Elder81's: VW T4 conversion

For some time now I have had a hankering after a project that I can make mine.

My dad used to be in the AA and had a T4 as his work horse. He liked it so much that when he set up his own garage 4 years ago he had to buy an Ex AA T4.

I drove it a few times and started to enjoy driving it. It really doesn't feel like a van.

4 months ago dad decided he needed a change so I bought the T4 of him for 2k.

My plans are not to do a full camper conversion, but instead to make a comfy van with a telly and sofa. (Maybe a bed if the mrs lets me)

It is going to done on a budget so is going to have slow progress indeed!

He it is as I bought it!
Side View

Front Seats

Rear Seats

The boot!

Do you think this will be practical for when we go camping?

There a few litte rust patches around which I need to sort as you can see on the roof!

Rusty roof!

The first thing to do is to give it a good clean and insulate the inside to keep it nice and warm!

I have more pictures, but they are at home so will update some more soon!

Well I have done a few things but not had my pictures on my laptop to update so here goes.

From an asthetic point of view the van looked like an off roader and as the T4 is known as a van that drives like a car I decided it should look like a car so I had to hit it with the lowering stick.

I bought me a set of these:

Yep they will lower the van 85mm, that is over 3 inches!





If you look at the rear wheels in the above picture there is a lot of arch left to fill!

So I replaced the rear springs and then needed to adjust the front as the front is a torsion bar set up, there are no springs required. Sadly I did not get any pictures of this process, but other than having to heat one of the torsion nuts to lower it, all went well. In fact it took just over an hour with all the problems we had as well.



As you can see she is much lower now and I am rather chuffed with how it looks.



The rear arch looking nice and full!



The front arch looking even more full!

The observant among you may notice the primer showing. I have started to clear some of the rust from the arches and footwells. Thankfully it is all surface rust and nothing to depressing unlike another VW project going on here! lol

I also picked up some alloys from copedummy last week and trial fit them last night. They need a good refurb and I am thinking of what colour to spray them, ANy feedback on that would be great.

Anyway here are a few pics of the alloys on the van.






I like the look and would be interested to here your thoughts.

The suspension has affected the ride a little!

Bit of un update! Not done a huge amount of work as the wifey has put a spending ban on until after christmas!

Well a good friend has just recently had some laminate flooring put down in the house. Before this they had some carpet. At the time of fitting they where skint so a family member got them some industrial sound deadening underlay. They wanted rid of this as didn't need it for the laminte so gave it to me!

This weekend I decided to remove the flooring and cover the floor in this stuff!



I had to leve holes for the seat to plug back in!



All covered at the backend!



The corner!



The back with the ply floor back in!



I also got given a bonnet bra which I fit last weekend!



As in above post I bought some alloys from coupedummy that need tyres and a good refurb! This weekend I got a phone call from my brother inlaw asking if I wanted some wheels with tyres for free! My reply was a simple hell yes!

So I also put these on this weekend and I am rather chuffed!



The one downside from this weekend is that I removed the water heater to refurb the rusty stand! It can be seen to the left of this picture!



This is the only bit of electrical work I have done and it seems to have stopped my stereo from working! Also my dash clock (Time not miles) resets on start up! Got to look into that now!

If anyone has any idea of what that could be please let me know!

The mrs has now ordered some leatherette samples as well as she has accepted the challenge of reupholstering the seats!

That is were I am now! Thanks for watching!

Please put any electrical comments on the discussion thread!