Friday, 26 January 2018

2. Motorcycle Trailers - Caravan #2


Some years after converting my first caravan to a motorcycle trailer, my wife said to me "why don't you get a bigger caravan and then I could stay with you at the rallies?" And so the search for a suitable caravan commenced.

The first problem was to find one with the right configuration to enable it to be converted. It must have access at the back (no kitchen etc. in the way) and it must have enough space between the seats to accommodate the width of the scooter. So we started going around caravan sales sites with a tape measure to find the right one.   

Eventually we found this lovely Elddis Tornado and what luxury. Central heating, a shower, hot and cold water and a proper cooker.  The top plan shows it in the day configuration and the lower plan with the two double beds set up.

Now although this caravan has a shower/toilet at the back, I could see that I could still get a bike in at the side of it and then roll it forward until the bike was over the axle, to distribute the weight.

The caravan sales site was asking too much money for the Elddis Tornado, but at least I now knew which model I needed. So I went back to the Internet and found this one, at the right price, on Ebay. I went to Leicester to fetch it and the man who owned it seemed to be appalled when I told him that I intended to cut it up. Never the less, he sold it to me and I towed it home.

The next step was to take it to my friends workshop for the conversion. Colin of Unit Two Services, at Ilkeston, Derbyshire, was fantastic when it came to working out how to do the conversion and I cannot claim the credit for the actual metalwork which he manufactured for me.

The first job was to remove the rear bottom panel that contained the rear lights and number plate etc.  Once removed, I had to strip out all of the furniture in the rear of the caravan. This exposed the water pipes for the shower, which would have to be re-routed down through the floorboards and under the caravan to give a clear path in for the bike.

The next job was the most frightening. It was time to cut the big hole in the back. The size of it was measured and marked on the back with a felt tip pen and then Colin set about it with a jigsaw. There was no going back now!

The section that had been cut out was saved to be used later as the door and the next stage was to strengthen the hole to give the caravan back its rigidity. Now I had learnt for my first caravan conversion that steel frames were too heavy and the rear door on my old van really took some lifting. So this one was to be all aluminium. Colin made a frame to sandwich the rear wall inside and out in the shape of a "U" and then welded all corners to make it one solid frame. It was then drilled all around and small tubes were inserted through the rear wall, in the drilled holes, to prevent the rear wall squashing as the fixing screws are tightened. As you may know, caravan walls have a thin aluminium inner and outer skin with only polystyrene between them.

 Some pre-painted aluminium was bought and used to replace the rear bottom fibreglass panel that had been removed. These are the panels that you can see in blue on the photo. The blue colour is a protective film that will be removed later.

More of this new aluminium was used to make the bottom of the door and a matching aluminium frame was made and fitted around the door using the same method. This frame was also welded on all four corners to give the door rigidity. The door frame was designed to fit inside the wall frame with a rubber seal between the two to make it weather tight. This obviously required reducing the overall size of the door to accommodate the thickness of the two frames.

The door was then hung in place with a heavy duty stainless steel piano hinge. Well there it is in place, but there was lots more to do.

 I found some German door catches on the Internet that not only turned to lock the door but also pulled the door in as you fold the handle down, sealing the door against the rubber seal.

Two additional "hook-over" fasteners were also added to the bottom of the door to pull the bottom edge in against the seal, when closed.

The trim strips and warning triangles could then be added.

Next it was time to look at the internal furniture. I wanted the original furniture to go back in but be removable, so that when the caravan was back in "living mode" you could not tell that it had been modified. The first task was the draws and storage area under the back seat.

Firstly I removed the draws and made a new cabinet to fit around them. Then with those in place I cut the kick board in half vertically to fill the gap to the left of the draws. I then hinged and fixed the half kick board to the underside of the seat base.

The seat base was then modified to drop on to side supports and lift out when needed.

 Now came the really hard bit. The small corner seat needed to fold up against the wall but also down and open to twice its width to support the bed when in use. Also its kick board needed to fold away to make room for the bike to pass by.

On this photo you can see the small corner seat after modification in the folded position. You can also see the next stage: Floor strengthening.

As you may be aware caravan floors are made up of a thin plywood top, then 50mm (2") of polystyrene, and then another thing plywood layer. All of these layers are bonded together and form a good solid floor, but not strong enough to take a motorcycle or scooter. The decision was made to cover the floor, inside the caravan with galvanised sheet steel with a small chequer-plate area at the entrance to give grip as the bike comes up the ramp.

A ramp was then made from chequer-plate and a carrier made to hold the ramp under the caravan. This carrier is very clever as it runs the length of the caravan and provides strengthening to the underside of the caravan floor and is bolted through to the top interior steel plates.

On this photo you can see the small seat in its down position and the full view of the ramp.

Another thing that you can now see are the new rear light clusters. These were originally for trailers but fit nicely on the corners of the caravan so that no wires need to go onto the opening door.

You can also spot that the original window blind has now been fitted back onto the door.

Another small addition, that's hard to spot, is the rain channel that has been added over the door, just to add a little more weather protection.




Now, at last, I can try the scooter inside the caravan and see how it fits. Brilliant!






The next addition was four hitching points mounted in the floor, to fasten the scooter down. These stainless steel plates were cut into the floor and bolted through to large support plates on the underside of the caravan, sandwiching  the floor between them. I also made some stainless steel cover plates to drop into them when they are not in use, so that my wife's high heels do not drop into them.






The final touch was to cover the steel floor with vinyl floor covering.







These pictures were taken after the conversion and show the caravan in living-mode with a virtually invisible conversion from the inside.


Well there it is the final completed conversion project. Not only did this caravan prove excellent for rallies, my wife and I found that we actually enjoyed caravanning and took it away on several holidays. Very handy when you can also take a motorcycle or scooter.

To prove it, here it is at St. Ives in Cornwall, and what a view!

It was during the use of this caravan that I finally decided that the scooter was finished and that I needed another project. So I bought a 1961 BSA A10 Super Rocket to renovate.

So this created a new challenge. How to get two bikes to the same show and still stay overnight? And that takes us to the next project and a change of direction in the next episode.

You can contact me on hopcroftscoot@gmail.com

Copyright 26.01.18 all rights reserved.

My Other Blogs:
1961 BSA A10 Super Rocket Motorcycle:
http://60sclassicmotorbikes.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/before.html

1961 Ariel Arrow Super Sport Motorcycle :
http://60sclassicmotorbikes.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/1961-aerial-golden-arrow-restoration.html

Miniature Land Rover Defender:
http://miniaturelandrover.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/1-miniature-land-rover-defender-idea.html?view=timeslide

1971 VW Karmann Ghia Convertible Car:
http://karmannghiarestoration.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/1-karmann-ghia-retoration-project.htm








Tuesday, 23 January 2018

1. Motorcycle Trailers - The Problem


This is going to be different from my other blogs. So far, all of my other blogs have been about renovating motorcycles and cars with the exception of the making of a miniature Land Rover.
This one is more about an attempt to find the ideal transport and personal accommodation for me and my motorcycles when I go to events.

I started attending vintage rallies about 20 years ago when I was talking to a supplier and was admiring a picture of a steam traction engine on the wall of his office.  He asked if I liked them? and I said "yes, I've always liked old vehicles no matter what type". It turned out that the steam engine was his and he said that he was attending a vintage steam rally at Belper in Derbyshire this weekend and would I like to go? He then asked me if I owned any old vehicles and I told him that all I had was a 1960 Lambretta Scooter.

He said "well bring it along". I said well  it's not a steam engine and he told me that these rallies show everything to do with vintage transport including Cars and Bikes, Tractors, old caravans, stationary engines etc. and that if I wanted to bring my scooter along, I would be most welcome. So I rode it to Belper and this picture shows it at that very first show. Little did I know that this was the start of a passion that has lasted over 20 years and the start of long lasting friendships. The man who said I should go is now a very close friend, as is his son who now runs "Unit Two Services" of Ilkeston and does metal fabrication and renovation. Also you will see in the picture, immediately behind my scooter, a lovely Norton Dominator Cafe Racer. I met the owner John at that rally and we have exhibited at rallies many times together ever since.

Although my scooter looked good, it was apparent that I would never win any prizes as there were bikes there where the owner had spent hundreds of hours making them "better than new" or as they called it "concours condition". I was hooked and decided I had to do that too.

Anyway, as I got more and more in to rallying the same problem kept occurring. These rallies are usually over two or three days and I had to ride the bike home every night and back again in the morning in any weather conditions. Also as I attended more and more rallies they tended to be further and further away and to ride a vintage bike over very long distances every day was just impractical. Most motorcyclists brought a tent for local shows and stayed over, but that didn't cure the long distance transport problem.

I was talking to my wife and told her that I was thinking of buying a motorcycle trailer, when she said "get an old caravan". I replied that a caravan would solve the accommodation problem but I still had to get the bike there. She then said in a very matter of fact way "put the bike inside the caravan". It seemed so obvious that I couldn't understand why I hadn't thought of it. What's more I really liked the idea. So we started searching for an old caravan.

We were looking around a caravan sales site and asked the salesman if they had any really old caravans that they wanted to sell and he took us to the back of the site and showed us this lovely old Thompson Glen caravan. It seemed ideal and had a double bed, a sink and cooking hob and a toilet compartment. What's more I could immediately picture how to convert it. So I became a caravan owner and towed it home.


Inside it looked like this, with a chest of draws at the back and two fitted bench seats.











The front had a cooker and sink along with a toilet compartment and a wardrobe.
So now it was time to figure out how to fit the scooter inside.  I cut the bodywork down from the bottom of the rear window and removed the central panel. A steel supporting frame was then added to the bodywork, either side of the opening and another steel frame was added to the door that had been cut out. This door was then fitted with a plywood back and hinges were welded to the chassis at the bottom. Two cover plates were then added onto the door edges to cover the gaps between the door and the body and two wooden feet were added at the top of the door to stop it dragging on the ground.


I moved the window stays higher up so that the window would open and provide a clear entrance and added two bolts inside the door to hold it shut.

Next came the interior. I made the chest of draws "free standing" so that it could be lifted out and then put back in again once the bike was loaded. This enabled me to park the bike directly over the axle to keep the caravan in balance when towing.

I then converted the bench seats so that they folded away to the sides and fitted four hitching points, two under each seat and then made an aluminium ramp to push the bike up. I found out later that it was actually easier to ride the bike up the ramp.

So there it was the complete conversion and ready to use at the next rally. I could now transport my bike and sleep and live in comfort. It was amazing to see people fascinated when I turned up at rallies and took my scooter out of the back of the caravan and then converted the van back to comfortable living quarters afterwards. By the way, the two interior pictures above were taken "after" the conversion.

The next big step was to add an awning and this gave me overnight secure parking for the scooter where it could be chained to the caravan and zipped up out of sight.

The final addition to this caravan, which I did a year or so later, was to add a gas refrigerator in the cupboard under the sink.

I used this caravan for about 8 years until one day, my wife said to me "If you get a bigger caravan, I'll come with you to the rallies". And so I sold this caravan for more that I paid for it and started on my next project, which you will see in the next episode.


You can contact me on hopcroftscoot@gmail.com

Copyright 23.01.18 all rights reserved.

My Other Blogs:
1961 BSA A10 Super Rocket Motorcycle:
http://60sclassicmotorbikes.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/before.html

1961 Ariel Arrow Super Sport Motorcycle :
http://60sclassicmotorbikes.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/1961-aerial-golden-arrow-restoration.html

Miniature Land Rover Defender:
http://miniaturelandrover.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/1-miniature-land-rover-defender-idea.html?view=timeslide

1971 VW Karmann Ghia Convertible Car:
http://karmannghiarestoration.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/1-karmann-ghia-retoration-project.htm