THE BEST $300 IVE EVER SPENT

by **BUSHPIG** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 3:16 pm

hey guys look at what i scored today for $300 :shock:

its a 1963 jackson pop top camper. pretty tidy since its been sitting since 1992 all i need to do for re-vin is make a new draw bar as its rusty and replace to little bits of ply wood behind the lights. As they were leaking and the wood behid rotted. any way what im wanting help with is the 12volt lighting/tv/stero system. what im keen on knowing is can i hook a power feed up to the back of my truck. and use it like a duel battery system so when the truck is moveing you can hook up a connector and it will charge the truck battery and my to deep cycle caravan batterys. oh and a sola pannel will be chargeing them when not moveing. do you guys thing its poss to rig up a system like that that wont put to much load on my altantor.

any way here some pic's of the new beast. good old isuzu managed to pull it out n down the road no worrys. even with siezed wheel bearings and to flat tyres on the caravan. go the bighorn

by **Demonic** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 3:19 pm

Bout time you got a house maid! :lol:

by **BUSHPIG** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 3:28 pm

yeh i was think'n that too. the dirty 1's charge to much tho.

by **geeves** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 4:17 pm

A true classic in true classic condition. (restorers dream)
Depending on what size sola panel you get you might not need any extra charging. I know a few people that live in caravans at an unpowered site and all there needs are met by large panels that will put out over 5 amps(12v) on a sunny day. You do need to think about energy saving lamps though for that to work. If you keep the van outside place the panel in the window and the battery will always be charged.
You can easily charge the battery from your alternator and there are some quite fancy setups to do this but a bare bones setup would be a fuse and simple high power diode to make sure the caravan doesnt backfeed into the car

by **sprey** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 5:50 pm

awesome dude!!. So what you got planned for the inside. If i ever got the chance to have a small caravan to do up id be keen as to make it into a mobile movie theatre :twisted:

by **BUSHPIG** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:56 pm

the inside will just get a nice modern retrim. and a good 12volt system as you can imagein the 1963 12volt system is verry simple just 2 lights and a switch. ive also go two 15" lcd dvd/tv's and some 2 sets of good component's a set of 6x9's and a 12" duel voice coil sub. it came with two 3way fridges whitch work(just need a clean) a 2 burner gas range and a small gas/240volt oven (whitch seam's to work). I just have to go thro and replace all the gas lines as they leak a bit. I also managed to do a quick 20sec test and all the gas stuff works

the the bottle holder as you can see in the photos has nerly rusted of so that will get replaced with the new draw bar. im probly going to make it a bit longer so i can fit two 15kg gas bottles. oh and im probly gonna add a fresh water tank and gas water heater. oh and its got a new arwing i found under one of the beds. im stoked with it not to much work so should be ready for summer.

by **BUSHPIG** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 6:57 pm

geeves wrote:A true classic in true classic condition. (restorers dream)
Depending on what size sola panel you get you might not need any extra charging. I know a few people that live in caravans at an unpowered site and all there needs are met by large panels that will put out over 5 amps(12v) on a sunny day. You do need to think about energy saving lamps though for that to work. If you keep the van outside place the panel in the window and the battery will always be charged.
You can easily charge the battery from your alternator and there are some quite fancy setups to do this but a bare bones setup would be a fuse and simple high power diode to make sure the caravan doesnt backfeed into the car

any idea's where i could buy a high power diode

oh and thanks for ya help

by **muzila** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 7:50 pm

you sound as happi as a bushpig in s*&t lol.

I looked in to just such a thing that you want for the power of a camper I was going to build. Until I got sidetracked.
I was planning on haveing a battery and three charging circuits. 1 : altinator of towing vehicle. 2: solar power and 3: AC if needed. thinking of power socket or a generator.

I was given a diagram by an auto sparky on how to do it. there wasn't that much involved once you took out the transformer for the AC side. The only real shocker was the cost of the solar panel. (Wowa those suckers are not cheap).

I will see if I kan find it. Dam this going to be a mission lol.

by **BUSHPIG** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 8:37 pm

yeh that would be cool if you could dig it out every lill bit helps.yeh i carnt belive how pricey they are aswell.then all the other bits you need it add's up to a bit.

by **wbski007** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:57 pm

Bushpig, great find, what a classic, now I'm jelious, here's some photos of my 1972 Canadain made CYGNET 15', I've been working on her on and off for over a year now, it may give you some ideas for yours, instead of a car battery I used one of those jumper packs as you'll see in the photo, it works very well and it has the charger ( 110 or 12V ) built rite in, when I'm in a camp ground it automaticaly charges when I plug my 110 in as I have it pluged in to one of my outlets in the camper,otherwise it s kept charged from a seperate 12V wire I have running from my Rodeo,all are simple plugins I made myself,that work for me. I mounted the box on the front to hold my gas bottles and battery, this keeps them out of the weather, plus its good storage for other things like water hose and tools, the other thing I did was get rid of the screw jack to lift the tounge up and down as it was wareing me out trying to left the trailer off the ball, some times it wants to lift the whole back end of the car before it slips off, no more, I welded an old bumper jack to tounge where the screw jack was, now its easy as pie, hope some of this might help, cheers mate and good luck, Wayne

by **wbski007** » Tue Oct 20, 2009 5:58 am

Here's somemore pictures of what I've done to mine, to make life easier for me as I do alot of camping and like to be as comfortable as possable. just a few ideas what you can do with a 15 footer and by the way my 2.5 pulls my camper with no problem. and I get 23MPG to boot, :lol:

not hard to live with that, what a great little camper you have, I love it, Cheers

by **BUSHPIG** » Tue Oct 20, 2009 6:06 am

thanks for the ideas m8. looks like your set up verry well. my camper only 11foot and 6" so i dont have as much room as you. im gonna use your table out side idea for shure that will free up some room so i can change it round inside a bit more. and im thinking of ditching my closet and putting a toilet or shower.

by **wbski007** » Tue Oct 20, 2009 6:27 am

I had to extend the side walls of the old closet 12" so the shower would fit, the porta potty room was already there, thank God, I got the shower and some other odds and ends like the small fold up table, and gas heater from a junk motor home a friend of mine had, if you can fine something like that their great for all kinds of cool parts, I like your fold out windows, you can leave them open in the rain.

by **KIWIINGENUITY** » Wed Oct 21, 2009 3:36 pm

what you want is a 3000 watt power inverter which you put on your battery terminals and it changes your 12v battery into 240v normal wall power . gr8 little invention

by **slightlydodgy** » Wed Oct 21, 2009 5:57 pm

one charging system I have seen way back when lands and survey camping grounds existed was an alternator mounted on an adjustable pole with a fan bolted to the pulley. He lifted it when in camp and lowered it to roof hieght when on the road Mind you he had another one on his wifes exercycle!!!!

by **geeves** » Wed Oct 21, 2009 7:04 pm

Its called a windmill. We have several on the local hills but Im not sure they are as portable (100meter blade diameter)

by **mulover** » Thu Oct 22, 2009 10:15 am

The 3000 watt power inveter is good, but it takes alot of battery power. I have a smaller 1000 watt one and its great for small stuff, you could easily run a tv and a couple of lights with it. I would be trying to have as much 12 volt stuff as you can, and then use a 240 to 12 volt reducer for when your plugged into mains power. Just an idea, i could be totally wrong...

by **BUSHPIG** » Thu Oct 22, 2009 10:27 am

yeh im going for a good 12volt system as where ill be useing it there's no mains power.(eg bush or beach) ive already got most stuff like tv's ect in 12volt. the 240 volt system it going to br verry basic just 1 light and a power point. might get a 1000w inverter for my laptop tho.

by **slightlydodgy** » Thu Oct 22, 2009 10:32 am

And a mobile data card so you can still get on here eh

by **BUSHPIG** » Thu Oct 22, 2009 10:36 am

haha always. this place is my home page.

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