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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.
Last edited by Isaac_Blanc (2025-01-08 09:16:03)
2018 Peugeot Expert Mk3 1.6L BlueHDi 115 hp
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