Luckily we found again someone who helped us in this case. Stefan! We would have been so lost without your help! 

Thank you so much!

Stefan said that we must use 40x40 square pipes for assembling the construction. 

To cut a long story, there would be a million things you would have to pay attention of when you’re doing something like this. 

We did our best but we had no experience and so we did a few things wrong which brought us nearly to a mental breakdown.

The secret word is: galvanizing. We didn’t do it, we decided to lacquer the square pipes because we thought that it’s cheaper and easier to do. 

haha. NOT.

Weight: about 300 kg

We decided to use a Almg3 2mm because 1mm would have been too thin.

The problem is when you try to cover steel with aluminium is that it corrodes. That’s why we used the Sika Glue 265 plus a 3mm double 

sided tape in between aluminium and steel to minimize the risk.

To make the roof walk-on-able, we sticked silk-screened boards (9 mm) between the steel construction and the aluminium boards.

Last but not least we had to prepare doors and windows. When we look back now, the construction for this was way too massive but now we are happy about this good insulation.

We polished steeple cab and truck body with a pop-up grinder and fixed it with a primer. After that we used Epoxy lacquer for the base coat.

It took us 6 hours for varnishing the steeple cab and more than two days for the truck body.

Never again!

In the end, it was not the blue tone we wanted to have (but we could handle it somehow ;) )

At this time it was already December 2015.

This was probably the most underestimated field for us.

We didn’t think about it that we would have to prepare the truck for 4 seasons. And it was again like this: 

10 different people we asked had 10 different opinions.

We came to the conclusion that we would have to use a 4 mm insulation. 

We decided to use Armaflex, which is a diffusion resistant insulation material. 

For the floor we used 6cm Syrodur. We framed it with 60x40 mm square timber to make it more stable. 

A good friend of us (he is an architect) gave us the advice to use a vapour barrier because the risk of mould is very high in this case.

After doing this we put another 9mm silk screen board on the floor for stabilization.

In this case it was more about minimizing the noise than insulating the truck. You can’t image how loud it is in the steeple cab of such a truck. So far, we had just 2 seats which was not enough and so we removed the old seats. 

Even though the steeple cab looks huge from the outside, there’s not much space inside and every cm counted.

We decided to use mechanic spring-loaded ISRI seats and we’re still very happy with our choice.

The time went by really fast and suddenly it was may 2016.

Our next step was the panelling and for this we decided to use Okume ply wood (walls 6mm / ceiling 4mm).

Unfortunately, this type of tropical wood is totally not sustainable. We didn’t think about this before. 

We could have used birch as well but we didn’t and we still regret it.

For finishing the passage we needed a flexible bellow. Finding something like this is almost impossible. Either it’s not insulating or crazy expensive. We wasted a lot of time for finding the right bellow and in the end - we did it by ourselves ;) It was much easier than we thought and we saved a lot of money! yaay!

To be honest, when we came to this part it felt reaaally good. Finally something REAL, something that gave our new home for the next 2 years a real face. Unfortunately, this was also one of the most expensive parts.

But for a reason. Investing in good and long lasting furniture gives us first: a feel-like-home feeling during our long and exhausting  journey and second: it lasts for years or even decades. 

We invested a lot but we’re still happy with this decision.

After a bit of a research we decided to use the following items for our water system:

Water tank: 2x150 l Plastic

Water filter: water-jack fres assembly 3h

Boiler: Elgena Nautic Therm, ME - 15 l

Water fuel indicator: Philippi  Ultrasound Tank disposer UTV

Water pump: Jabsco PAR MAX Plus 4.1 bar 12V

We put a lot of time and effort in this topic. Water is one of the most important things during our journey and we didn’t want to do something wrong.

We created a proper map with all branches, outlets, hot- and cold water pipes.

The system itself is from „famous water“. They are just the best in this field. Quality, customer support, pricing… everything is great definitely worth the money. Big thanks to Joachim and Sonja at this point. They helped us a lot and they didn’t laugh because of our stupid questions (that was probably quite hard) :)

Independent vehicle heater: Eberspächer, Airtronic D4 Plus

Wood stove: Hobbit Stove

Roof penetration: Ejot Dektite

Our journey brings us through a lot of different countries aka different temperature zones. In most of these countries it’s really warm but in a few it can be very could as well. That’s why we needed a proper heating system.

There are many different heating systems like hot water heater, gas heater, electric heater, wood stoves, oil heater etc..

The easiest thing to do for us was using a  independent vehicle heater.

We also needed a height kit for higher regions (up from 2000 m) because independent vehicle heater doesn’t work anymore when you are beyond this height.

Oven: Dometic Sunlight

Fridge: Dometic Coolmatic CR110

Gas: 2x 11kg gas bottles

It’s not a lot to say about the kitchen… The fridge is electrically driven and the oven works with gas.

Batteries: 6x Optima Yellow Top 75ah PV construction: 2x250Wp Poly Solar regulator: 2x Victron Bluesolar MPPT 75/15 Battery computer: Victron BMV 700 Charger: Victron Blue Power IP22 Inverted rectifier: Waeco Sinepower MSI 3512T For the basic supply we are using 6 pieces Optima Yellow Top Batteries are constantly charged through the 2nd alternator plus a photovoltaik system on the roof.

Zweite Lichtmaschine 

Und für was jetzt genau eine zweite Lichtmaschine?? Nun ja, wie bereits vorher erwähnt haben wir im LKW eine Spannung von 24V und im Aufbau 12V. Und irgendwie gehören die Boardbatterien ja auch geladen. Von dem her gäbe es für uns zwei Optionen. Entweder ein Spannungswandler von 24V auf 12V, oder eine 12V Lichtmaschine.

Der Spannungswandler war nicht wirklich sympathisch für uns, da es eine weiter Fehlerquelle wäre. Zumindest ziemilch wahrscheinlich anfälliger als eine Lichtmaschine. Und die vorhanden 60A Lichtmaschine minus Leistungsverlust der Übertragung haben uns auch nicht sonderlich überzeugt. 

Daher haben wir eine zweite Lichtmaschine mit 120A verbaut. Jetzt haben wir sozusagen 5 Keilriemen zu tauschen ;-)