Micro camper from Ranger service body

[holyford86]

I've been busy putting up panels inside, I've got two more little panels to make and paint and then I'm done with the interior other than electrical, which won't take me very long. As you can see in a couple of the pics I had to get a little creative with ways to support the ceiling panels while I attach them. As a side note, the aluminum corner panels were bent from scrap and the oxidation is not deep, a little bit of work with a scotch brite pad will take that right off.

 

[holyford86]

Lights!

 

[ekrampitzjr]

Those aluminum (?) pieces in the upper corners by the roof would be ideal for mounting strip LED lights. You wouldn't be likely to hit such lights with your head.

 

[holyford86]

Those aluminum (?) pieces in the upper corners by the roof would be ideal for mounting strip LED lights. You wouldn't be likely to hit such lights with your head.

Yes, aluminum and that's the plan, I have an RGB set that will go around the inside. I had to modify them to make them better suit my needs and could do a post on how I did so if anyone is interested.

 

[SenorNoob]

Yes, aluminum and that's the plan, I have an RGB set that will go around the inside. I had to modify them to make them better suit my needs and could do a post on how I did so if anyone is interested.

I am interested. I have a cheap set for Brittney's library.

 

[holyford86]

I am interested. I have a cheap set for Brittney's library.

As a side note, don't mind my lazy boy and cardboard box soldering station, haha.

I picked up a cheap remote controlled 24 foot set from lowes, they were branded Bell and Howell but I'd imagine any other set will be similar. The issues I had were that the IR reciever and connection for the light strip were too short for where I needed to mount the controller and the USB plug and an associated power strip would take up too much space for where I needed to mount the controller.

I disassembled the controller box and noticed the board took up very little space and wasn't attached to anything in there, lots of extra space in the little box for changes. In the pic, upper left is the IR reciever, lower left is RGB strip output, right is 5v usb input.

I dug around in my box of scrap wire and found a pair of leds and associated control harness from some accent lights someone gave me, they had the correct number of conductors and were terminated in some pretty decent little connectors, so I robbed those connectors and associated 6 ish feet of wire and soldered them in place of the reciever input and light output

The 120 volt wall wart that was included with the kit had a 5v output of 2000ma or 2 amps, I found a 12v usb adapter with an output of 2.4A disassembled it, removed the USB ports, soldered a couple wires in place of them and added a couple wires as extension for the 12v then I trimmed the standoffs off of the inside of the enclosure and secured the main led controller to the top of it using a bit of hot glue, once that cooled I put in a bit more glue to be used to separate the two boards and secured the power supply board in a similar fashion as the other one. For some odd reason I didn't take any pics of this process but it's pretty straight forward. Below is the finished product.

Then I used the wire that includes the mating plugs to those connectors and made an extension, I just soldered and heat shrunk the wires then loomed them all up after a functional test. Hopefully that all makes sense.

 

[RobbieD]

That's some nice electrical work.



Toonces approves.

 

[holyford86]

That's some nice electrical work.



Toonces approves.

View attachment 112166

Automotive electrical work and electronics hacking are a couple of my hobbies, I really enjoy them. Thank you.

 

[Uncle Gump]

Everytime I look at this thread... I find myself looking at small "capable" campers.

The price for those things... yikes!

Your project is shaping up nicely.

 

[holyford86]

Everytime I look at this thread... I find myself looking at small "capable" campers.

The price for those things... yikes!

Your project is shaping up nicely.

The shock of the sticker price is much of the reason why this exists, haha.

Thank you for the kind words

 

[sgtsandman]

Everytime I look at this thread... I find myself looking at small "capable" campers.

The price for those things... yikes!

Your project is shaping up nicely.

Thus why I've been beffing up and upgrading my utility trailer. Off road utility trailers are tiny and stupid expensive.

 

[holyford86]

Thus why I've been beffing up and upgrading my utility trailer. Off road utility trailers are tiny and stupid expensive.

No joke, and with a couple modifications, some larger tires and a little bit of care, one should be able to carry about half of it's rated load over rough terrain

 

[sgtsandman]

No joke, and with a couple modifications, some larger tires and a little bit of care, one should be able to carry about half of it's rated load over rough terrain

Oh, it's too big to reasonably go on full on trails with it. It's a 4X8 utility trailer. I built it for fire roads and moderate trails. That big of a trailer is going to be anchor if I was to take it full on off roading with a Ranger. The 2019 could take it further but the idea is to get it close to the trails. Not take it on them.

 

[holyford86]

Oh, it's too big to reasonably go on full on trails with it. It's a 4X8 utility trailer. I built it for fire roads and moderate trails. That big of a trailer is going to be anchor if I was to take it full on off roading with a Ranger. The 2019 could take it further but the idea is to get it close to the trails. Not take it on them.

This project is a similar situation, it's over 7 feet tall and 5.5 x 7. Once it's done (real soon) I'm going to weigh it out of curiosity.

 

[bilbo]

As a side note, don't mind my lazy boy and cardboard box soldering station, haha.

A Jenson box, that’s high class! I just got a new helmet on closeout from them.