Poor Thomas

My plans for this weekend were well made, but sadly defeated by poor Thomas, who is more unwell than he was and appears to be getting worse.

Anyway that is getting ahead of myself.

The dining table before being taken down

On Thursday I got home and took my dining table down in preparation for my plans of bringing the trailer to my home with Thomas and taking the table and chairs to the storage. It took me a fair while as when I bought the table (second hand, obviously) it didn't come with all of the bolts and so I had to go and try and  buy some bolts which would fit well; they fit too well and to get them in and out I have to use the spanner to unscrew each 6" long bolt. Pretty boring stuff.

Rocking the garden furniture

With the table taken down, but about three months until I actually leave, I do need to have some kind of table so I have brought in my garden furniture because that is how I rock. It's comfortable enough, though I think I may need to put a cushion on it if I am to sit there for an extended period of time.

And so on Friday I was in work really early having driven Julian to work (early as I needed to ensure the carp parking space which would allow me to drive straight out of the gate) and then off to the studio after work with my work colleague and the drive was quite enjoyable with company. Once again I dropped the duvet down behind the front seats to keep the heat in and this works so well I am definitely going to keep doing this.

I got to the studio and went straight to the garage to collect Thomas. My plan was to stop at the studio in Julian the Friday night and head to Manchester really early doors with the trailer. This plan all changed as in the short (less than a mile) drive from the garage to the studio I started hearing a really unusual hissing sound from under the bonnet. Further inspection revealed that the filler cap on the radiator was venting. In my ignorance I thought this was the sum of the problem and so decided to go straight to the garage the day after to talk to my mechanic.

Insulation packed in behind the access panel

My plans for the Friday were to finish off the rabbit hutch however, with the fact I wasn't going to have to rush off to Manchester the next day, I decided to just do some preparation on Friday, and do the fiddly fitting in the morning after I'd taken Thomas back to the garage. The first thing I did was get the scraps of insulation and stuff behind the access panel.

Insulation behind the top panel

I also got the correct size of insulation to put behind the top panel, and measured and cut the sheet of wood for said panel. It was dark and I had discovered that the alternator was not charging the leisure battery and so I got a little down at this point; all that hassle and harassment with the camper van guy and I've had to email him to ask for him to honour his overly-expensive (and not optional) warranty. We shall see if he does so.

I fell asleep listening to the rain hammering down and as it normally does this really lulled me quickly. In the middle of the night I was woken by complete silence and lay there, just enjoying the fact that soon I would be able to experience that rare lack of bustle every day.

My first act on Saturday morning was to jump in Thomas and head over to the garage; I had a short conversation with the mechanic and he suggested I take him for a drive around and report back with what I found; I got about a  mile away from the garage and the heat gauge started rising and fast.

Not the thing you want to see

By the time it got that hot I had turned round, headed back to the garage, and dropped it off with the "just fix him please" instruction. My thinking is his illness has gone too far for me to be able to pass off as nothing to a potential sale and therefore if I write him off I will be losing thousands.

Completely solid olive oil

One of the best things about Julian is his cooker and this is proven by the fact that even though I was parked outside the studio I still chose to cook my breakfast on the gas hob in Julian. I was very amused to find that my olive oil had gone past the "cloudy because it is cold" stage to "completely solid"!

I was able to get some olive oil out by holding the bottle over the frying pan while my bacon was frying, and eventually some started to trickle out. I have never seen olive oil go totally solid before!

How amazing does this look!

I am not sure why but the bacon and egg butty I made this morning was outstanding. The bacon was crispy but still moist and the (over easy) egg still had enough runny in the middle and all in all it was amazing. Nom.

Back panel attached

After this excellent breakfast I set to with the tasks I had set myself for the morning which first of all was to put the back panel on over the insulation. This was quickly achieved and proved the wisdom of not forcing this the night before.

There's an 'ole in the roof!

The next thing I spotted was that there was a hole I'd not seen before, which was only obvious now that panel was fitted, which would still allow Sassy the destruction machine to get to the (still live) power cable.

Guide holes to easy fitting

Rather than spend ages boxing this off, and in such a tight space, I realised that I could make use of a spare bit of wood from the shelf and block this gap off really quickly and easily. It was still an awkward space to access so I marked up and drilled out guideholes to assist fitting.

Guard shelf fitted

There is a limit to the usability of a power screwdriver and I reached that limit while fitting this shelf; I was able to get two opposing corners partially inserted but then I had to revert to the manual driver to finish these off, and put the other two in.

The platform measured and cut and ready for assembling

My next task was (if you remember, or care) was to build the platform which will sit below the ramp and allow Sassy to have move between the two levels. I spent a little bit of time taking measurements and working out exactly how I want this platform to be built and eventually decided that I would have one which went the whole depth of the cage and had legs like a table.

Fitting a leg

The best thing I have found in this whole process are these right angle joints which have made many things far easier and the legs for the platform are no different. I fitted all four legs in about five minutes (using the manual driver again) and the platform doesn't wobble at all.

The completed platform...

...and in place

Perfect!

Wow this is a long update. Just a little bit more now...

Shutter is open!

I finally gained access to the storage unit via the shutter door; I was able to use the inverter off the leisure battery to run an extension cable into the unit and use the power to raise it; this is a good thing as the manual action is really awkward to use.

My stuff and the trailer in storage

I have been able to take the top of the desk over into the storage which is good as it means I have very little left to take over and this is helping me to understand just how much stuff I am taking. I have also been able to get the trailer in under cover and that is a really good thing.

So it has been a really good weekend of progress and on top of that I have heard from Dilyana and she is going to send me the translated paperwork this weekend so I can book into the notary next week and get that progressed.

I have a list of stuff to continue progressing at the storage; I want to mount and affix the laycorn boxes to the frame on the front of the trailer and I need to get the roof box off the top of Julian and work out how I can get both boxes up there. I also want to reseal Julian around the joints with waterproofing tape. Most of these things are held up now because of Thomas being off the road.

That's a long enough blog post for now. Cheers for reading it all.