Posts by Isaac_Blanc

Isaac_Blanc · General Discussion

That's a good point that I could just remove any exhaust extension if it affected engine performance. (Un)fortunately, I completely forgot about this and have been staying in the van for the past week with (touch wood) no exaust-induced poisoning, in spite of the small hole I have in the floor. In conclusion, I think its fine, even without the exhaust extension. Thanks for all the replies!

Isaac_Blanc · General Discussion

OAT wrote:

You could use one of those short chrome extensions.

I'm reluctant to make the exhaust longer for fear of messing up potential wave tuning in the exhaust and therefore reducing efficiency. I may be massively overthinking though.

kenbw2 wrote:

I didn't know you could install these in them

Hahahaha

Isaac_Blanc · General Discussion

That's interesting to know that the Mk1s have a hole in the floor & an exhaust that doesn't extend beyond the sill. That's not what I would have thought, but its an encouraging sign for my dropout vent. Cheers!

Isaac_Blanc · General Discussion

The exhaust on my van does not extend beyond the vehicle sill. This strikes me as odd. The exhaust has always stuck out on vehicles I've owned previously. I had thought this was a safety requirement, so that exhaust fumes would not collect underneath the vehicle and potentially seep into the cab. The van is Euro 6 compliant, so has an AdBlue aftertreatment system. The standard also requires lower CO emissions, but are they really so low as to risk breathing them?

I ask because I am going to cut a hole (~30mm) in the floor of the van to install a gas dropout vent. I am wary that exhaust fumes may drift into the cab through this hole. Thoughts? Also asked on Reddit.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Sorry for the long (and late) reply.

I was unable to fix the unit so I bought a replacement on eBay for £80. I fitted the replacement, which was easy, but didn't fix anything. The new locking unit behaved in the same way as the original one. I figured it was an electrical problem in the wiring that runs between the lock and a computer somewhere in the van. I noticed that my cable drag chain (shown previously) was in a bad state. Perhaps the wires inside of it were snagged? Perhaps there was an electrical fault somewhere else. Having previously tried (and failed) to troubleshoot electrical faults on a French van, I gave up all hope of fixing the issue. Instead, I returned the new lock for a full refund (!) and devised a bodge.

I detached the pull cable for the external door release but kept the pull cable for the internal door release attached. This way, the door can be opened from the inside but not the outside. I was wary that the latch might naturally slide into the 'child lock' position (ie: locked from the inside) over time, so I cable tied this bit open (see pic). This way, the door is always unlocked from the inside and always locked from the outside.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Right so here's the problem. Was just looking for a new part online and noticed that mine (left photo) is missing this bit that is present in the replacement parts (right photo). I actually saw that bit lying on the floor when I disassembled this. Looked like it had sheared off. I think it relates to the gear used for locking the first door release shown above.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Just added the rest of my pics.

No, the electrics to the door all go through this cable drag chain.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

I couldn't fix it and shall order a replacement, but here are some photos from taking it apart.

It comes out of the door pretty easy. Its attached to two pull wires for inside & outside door releases. There was also an electrical cable plugged into it, but I've unplugged that in this photo.

The grey cover comes off fairly easily. Photo below of the internals. I have drawn a red circle around the microswitch. There are also two motors, which can override/lock either door release.

The lock works via this pin. When the pin is down (left photo), the latch is unlocked. When the pin us up (right photo), the latch is locked.

This lever pulls the pin down when one of the door releases is pulled (blue arrow). It can be overridden by this gear being turned by the motor (red arrow, circle).

This lever pulls the pin down when the other door release is pulled (blue arrow). It can be overridden by a different gear being turned by a different motor (red arrow, circle).

In either case, the door releases will not open door if they are 'overridden' by their respective motors. The motors can be pulled out of the frame by hand. I tested them like this with a 12V 0.5A limited power supply. Both work fine. You might struggle to get them back into the frame in without damaging anything.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Electrical locking mechanism is broken on my sliding door. Gonna remove the mechanism today & have a look. Any idea what I should look for? Any ideas for how I can test it? I would like to confirm that its a problem with the lock unit rather than with the wiring that runs to it, before I buy a replacement.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

I get this if one of the doors is not properly shut. I lock the van with the remote and then 30 seconds later the alarm goes off. If I hit unlock on the remote, find the offending door (usually the back ones), slam it shut and then re-lock the van, the alarm doesn't go off.

One solution is to listen to the doors lock when you lock the van with the remote. If you hear one click, they are locked properly. If you hear two clicks, they are not locked properly and the alarm will likely go off ~30 seconds later.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Isaac_Blanc wrote:

no explosions yet.

Another 500 miles later and the hose has exploded. Big gash down the side of it. Seemingly spontaneous failure. Maybe due to thermal cycling. Seems like I was indeed naive to think a hose is a hose. Shall buy original parts next time!

Isaac_Blanc · Camper Conversions

We installed one behind the driver's seat. Its on the other side of the bulkhead from the cab. Then I think the pipes go thru the bulkhead and through the floor of the van beneath the driver's seat. Can't remember the specifics because my partner did it; not me. I can ask her for details & photos if you want. We were nervous about dropping the tank, so feed the heater from a separate tank mounted to the inside of the rear door, but I understand you're not keen for that.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Took me a day but I expect it would be quicker for a mechanic. Let me know if you run into any issues. Best of luck!

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Yeah that's right. Have since put 2k miles on the van and (fingers crossed) no explosions yet.

Isaac_Blanc · Camper Conversions

Final post for a while. Here are a few thoughts on the bed we designed for our medium wheelbase Peugeot Expert Mk3.

It is a cantilever design, meaning that the bed "extension" has no legs. This makes it easier to pull the bed out into "double-bed" mode.
We used "Accuride" heavy duty drawer runners from Components Direct. They are rated for 80,000 cycles with 140kg load or 10,000 cycles with 160kg load. I have slept with two folk on the bed in double-bed mode for about 6 nights and they haven't broken yet. Shall report back if we have long-term reliability issues.
The top of the bed in "singe-bed" mode measures 2100 x 610mm, which is comfy for me (6 foot 2, skinny) to sleep on and also works nicely as a bench for sitting on. The bed is a little less than double this width when in "double-bed" mode, which is plenty comfy for two people.
The surfaces of the fixed and sliding bed sections are both 9mm ply from B&Q
The sliding bed is reinforced by a basic rectangular frame built from 38x63mm CLS that sits beneath the sheet of ply.
The bed is supported at either end by sheets of 18mm ply that are screwed to the walls & floor of the van via pocket holes. The drawer runners are also screwed into these 18mm ply sheets.

Showing the attachment points between the bed and the van. Note that the flooring is removed in this photo so we can see the sub-floor frame. Of course, we reinstalled the flooring before fitting the bed.

Single bed mode:

Double bed mode:

Isaac_Blanc · Camper Conversions

Here are some notes from insulating and panelling the back of my medium-wheelbase Peugeot Expert Mk3. To begin with, here are the rough dimensions in mm.

We intended to 'panel' the back of the van with lots of long 'slats'. We thought this would look nice and fit more easily over all of the curved surfaces. The slats would sit on a basic wooden frame that would be screwed into the metal of the van. Here is a drawing of the frame locations.

The slats would then sit atop the frame like this, with insulation trapped between them and the metal walls of the van.

We got all of the timber from the Bristol Wood Recycling Project for £80. We have loads of timber leftover, so I suspect we could have gotten away with spending just £50. However, the decision to use recycled palletwood incurred a lot of work on thicknesser, sander and table saw. Had we been 'charging' our time and running the tools in our own workshop, with our own electricity meter, it would have been cheaper to buy prepared stripwood. Here is a photo of all the palletwood before 'processing'.

Once we had processed all of the wood, we built the frame. In a few locations (eg: middle ceiling frame), there were already threaded holes in the van chassis and we fitted our frame to those using machine screws. In other cases (eg: rear ceiling frame), we drilled through exposed sections of sheet metal and use nuts & bolts. In most cases, we merely forced wood screws into the van metalwork. This felt like a bodge but, as long as we drilled pilot holes, it worked fine. Here are some photos from installing the frame.

Front frame:

Middle & rear frame:

A very bespoke spacer, for the side frame:

Side frame:

Once the frame was done, we began to fit the panelling 'strips' on top. While we did this, we slotted insulation panels between the strips and the van metalwork. We padded around these insulation panels with sheeps wool. Of course, we had also routed the electrical cables beforehand. Here are some photos of that.

We used a table router to cut slots in the back of three ceiling strips and stuck self-adhesive LED strips into those slots. This offered a sort of makeshift diffuse strip lighting and is bright enough to illuminate the whole van. Here is a photo with the panelling finished. Note that the doors are not panelled. We realised that adding stripwood panelling would add a lot of weight and put load on the hinges. Moreover, there is not much clearance between the inside of the doors and the outside of the van when they open. Therefore, we shall just panel the doors with 5mm ply and shove insulation behind. We haven't done that yet but it should be straightforward.

We slept in the Cairngorms last weekend when temperatures where around -5C. We ran our 2kW diesel heater in the evenings when hanging out and then turned it off to sleep. We were warm enough with two duvets, indicating that the van insulation is ok, however there is plenty room for improvement. We still need to insulate the doors and make a cover for the ceiling fan. We did make a double-layer curtain lined with sheeps wool that hangs over the back of the seats. This reduces heat loss into the cab and out of the windscreen/windows. Its an easier solution that buying those windscreen/window covers, which are a pain to put up and take down whenever you want to drive somewhere. The curtain is good but unfortunately not quite wide enough. Fortunately, my partner designs Passivhaus buildings, so I trust the van will be totally adiabatic in a few months time.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

The 9820100680 that I ordered from eBay arrived first so I fitted it and drove to the Scottish highlands & back. I'm a little worried that its a couple cm too short (see below) but everything is running fine. Things look good in the engine bay aswell. Everything sits nicely etc. Am I being daft to use a non-OEM part from eBay like this? I think (naively) that a hose is a hose, so why spend an extra £70 on one? As usual, I'm very open to being told I'm wrong. Driving to the French Alps this weekend with all my mates' luggage in the back, so would be a shame if something failed.

In this photo it looks too short.

But in this photo it looks correct haha.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Thanks for the detailed reply. That all makes sense. Shall post back here once the parts have come.

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Ah yes, I am a fool. I see you have just read the part number from the hose, like you said in your message. Shall order one of these too then, and send whichever doesn't fit back. Thank you!

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Thanks for the reply!

What makes you think that? I am of course very open to being proven wrong, but I still think it is 98201 00680 for two reasons.

The two hard plastic ducts that I have circled in red in the drawing below seems to be a single part in my van. That is how they're shown in the drawing in my original post.
The part I have circled in blue in the drawing below is a short 'bulging' rubber hose in my van that looks like this. Again, that is shown in the drawing in my first post.

Drawing below is of 98216 87780 and taken from your eBay link. I have circled the two differences between it and what I see in my van, and in the drawing for 98201 00680 that is in my original post.

Also, what do you mean by an up-to-date EPC? Sorry if its a daft question, but I'm new to this. Thanks again!

Isaac_Blanc · Maintenance

Does anyone know where I can buy Part 12 in the drawing below? Its the lower intercooler hose, which as I understand it, is the 'hot side'. Lots of folk online sell the 'cold side' hose (ie: Part 11, with a distinct u-bend in it) and some websites sell the lower intercooler hose for the 2.0L van, but I am struggling to find one for my 1.6L. From looking at other drawings, it seems that the 1.6L and 2.0L vans use different intercooler hoses. I've tried the obvious places like Autodoc, but nothing looks right. Not sure if I'm being stupid. Am I right in thinking that this part is also known as the 'charger intake' hose? Seems like an odd thing to call it, since it connects the outlet of the charger to the intercooler?

Have bought this one for now, but would still appreciate any info that folk have, as can always return that one and order another.

Isaac_Blanc · Camper Conversions

Damn that's incredibly well-packed, and I'm impressed to see proper AC power in such a small van. What are the two HXs on either side of your Autoterm heater outlet?

Isaac_Blanc · Camper Conversions

A few months back, we built this kitchen cabinet for our Peugeot Expert Mk3. The timber was about £20 from Bristol Wood Recycling Project and the build took us a few days. It features a cupboard for our 25L water tank and four shelves behind sliding doors. There are LED strips inside the cabinet. Eventually, we will drop a submersible pump into the water tank and have a tap on top of the kitchen counter. Possibly also a sink... one day. Since the build, I have spent about a week living in the van. The unit is sturdy and the doors slide nicely. My only regret is not fitting a back panel for the top shelves. In their current form, things can fall off the back of the shelves and into a hard-to-reach area above the wheel arch.

We cut the sheet material with a table saw. Used a band saw for the angles. Hand router for the sliding door slots, which we then lubricated with beeswax supplied by a friendly beekeeper. Everything assembled by pocket hole. We were in a rush that day, so this is the only photo I have; it shows us routing the sliding door slots.

First trial assembly the next day...

There was quite a lot of adjusting to make it fit snug with the van. Typical French design; nothing is straight, square or even symmetrical. Then we screwed the cabinet to the floor and wall frame inside of the van. In the picture below, don't mention the gap!

At the other end of the kitchen cabinet, this gap is more intentional. I think we will fit some storage netting onto the far-end of the cabinet. Then it will be accessible when you open the back doors.

Finally, here is the cabinet inside of the (mostly) finished van.

More similarly bodged reports to come detailing how we did the panelling (recycled palletwood) and the bed (cantilevered drawer runners).

Isaac_Blanc · Camper Conversions

In the spirit of over-sharing my van conversion, here are some notes I made about potential storage locations in my Peugeot Expert Mk3. All units are in cm. And yes, storing stuff in the engine bay would be stupid, but there is just so much space!

Isaac_Blanc · Camper Conversions

I recently removed most of my dash in order to change my heater matrix. This included removing the dash panel that the central locking button is embedded in, so I was able to do some experiments. Here is the dash panel on the electronics desk. Yes, it looks stupid to put the whole panel on the desk, but for the life of me I couldn't work out how to remove the button (circled in red) without breaking something.

Here is the back of the central locking button. As expected, it has four pins. Note that the dash panel is flipped over in this image, so the two pins circled in red are actually the top two pins when the panel is installed in the van, even though they appear to be the bottom two pins in the image. The middle two square black holes are just blanks. There are no pins sticking out of them and therefore nothing connects there.

I continuity-checked every combination of pins with the button pressed and unpressed. I found that there is continuity between the two pins circled in red only when the button is pushed. In this case, the resistance between the pins is about 5 Ohm. There is no continuity between any of the other pins, whether or not the switch is pushed.

Conclusion
The button is a normally open (NO) switch with an internal resistance of 5 Ohm. I think that briefly closing this switch by pressing the button sends a signal to the van to toggle the central locking. I think that the other two pins (not circled in the image) are for powering the LED. The multimeter probably can't provide enough voltage to overcome the LED threshold voltage, which is why it can't detect continuity between those two pins. Therefore, I think that I can wire a second 5 Ohm button in parallel to the circled pins and fit this in the back of the van. I will probably ignore the two LED pins, since I don't care about having an LED on my second button. That's all for now. Shall post when I next have time to work on this... probably in another three months.

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#1 Re: General Discussion » Exhaust doesn't extend past sill » 2025-08-11 19:41:05

#2 Re: General Discussion » Exhaust doesn't extend past sill » 2025-07-31 23:38:29

#3 Re: General Discussion » Exhaust doesn't extend past sill » 2025-07-29 08:05:22

#4 General Discussion » Exhaust doesn't extend past sill » 2025-07-25 19:00:30

#5 Re: Maintenance » Sliding door lock » 2025-07-16 22:20:37

#6 Re: Maintenance » Sliding door lock » 2025-05-18 17:44:37

#7 Re: Maintenance » Sliding door lock » 2025-05-18 17:21:23

#8 Re: Maintenance » Sliding door lock » 2025-05-18 12:37:36

#9 Maintenance » Sliding door lock » 2025-05-17 12:02:46

#10 Re: Maintenance » Alarm problems » 2025-05-14 11:12:15

#11 Re: Maintenance » Lower intercooler hose » 2025-02-24 22:58:43

#12 Re: Camper Conversions » Diesel Heaters » 2025-01-26 19:27:14

#13 Re: Maintenance » Heater matrix replacement » 2025-01-26 19:22:02

#14 Re: Maintenance » Lower intercooler hose » 2025-01-20 22:51:15

#15 Camper Conversions » Bed » 2025-01-08 09:22:05

#16 Camper Conversions » Panelling & insulation » 2025-01-08 08:59:54

#17 Re: Maintenance » Lower intercooler hose » 2025-01-07 09:08:54

#18 Re: Maintenance » Lower intercooler hose » 2024-12-28 19:28:21

#19 Re: Maintenance » Lower intercooler hose » 2024-12-27 23:06:56

#20 Re: Maintenance » Lower intercooler hose » 2024-12-27 19:37:25

#21 Maintenance » Lower intercooler hose » 2024-12-24 14:15:15

#22 Re: Camper Conversions » Storage opportunities » 2024-12-20 12:45:43

#23 Camper Conversions » Kitchen cabinet » 2024-12-19 22:47:59

#24 Camper Conversions » Storage opportunities » 2024-12-19 19:49:27

#25 Re: Camper Conversions » Locking button in back of van » 2024-12-18 14:44:07

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