Black'95

Since we changed colors of van when we upgraded from the 2001 indigo blue van to the newer 2018 black van we felt a change of mascots was due too. Cookie Monster just didn't seem to fit the black one, so my wife found a new mascot. The name has not been finalized yet but my wife is leaning towards "Gizmo" because of all the little mods I have made to the van!

Black'95

One of the major hurdles in the transfer from my old 2001 van to the newer 2018 van was the lack of a side door pocket. I used this for storing our small stools and my camera tripod.


I solved this problem by building one out of pine and painting it gray. I also added a frame around the second side door opening. This allowed me to mount my light on top, the smoke alarm on the side, and it gave me a place to mount the Velcro for the screen door, along with a place to mount several hooks for hanging things. It may be hard to see because the interior is gray and I painted the wood frame gray too. Another advantage to this wood frame is that I can open the second side door if needed. With the old van I could not open the second side door without removing all of the Velcro screen door on that side.


All is starting to shape up, now I need to move on to installing the seat swivel on the passenger side seat. I could not do that on the old van because it had electric seats, but the new van doesn't have electric seat so I will attempt to install the swivel. More later.

StanVan

A mascot is important.

the Brain

yes I am disappointed in some of the newer vans minus door storage not limited to sides but also fronts/rears.this is a down grade rarely do see a DG remember some guy said stuff happens ha ha.
doesn't the stuff in top shelf go flying at first turn?
I kept spare oil quarts in the side doors.

good
TB

Black'95

Either I am a very gentle driver or the sides of the little white box are deep enough, but I have not had any of them jump out even with the somewhat harsher ride of the 2018 (2500) vs. the old 2001 (1500). If they start causing a problem I can always put Velcro strips on the bottom of the shelf and the bottom of the bottles. The new wood frame in the 2018 also gave me the option of adding some hooks to hang things on when we are camping and not traveling down the road. I am contemplating adding some fold out shelves or a cabinet of some kind like LenS did in his "Green Tardis." I am a big fan of LenS and have adapted a lot of his ideas into my van.

Black'95

Here is a shot of the side frame with the door open so you can see the frame a little better.

Here are two more views from the outside looking in.


I added sticky-back rubber molding to the right side of the frame to seal tightly with the door when it is closed to keep bugs out.

Black'95

Another improvement I made to the bed area when I upgraded to a 2018 Chevy Express was the addition of a shelf on the right side of the bed. Previously this was, kind of, wasted space. I built a shelf to follow the contour of the side of the van and screwed it to the right side of the bed. All the edges that come in contact with the side molding of the van are covered with sticky-back felt.



I added a cut out in front of the wheel well bump and behind it also. I added hinges and holes to use for opening the little doors. This way I could utilize the space below the wooden shelf. I use this space for storing items I don't use very often and the back one for our dirty clothes hamper. You can see the edges of wood wall restrainer box I added for my folding picnic table mentioned in the last picture caption.



My wife found several cloth boxes that fit the shelf space to load in other item she wanted to store for handy retrieval.



The back section of my newly added wood shelf is much narrower because of the back door opening. It was big enough for me to add a wooden side wall and end piece so that I could store our small fold-up picnic table (wrapped in an extra purple colored blanket which you can see in the picture above with the red and blue cloth boxes). It also helps me so that I don't lose my book or glasses down the side when I fall asleep.



I made a much smaller and narrower version of this wooden shelf on the left side of the bed. It is not used for storage yet because I mainly wanted it there to stop things from falling down the side of the bed to the floor, a fairly unreachable location to retrieve it from.

Black'95

It is about time for another upgrade to my van camper conversion. I have always wanted a swivel seat in the van, but my old 2001 van was an LT with dual electric seats and I could not find a swivel to fit those. The new 2018 van does not have electric seats so I bit the bullet and ordered a swivel seat adapter for it. It took a little modification because I had to drill some new holes as they did match up with my seat but the placement was too close to the door after swiveling it, so I could not swivel it a full 180. Now I can and it works beautifully. I am pleasantly surprised at the extra room it gives us in the van. Iam now thinking maybe I should get one for the drivers seat. I would not be able to swivel it 180 because of my kitchen unit, but I could still swivel it enough to make it usable.



I had to cut the wires and soldered in a new six wire connector after feeding the wires through the seat swivel hole in the center because no connector would fit through the center bolt hole on the seat swivel. I would suggest disconnecting the battery before you do the cutting and soldering. Here is a picture of the 6 wire connector I used. I found them on eBay.


I forgot to take pictures of the wiring before I mounted the seat and swivel, so here is a picture taken after the mount was installed. Label A is the connector wired in after the wires were cut and label B is where the wires were threaded through the seat swivel hole before I soldered them to the 6-wire connector.

Black'95

Another update I made to my 2018 Express DIY camper conversion is in the mounting of my GPS. The dash on the newer Express vans has several storage pocket on it. I used the top pocket for my GPS mount. I cut a chunch of 2x4 pine to fit in the space by sanding it down until it fit well. Then I covered it with sticky-back felt and mounted one of my GPS mounting clips to it with screws. The felt made it fit snugly so it does not fall out when I drive. It works well for me.

Here is a side view:




Here is a view from the top:



Not one to leave things well enough alone, I had to make a mount for my Apple iPad too because there was a 2nd pocket on the dash. I did the same thing, making another chunk of 2x4 pine that fit into this pocket and covering it with sticky-back felt. The holder for the iPad was one I picked up on Amazon.

Front view:



Side view:



View of the dash pockets:



View of the dash with GPS and iPad mounted: (notice that the AC outlets are not obstructed)

Black'95

After I got my swivel seat installed there was space under the seat for more storage. I made a box to fit this space and in it I store our campground directories and maps for the trip. I did have to cut a notch out of it so it would slide by the swivel seat nut sticking down. Now to get it repainted and we will be off on our next trip. Even though we have a GPS unit, we still like to see where we are going on paper maps and highlight the highways we travel.