leisure battery under seat?

[DreamSeeker]

Ok folks, this is probably going to be the first of many questions!  All I have done towards my camper conversion so far is remove all the rear seats and the boot carpet.  The boot area already has some ply fitted so I have drawn out the single bed platform, (just me and large sighthound, though he may have to have a separate night-time bed on the floor) this is on the nearside with a fold down part across the sliding door area.  On the opposite side will be the sink and hob cupboard also leaving access to the sliding door on the offside.  This will enable me to still use it for collecting sacks of poultry food etc.

The next thing to work out is where the leisure battery is going to go because that will impact on planning other things.  I have heard it suggested that it can be fitted under the passenger seat, and i think a member here also did so.  Well I have had a peer under the passenger seat and i think heightwise the low profile battery of 175cm i found  http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/112299035220 may just fit under there but there is a fixed sliding draw thingy that sits over a central bar as well as some bars back and front that look to be part of the seat.  There are also some electrics that seem to be something to do with the seat belt alarms?  These wires look as though they are wound around the central bar, but this must come out somehow or how would the seat come out?  I am not at all sure that that low profile battery which is longer than standard would fit within the constraints of the available area.  I'm not sure I would fancy sitting above it either!  Has anyone else had success of doing this, and if not where did you end up fitting the battery.
 
I thought perhaps it could go behind the drivers seat and with more available room i could have a higher Ah battery? 
I have also been learning about split charge relays and voltage sensitive or intelligent relays and the need for heavy duty cabling.  I was asking my son about which version to buy and he just said what was the output of my alternator, well i have no idea and it does not say in my downloaded manual, so if anybody knows this it would be most helpful and i can order the necessary items to set it up.

Is it easy to post photo's on here? I can't seem to see the photobucket ones!

Thanks, DreamSeeker

[pompeylewis]

Ok folks, this is probably going to be the first of many questions!  All I have done towards my camper conversion so far is remove all the rear seats and the boot carpet.  The boot area already has some ply fitted so I have drawn out the single bed platform, (just me and large sighthound, though he may have to have a separate night-time bed on the floor) this is on the nearside with a fold down part across the sliding door area.  On the opposite side will be the sink and hob cupboard also leaving access to the sliding door on the offside.  This will enable me to still use it for collecting sacks of poultry food etc.

The next thing to work out is where the leisure battery is going to go because that will impact on planning other things.  I have heard it suggested that it can be fitted under the passenger seat, and i think a member here also did so.  Well I have had a peer under the passenger seat and i think heightwise the low profile battery of 175cm i found  http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/112299035220 may just fit under there but there is a fixed sliding draw thingy that sits over a central bar as well as some bars back and front that look to be part of the seat.  There are also some electrics that seem to be something to do with the seat belt alarms?  These wires look as though they are wound around the central bar, but this must come out somehow or how would the seat come out?  I am not at all sure that that low profile battery which is longer than standard would fit within the constraints of the available area.  I'm not sure I would fancy sitting above it either!  Has anyone else had success of doing this, and if not where did you end up fitting the battery.
 
I thought perhaps it could go behind the drivers seat and with more available room i could have a higher Ah battery? 
I have also been learning about split charge relays and voltage sensitive or intelligent relays and the need for heavy duty cabling.  I was asking my son about which version to buy and he just said what was the output of my alternator, well i have no idea and it does not say in my downloaded manual, so if anybody knows this it would be most helpful and i can order the necessary items to set it up.

Is it easy to post photo's on here? I can't seem to see the photobucket ones!

Thanks, DreamSeeker

[pompeylewis]

Ok folks, this is probably going to be the first of many questions!  All I have done towards my camper conversion so far is remove all the rear seats and the boot carpet.  The boot area already has some ply fitted so I have drawn out the single bed platform, (just me and large sighthound, though he may have to have a separate night-time bed on the floor) this is on the nearside with a fold down part across the sliding door area.  On the opposite side will be the sink and hob cupboard also leaving access to the sliding door on the offside.  This will enable me to still use it for collecting sacks of poultry food etc.

The next thing to work out is where the leisure battery is going to go because that will impact on planning other things.  I have heard it suggested that it can be fitted under the passenger seat, and i think a member here also did so.  Well I have had a peer under the passenger seat and i think heightwise the low profile battery of 175cm i found  http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/112299035220 may just fit under there but there is a fixed sliding draw thingy that sits over a central bar as well as some bars back and front that look to be part of the seat.  There are also some electrics that seem to be something to do with the seat belt alarms?  These wires look as though they are wound around the central bar, but this must come out somehow or how would the seat come out?  I am not at all sure that that low profile battery which is longer than standard would fit within the constraints of the available area.  I'm not sure I would fancy sitting above it either!  Has anyone else had success of doing this, and if not where did you end up fitting the battery.
 
I thought perhaps it could go behind the drivers seat and with more available room i could have a higher Ah battery? 
I have also been learning about split charge relays and voltage sensitive or intelligent relays and the need for heavy duty cabling.  I was asking my son about which version to buy and he just said what was the output of my alternator, well i have no idea and it does not say in my downloaded manual, so if anybody knows this it would be most helpful and i can order the necessary items to set it up.

Is it easy to post photo's on here? I can't seem to see the photobucket ones!

Thanks, DreamSeeker

[DreamSeeker]

Thanks for your response!  I think that the van seats are different to the multispace type as i decided that even if i could sort out the strange wiring underneath, (which i have since sussed goes to the side airbags) that because of the seat bars, I would then not be able to slide the passenger seat forward enough to get sufficient bed length.   We are either going to do as you did with the split relay wiring and go via the bonnet pull or across the back of the engine compartment wall as there is already a hole that goes thro the back of the dashboard that looks like it should be accessible to the right of the steering wheel.   Probably to do with the air vent thingy. 

I need a hand from my son to be able to do all this stuff and he is quite busy, so everything is taking over the lounge at the moment!  But I have just been cutting to size the floor insulation and have been watching youtube to learn how to get the side panels off to insulate them.  I dont know if people usually take off all the fancy plastic trim that the multispace has, like on the pillars, or if that is just a step too far?  I imagine in a berlingo van things are far more accessable?

I did find out the output of my alternator which seems to be a bit difficult to find in manuals, eventually I found a very informative website that specialised in selling them where you put in all your vehicle details (or reg no) and it tells you which one you need and the details, very useful i thought and good to know that companies like that exist.

Have not thought about a heater yet, my first camper was an old romahome and I managed well enough with a hot water bottle and a dog!   More recently i had a autosleeper talisman and didn't use the gas heater in that either, though i did have a tiny radiant heater which was useful when it went down to -12 one weekend!  Luckily i was on a pitch with electric hook up.  Have to say that although it worked it was a bit precarious because i discovered that the flex was not long enough to have it on the floor! 

Have you decided what layout you are going to have yet or is it going to evolve as you do it?  Lovely today, just right for doing some to my insulation etc, but no, son has borrowed the berlingo so i am twiddling my thumbs, oh well, I shall have to do some arm twisting tomorrow and hope the sun is still shining.......

[pompeylewis]

Ok folks, this is probably going to be the first of many questions!  All I have done towards my camper conversion so far is remove all the rear seats and the boot carpet.  The boot area already has some ply fitted so I have drawn out the single bed platform, (just me and large sighthound, though he may have to have a separate night-time bed on the floor) this is on the nearside with a fold down part across the sliding door area.  On the opposite side will be the sink and hob cupboard also leaving access to the sliding door on the offside.  This will enable me to still use it for collecting sacks of poultry food etc.

The next thing to work out is where the leisure battery is going to go because that will impact on planning other things.  I have heard it suggested that it can be fitted under the passenger seat, and i think a member here also did so.  Well I have had a peer under the passenger seat and i think heightwise the low profile battery of 175cm i found  http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/112299035220 may just fit under there but there is a fixed sliding draw thingy that sits over a central bar as well as some bars back and front that look to be part of the seat.  There are also some electrics that seem to be something to do with the seat belt alarms?  These wires look as though they are wound around the central bar, but this must come out somehow or how would the seat come out?  I am not at all sure that that low profile battery which is longer than standard would fit within the constraints of the available area.  I'm not sure I would fancy sitting above it either!  Has anyone else had success of doing this, and if not where did you end up fitting the battery.
 
I thought perhaps it could go behind the drivers seat and with more available room i could have a higher Ah battery? 
I have also been learning about split charge relays and voltage sensitive or intelligent relays and the need for heavy duty cabling.  I was asking my son about which version to buy and he just said what was the output of my alternator, well i have no idea and it does not say in my downloaded manual, so if anybody knows this it would be most helpful and i can order the necessary items to set it up.

Is it easy to post photo's on here? I can't seem to see the photobucket ones!

Thanks, DreamSeeker

[DreamSeeker]

Well we have made some progress!   I have been busy with the foil bubble-wrap insulation after removing the side panels and and below window trim in the boot area, even managed to get the xmas tree peg things out in one piece (a youtube tip, use an old dinner fork!), and also put a layer of insulation over the wheel arches and under the ply floor.  I still don't know what to do about the metal under the trim on the upper areas, as surely the condensation will form wherever you have not done, think i will wait and see how bad it is.

My son had a go at getting the split charger cable through the firewall via the bonnet pull grommet but it already had three cables tightly through it and there was no way any more was going to go.  It also was not straight forward as the cables went out into the outside wheel arch area before turning in towards the engine compartment by the engine battery.

We also gave up with the other potential route which we had hoped would come out to the right of the steering wheel but after we found it would mean taking out the computer we felt best to find yet another route.  And that turned out to be very a simple thanks to this site!  After much searching of the net in general I eventually found the information on an old post about the plastic blanking plate in the passenger foot well covering the hole where the steering column would be if it had been left hand drive, a circle was even precut in the carpet!    Brilliant stuff, photo's as well, just needed to drill through a hole through the plastic large enough to take a grommet and run the cable through.  It now looks like the leisure battery (110 Ah) will be going in a box behind the drivers seat, hoping there might be a bung hole that can be utilised. 

So thank you very much especially to poster 3 of
https://www.berlingoforum.com/thread-6204.html

Just need son to get and finish the job now, though he has also pointed out I will need a couple of 12volt sockets and
how about a 240v socket, and did i want a charger for when i was on hook up, muttered something about an inverter and so it went on!  Think he likes spending my money and probably is hoping to use it as well.

Whether the bed and kitchen units will be removable I'm not sure yet, depends how secure just fitting them with u-bolts and other improvised attachments are.  I would be very interested if anyone has made theirs removable and if so how they achieved anchoring them.

Also has anyone tried insulating their tail-gate (the bit behind the panelling) and has it made much difference?

Thanks
DreamSeeker

[MrDrizz]

Hi, have you had any luck with the bettery location? I'm not going full conversion like you, I just need a battery for a heater.

[DreamSeeker]

Hi, have you had any luck with the bettery location? I'm not going full conversion like you, I just need a battery for a heater.

I would have liked it under the passenger seat but apart from the complications with the sliding draw and the wiring which i now think is to do with the side airbag, it was such a tight fit height-wise that i would worry about having to keep moving the seat forward to get the bed length behind it each time i needed to use the bed.  There are thin metal bars under the seat which support the seat cushion foam stuff and i had this vision of moving the seat across the battery terminals and the seat metal becoming live!!!  Or it happening when a passengers weight is put on the chair!
So it did end up in the rear foot well fairly centralised.  It was made taller than needed and with a dividing floor above the battery and a removable lid, making a useful extra space I can use to stow bits and pieces.  It is also the same height as the underside of the bed frame which means that it doesnt need a leg at that corner as it sits on the battery box. 
We managed to exit the gassing-off pipe by making a hole thro the battery box and feeding the tube under the edge of the carpet and into the strange foot-lockers that the multi-space has, and thro a convenient rubber bung hole at the bottom.  We had already fitted a length batten along the top edge of the rear footwell by reusing the bolt holes from the removed rear seats (also means that we will not lose the bolts if we ever want to put the seats back in.), and the battery box is secured to that.
Hope that has give you a few ideas, but i guess every model is a bit different?

[Gravity]

PHOTOS?