10]Hey. Hey.

[00:02:12]Heat.

[00:02:29]Heat. N.

[00:02:46]So now the only thing is to flick that breaker overload.

[00:02:59]Don't know what that can be. Nothing's on.

[00:03:08]Okay, that was all right. Try that switch again.

[00:03:18]Just turned all the breakers on the bus off. Um, managed to get power through here and it's going in and the bus is plugged in. So, I don't think it is that socket actually. I think that's actually all right. It'll just be a case of which of these is playing up.

[00:03:37]>> Okay, first one.

[00:03:41]>> Is that all right?

[00:03:44]>> Second one.

[00:03:47]Third one.

[00:03:50]Fourth one.

[00:03:54]Yeah, we heard that here, didn't we? I didn't trip. So, that one's Don't know what that's for.

[00:04:02]Do you want to reset it? Loose.

[00:04:05]Fifth one. Sixth one. Seventh one.

[00:04:10]Eighth one.

[00:04:13]>> So, it's just one of these is the problem.

[00:04:16]>> I don't know which circuit it is. I'll have to find out. But let me see if it's the fridge one cuz that'll be a pain.

[00:04:23]One circuit isn't working, but not the one this is on. This is going well. So, the fridge has just jumped into life.

[00:04:29]Just needed a bit of time. I've just been round with that battery charger testing all the other sockets and they've all got life except for these two. So, there's probably going to be something wrong with the wiring in there and that's what was shorting it. So, um no need to get on to that today. We'll just get the fridge nice and cold.

[00:04:48]Look at that. Ice cubes. Unreal.

[00:04:54]But we've got mains power for the first time.

[00:04:58]Absolutely huge step.

[00:05:01]Okay, so we've got the fridge on and we've got a phone charging using 133 W.

[00:05:07]I do have the solar charge controllers with Anderson plugs. So, I can take one of our solar panels and just hook them in. So, I think from tomorrow we'll do that and uh that'll probably give us more power than the fridge is using.

[00:05:21]Doesn't seem to be anything wrong with it now. I guess we'll leave it be and uh hope it doesn't burn it down.

[00:06:05]So morning of this Saturday and um I've just got the batteries talking to the inverter so we can see how much charge we've got which is a a good step forward. So, currently sitting on 82%, I don't know what we started with. They should have been full. Uh, we've only really had the fridge running. We've done a little bit of um phone charging and stuff, but uh yeah, I do think the batteries have degraded a little bit just cuz we haven't used them. They've just sat in our lounge for a year. I was going to look at getting a solar panel hooked up. Um, it's really windy today, so I don't know if I'll do that, but you'd really want it to be kind of mounted properly. Um, so instead we're going to look at getting the diesel heater in. It was very cold last night and uh we'd like to have that for the remainder of the stay.

[00:06:54]Um, so we're going to have to do a bit of a run into town just to get a few little bits and pieces, but um, if we can get this running tonight, that'll be that'd be incredible.

[00:07:13]I couldn't get a good ground on the chassis, so I had to run another cable back to the battery negative. But we got power now. It turns on. So, going to fill it with diesel and see if we can get it fired up.

[00:07:29]All right, I think we're on.

[00:07:37]I just changed the battery in the bus as well. That one's getting a little bit low. This thing is cranking.

[00:07:46]Oh, yeah.

[00:07:49]That is getting warm.

[00:07:51]Oh, cool. All right. Well, that was painful. I'm not going to lie. But at least we've got heating in the bus now, which is pretty cool.

[00:07:59]This thing is cranking.

[00:08:02]That is way too hot.

[00:08:05]We're going to um just let it kind of gas off and get rid of the plasticky smell. Um we got all the windows open.

[00:08:16]Yeah, that thing that thing cooks.

[00:08:20]It's now the Sunday, day three. Um that diesel heater is banging. That has changed things drastically. So, main's power and a heated bus in well, one and a half days worth of work. Feeling pretty good. But it is going to be sunny today. So, the first thing going to do is get this solar panel powering the big batteries. Hope to get a bit of juice back into them. All right, so this should be it. I've had to replace the uh the Anderson plug. That one was just not fitting. These are odd these red ones that came with it. So, um anyway, replace that. We'll hook it up and see if we can get some solar power. Okay, we're hooked up to one of the controllers.

[00:09:01]solar nothing. So, I wasn't getting any power at all from the one panels cuz the voltage was too low. So, brought out the second panel, got them in series, matched up the voltage. As long as it's above 48 volts, which is what the batteries are, and I'm assuming probably more like above 50 volts, then we should be able to get some charge from it. And we are. That's more like it. So, at least we got some charge coming back into the batteries now.

[00:09:42]The Net and Adam have just told us they're going to come down. So, um, what we're going to do try and do is move this water tank. Haven't really planned out exactly how we're going to do it.

[00:09:51]I'm thinking the long way round might be the easiest.

[00:09:56]Well, after a bit of time on the tractor, I've made a bit of a pathway through for the tank. I'm just going to go through and pick up anything that's going to pierce it.

[00:10:09]Then round here, I've kind of flattened out the pad a bit more. Much happier with that. Well, well, well.

[00:10:19]Not into that, is he?

[00:10:37]Got to say, I'm thoroughly enjoying all these little odd jobs rather than just focusing on the one thing an extended period of time.

[00:10:45]It's nice. feel like I get lots done.

[00:10:47]Which brings us to this job. Loose is going to get stuck into this monstrosity.

[00:11:10]While Loose is painting the bus roof, I'm going to try and get the old bus roof rack out of the bracken. It'll make a perfect welding table for the new trusses. It's the exact width it needs to be.

[00:11:39]Show us what we got.

[00:11:42]>> We got towel hook.

[00:11:45]Very nice.

[00:11:47]And the shower head is properly installed now.

[00:11:52]>> Kind of. The hook didn't fit. So, we've just chucked a nail in.

[00:11:56]Well, the second coat of primer is drying. We've turned our attention this way.

[00:12:03]Please climbing there. renunculous.

[00:12:07]Beautiful colors.

[00:12:12]>> And I'm starting to put the fittings on the tank. Big chunky valves.

[00:12:18]Just means we can keep it all shut. Stop anything getting in there.

[00:12:34]While this is coloring in, I've just shut the mains power. Can have a look at these.

[00:12:40]Everything actually looked all right, which is a bit disappointing. Um, I could get another kind of quarter of a turn on on everything. So, maybe it's just a little loose. It was arcing. I don't know.

[00:12:55]All right.

[00:12:56]See if it will have it.

[00:12:59]Nope.

[00:13:01]I don't know what that is. I think I might have to take the breaker off and see if that's widing. Okay.

[00:13:19]So, I wasn't super happy with the way this table turned out. Um I probably could have well needed to sand a lot more cuz there's still sort of original um coating there, I guess. Um I just sort of wanted to get all the scrappy loose stuff off, but now it's that it's oiled, it just kind of looks, I don't know, ratty. So I'm going to use um the same stain that we used on the cabin. So see what that looks like.

[00:13:55]Definitely an improvement. Probably hard to see in the video, but it's just a bit richer looking. Um, oops, missed a spot.

[00:14:07]Tomorrow I'll probably give it another coat and do all of these bits underneath just so it's a bit more consistent. But yeah, definitely an improvement. So, >> we decided to cook our fresco tonight.

[00:14:21]need quite a few burners and I thought I'd give the induction a go. This is by far the the biggest load we'll be putting on the inverter since we've had it running.

[00:14:33]Currently 92 watts that the fridge being used.

[00:14:42]Nice sweat.

[00:14:59]So, I woke up to a very wet Monday. Um, everything's just a swamp and we've had a bit of a nightmare morning. Just trapesing mud everywhere. So, uh, yeah, definitely added to the list to try and get some kind of boot cleaning apparatus in and around the bus and the cabin. Uh, but the sun's starting to break through and it's warming up, so hopefully it will cook all this a little bit and I'm going to get the solar panels hooked up and try and catch some of this sun.

[00:15:27]Probably a good day to do some indoor jobs. So, I'm going to have a look at getting this switch running for the extractor fan.

[00:15:43]about to start finishing the curtain rails. Uh I don't know why this has just become a completely dreaded task for me for some reason.

[00:16:08]Well, it's turned out okayish.

[00:16:12]Um, I've actually measured the lengths of the curtains and they're different lengths, which is kind of annoying, but um, whatever. It'll do. It's what happens when you buy cheap stuff. cuz we'll have the splash back here um for the entire length of this table. We won't need um any curtains. So, that's good. So, it's really just that strip there, which will probably need to be two curtains. And then should be able to fit one at this end, too.

[00:16:54]All right, all these curtains are done.

[00:16:57]See, I just cut out a cut a small piece for there behind the fridge.

[00:17:03]Um, it's definitely far from perfect, but I think we'll do the job and can probably get Velcro or something for when we want it to be really blacked out.

[00:17:16]>> Tell us what we do now.

[00:17:18]>> Try and get this broken glass out.

[00:17:22]Could be a bit hairy.

[00:17:40]Right. So, we just got these little bits of steel, little tabs. It is solid. Then tomorrow I'll take it all off, paint it, and might even recut this wood, get a better shape rather than just eyeballing it.

[00:17:56]We've been putting that job off since day one of having the bus. Although it's not the best job in the world, it definitely feels like a hell of an improvement.

[00:18:04]It's now the Tuesday and it's just been raining non-stop. It's absolutely flooded outside. So, uh, although the steel is coming this morning, I don't think I'm going to get much done in the way of fab work. This will be my still missed the gate.

[00:18:22]Right, we're on. We're in business.

[00:18:37]So, I'm just going to get that steel moved undercover. Um, I don't know if I'll start on that today. Uh, really do want to work on the bus. So, if we can get that front sorted, that means we can get the kitchen in place properly, means we can get the splash back in, and I think most importantly, it means we can start on the plumbing.

[00:19:20]Hey.

[00:19:33]Hey.

[00:19:46]It's now the Wednesday morning and uh yeah, fresh today. The big batteries are running very low. Um down to I think 22% when we got up and after we boiled water for coffee and all that stuff. They're now down to 17%. Today is going to be about getting these up to 100% again.

[00:20:07]So, I've got to run into town. I got to buy some cabling so I can get the generator to hooked up.

[00:20:14]All right. Well, I've been gone about 2 and 1 half hours and we've managed to get it up to 25%.

[00:20:20]So, the side is just not going to be able to cut it today. Um, it's already about midday and we'll start to lose light around this side in the next couple of hours anyway. Um, so what I'm going to do is just make a cable up for the generator. So, I think I'm going to have it on this side of the container permanently. I'll need to make a little kind of soundproof box for it as well cuz it does make a D.

[00:20:42]Um, so yeah, another cable line in. And, um, see if we can put some juice in.

[00:20:48]I've kind of rewired a bit of this as well. Just made it a little bit neater, a bit more positive now. Um, but this now runs out to the lead that we can chuck in the Jenny and um, see if we can get some charge.

[00:21:04]There we go. It's found his feet.

[00:21:18]So, having trouble with the extractor fan. Uh, you flip the switch and nothing happens.

[00:21:24]Um, I was trying to trace the issue. Bad wiring over there, bad connection, issue with the relay, giving it a tap, all that kind of stuff. And sometimes it just kicks in. But what I found is that it's the switch.

[00:21:44]So, another thing to replace. I'll just do that quick. Hopefully that'll sort that out.

[00:21:52]Feels better. Right. the next job while the bus is powered down. Let's have a look at this RCD. I reckon that's the problem. Think just issue with wiring in that maybe. Unfortunately, couldn't see anything wrong with that. Um my dad put this together so it's going to be right.

[00:22:10]But um just in case I think we had a couple of spare breakers in there, so I'm just going to flick onto the one next to it and see if that um see if that remedies it. And then it's just a bad unit. Might just be that. We have had it running off the generator before, so you think it would have shown itself beforehand.

[00:22:27]It's worth a go.

[00:22:34]Oh no, that's working.

[00:22:44]>> All right, it's been on 97 for a long time now. I think that's just a kind of safety measure to stop it overcharging.

[00:22:50]Yeah, it's probably been 20 minutes without it moving at all. So, I'm going to cut the generator and um and call that a success, I reckon. That was weird. Um so, once I cut the generator, it went to switch over to to battery and inverter and it just went clunk overload like it did with the um errant MCB in the bus even though I've swapped it over. So, there's still an issue there.

[00:23:19]Um, so we can run the power sockets by the kitchen when the generator is running, but when it's the inverter align, we can't.

[00:23:28]Yeah, a bit beyond my pay grade that.

[00:23:31]Um, anyway, we can work without for the moment. Yeah, I think it took about 3 to 3 and 1/2 hours to get the batteries from under 20% up to 97. Um, which, you know, is a long time to be running this generator. But I think if you know I can see there's going to be a few cloudy days in a row and you know it's only down to kind of 70 80% can run it for half hour or so just to kind of keep it topped up. That's fine. That's workable.

[00:23:58]Can live with that. More importantly our neighbors could live with that.

[00:24:04]It's now Thursday and we had a lot of wind in the night and sustained some damage.

[00:24:11]All of our pegs are used to pin the poly tunnel down. Shredded as soon as the frame started to walk.

[00:24:19]So yeah, another cover gone. I can't see myself doing any of the roof truss work today. Um so it's just going to have to wait until later in the month. Um but what we can do is get the kitchen splash back on. Um and finally have the the kitchen bench kind of tied in place permanently. Um, and Loose wants to do more painting inside as well. I've also got a hole saw so we can get the vents in for the diesel heater. It's quite a few things we can do inside the bus. So, it's a bit windy. Not bad outcome really. First job of the day. I just threw a quick stand together so we can get the gas into the heater without having to have the door open. This flimsy little thing wouldn't lasted another day in this wind.

[00:25:05]So, I decided on a whim to do some painting in here. Um, so I've used the same paint that we used for the roof um to cover uh the timber that was here. It was just like green coated and sort of covered in uh spray foam residue and just crap. So, I think it looks a lot better now. And I've decided I think I'm going to paint these red. um strips as well because I really don't actually like the red and black look. I'll keep the feature wall at the back. Um but yeah, I think I'll cover these and I'll test it out um down here sort of where the power socks will be just to make sure that paint does actually cover the red adequately.

[00:25:55]And then down in the footwell, I've sprayed uh some metal um enamel. So, covering up those old tiles and gross floor. So, that looks a lot better. And then these blue panels on the side, I'll paint with the that white paint. Lighten things up a bit.

[00:26:19]And then I think we're going to put a um floorboard here as well for that step.

[00:26:24]So yeah, it'll look nice. So I am super happy with this result. Um it's changed the whole feel inside the bus. Um I think the red was just too I don't know, too heavy or something.

[00:27:50]Okay, it's now the Friday. Luc is just headed back to town. She's got a lot to do before the wedding tomorrow and I'm going to spend probably like an hour packing down everything and and making sure it's all kind of locked up, powered down, unplugged, and ready to leave for another week. Um, tons of rain in the night. So much water lying around. I don't think we would have got much done today anyway. Uh yeah, absolute swamp.

[00:28:14]>> Just started hacking down. Um and I'm out of here. Not a moment too soon. But I'm not complaining. We got a hell of a lot done. Um it's just going to be a case of hoping that the uh the dice land in our favor each weekend um from now on just because it's going to be much wetter, much colder. Um and with the gazebo out of action, we've kind of lost our cover as well. So anyway, um off to the wedding. looking forward to that.

[00:28:42]And then um we'll be back next weekend to uh pick up where we left off.

[00:28:48]We're now back for the third weekend and it is Friday night. We've got ourselves fish and chips and we've come down to start our weekend down there. Feels like we've got a little holiday home or something. I've just got the batteries powered up in the container and we got the bus plugged in as well. And uh we can start getting settled in. 97% just as we left them. Perfect.

[00:29:15]And we're up nice and early to get started on the Saturday. Um, looks like we're going to get a bit of sunshine.

[00:29:20]So, I'll get the solar panel set up first and then I'll get the cover off the steel and uh see about making one of these trusses.

[00:29:29]Panels are hooked up and we're getting just under 400 W.

[00:29:35]I won't do a running commentary of all the solar stuff. It's just while it's new. Cumor me. I also grabbed a couple of IBC's yesterday as well. Got a good deal on some food grade ones. They do need rinsing out, but um they're a good price and I just thought I'd nab them.

[00:29:50]So, I'll get these out of the trailer as well and uh sling them somewhere out the way.

[00:30:13]So, I spent probably the last hour just setting up, measuring, checking the model I've drawn up and um trying to get everything square as I can. I've also taken off any proud welds off of this as well, just so uh nothing's throwing anything off. It's not the flattest thing, but uh it's better than anything else I've ever used.

[00:30:52]I've skipped ahead a little bit here.

[00:30:54]Um, this is as far as I've got today.

[00:30:56]Kind of running out of generator hours.

[00:30:58]Got the inspector coming in to make sure it's all okay.

[00:31:02]Everything's lining up and matching the model at the moment, which is great. I won't dress every weld either. I'll just be here forever if I'm doing that. So, um I'll just chuck a bit of primer on the bare metal and leave it for the day and hopefully get this one wrapped up tomorrow. Loose is in full arson mode.

[00:31:22]Arson about.

[00:31:25]All right, now the Sunday. Uh, unfortunately Loose woke up with a migraine, so had to run her back to the house. Um, so yeah, lost most of the morning, but back now and looking to get this truss finished today. Um, gave me a chance to pick up some more diesel as well. Hot property at the moment. Right, I've been railing through this for the last 2 hours, I guess. And, uh, the first truss, the frame is there. I just need to sort the feet, I guess you'd call them, which are going to go into the gutters. But, uh, I've just offered it up with the, uh, the reference piece, and it's it's spot on. Absolutely perfect. Really happy with that. Um, I'm just wondering whether I'll make a jig with it while it's still flat, cuz once I put these feet on, it's not going to lay flat anymore. Um, so I might do that. And, um, then after that, have a look at making these feet. Then after that, it's just going to be a production line getting another six of these made.

[00:32:38]So, that's the jig. It's not the most detailed, but I think it'll give me the kind of key layout. So, I've got the angle set now, and I know that these are all 2.4 long, so that's an easy one.

[00:32:50]that will be consistent. And I've got the crossmember as well. So that's completely horizontal. So that's a really good reference point to go from.

[00:32:56]So that ties those two in together. And then I've got the legs, which is the other kind of critical span of the the bus roof itself. Um all the other things, the gussets and stuff are all kind of easy to do, and you can just kind of measure them on the on the go.

[00:33:10]Well, hopefully that saves some time. um when it comes to the others. Um what I'm going to do now is is look at making the feet for this and maybe auditioning it on the roof.

[00:33:48]Well, how's that? Perfect fit. Snug even.

[00:33:55]It's just right. No higher than it needs to be. Good amount of span off the side of the bus.

[00:34:05]very very happy.

[00:34:07]So I would have actually had it even lower, but I needed to account for the vent.

[00:34:14]So we just need to make sure that once the batters are in place, this isn't going to foul on that.

[00:34:22]Yeah, just right, I think.

[00:34:28]Right. One of seven. Um, if it come together like that, I'd be very happy.

[00:34:40]And we're back for the last weekend of April. Um, we stayed again last night, Friday, and uh, nice early start this morning. I'm just going to get straight into the treses.

[00:34:56]So, I'm just continuing with the splashback today. got some stainless steel uh shelves and um racks uh from IKEA. So, continuing to indulge my obsession. I've roughly sort of figured out where I want things. Um and I'll probably still need to buy some more uh bits and pieces, but yeah, we'll see how it comes out.

[00:35:39]pulled out some of the sleepers that we were gifted by our neighbor. Decided to make bit of a frame um for around these garlic. So, I might possibly put some PVC piping over it to like maybe put some shade cloth over it. Haven't decided yet, but hopefully the walabbees leave it alone.

[00:36:12]I am beat.

[00:36:15]But that's all six at the same stage now. and they came out pretty good. All the stuff that matters, such as the width between the legs and the angle of the the pitch, all matches fine. We're not done yet, though. We need to get to um pick up some solar panels that we've bought. Um so, I need to hurriedly pack down then run into town, grab those panels.

[00:36:40]It's now the Sunday, the last working day of April, and we both feel so rough.

[00:36:45]I think we really got hit by the sun yesterday. just feeling really nauseous and lethargic and just miserable to be honest. The idea of facing another day out in the sun is not an appealing one.

[00:36:57]Luca's gone home. There's no point in her being down here. There's nothing, you know, vital that she needs to get done. There's no point in pushing it if she's not feeling well. But I'm going to try and see how far I can get with these trusses. And you can see how much I got yesterday.

[00:37:13]Yeah, that's stings. I couldn't do it.

[00:37:18]Got a splitting headache and that generator was just killing me. I did manage to get one truss with all the gussets in. And then when I started the next one, I thought instead of just doing one at a time, I'll I'll cut all the pieces for all of the trusses in one go. So, I got a certain amount cut. Um, which will help us get ahead next week when I pick it up again. Um, still some time left in the day. So, I'm going to have a look at getting these problem sockets working on the bus. I swapped the live from the one that wasn't working into the one next door which has been working. So that should if the problems here allow me to use the problem outlets. If there's still overloads then it's going to be beyond this and it's going to be somewhere on that circuit.

[00:38:05]It's good to go.

[00:38:09]Yeah. problem with the circuit though, not with consumer unit. Just reset it.

[00:38:15]I'm going to try that one next door.

[00:38:18]Just to double check, there's nothing wrong with this.

[00:38:22]So, that works fine. So, that should be all the other circuits still up and running, even if it goes via that MCB.

[00:38:31]So, these really are the worst sockets to be playing up. These come right the way around the bus right the way the long way around. They're in the walls. They're in the insulation.

[00:38:43]That cable, if it's got a screw through it or something, is um a lost cause. Um I'm not going to rip the whole bus apart trying to trying to fix it. Um but if it was a screw through the cable, you'd think that it would started a fire when we had the generator running because it does run fine if it's hooked up to the Jenny. It's only when it's straight from the batteries we get a problem. Can't figure it out. Defeated again. Not my day out. Um, well, I've still got loads of packing and washing and cleaning and stuff to do before I head home. And, uh, it is getting on, so I think I'm going to call it there. Don't want to end the video on a downer, though. It's been a great month. We got so much done. And, uh, I'm just super excited to get back each weekend and keep it going. So, um, we will get this power sorted. I will get those treses built. And, uh, yeah, who knows what we'll get up to in May.

[00:39:38]But, uh, as always, thank you very much for watching and we'll see you in the next one.