Auto-Sleeper Warwick Duo Modifications 2017+

justlooking wrote:Side Door Stop. I fitted a Stopsy side door stop in a Kemerton XL a while back and it worked well. Fitting was easy - just stuck on with supplied mastic. In my current van I've gone back to basics - a champagne cork on a tell tale that fits into one of the holes in the body under the side door.
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Great idea!

We have used a squash ball pushed into the gap which worked well

After noticing a smell from the loo I replaced the lip seal today. Fairly straight forward but takes a few hours when cleaning everything.
Needed to cut some wood as the sliding lid did not provide enough leverage, it may have never been apart before. [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
 New seal compared to the old one 
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Fitted and lubricated with olive oil. Not tested yet.
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The spindle on our washbasin tap broke while away last week, ordered new parts and was able to remove it by a tip seen on utube. 
Heated a very small screwdriver over the hob pushed into the centre of the broken spindle hold until cool then had enough grip to pull out the remaining shaft. 
 Anyone else with a warwick lubricated the bathroom taps?

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Still waiting for the replacement, bit of a pain as the tap was partially open when it broke.

Tap replaced and less stiff after opening and closing fully a number of times, something they normally never do.
 After washing I had a go at the rear camera, the image had been getting slowly worse, had a look at the rear camera and the clear plastic had definitely degraded.
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The plastic housing was rather cloudy.
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Close up before


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And after a good polish with toothpaste. I have some plastic polish but this does the same thing. Picture in the cab while not great as the system is rather poor is much better than it was.

My thanks jennyandpeter for sharing with us your modifications, you like many others on ASOF have without doubt contributed lots of super suggestions I've been able to take on board. Currently I'm interested in your fridge mod where you've added a fan. I like your simple mounting just with some zip ties. I guess you could have even had two fans if needs be. Where did you take off the power supply for the fan? I think the Theftord kit available for our fridge just uses some Scotchlok type connectors to tap into the 12V low current supply to the fridge.

Previously when we had a Dometic fridge in our previous van we've had no bother in France and Spain however, on our Kemerton XL the sliding door covers the fridge vents, a design flaw I suppose. I'm not so certain that our Thetford fridge could cope under the same circumstances camping there as before.
On the other hand, Covid, Brexit, and the closure of the P&O Hull to Zeebrugge service could mean I don't need to modify our fridge in the near future, our camping will continue to be in the UK for now, boo hoo.

Doesn't help with a van conversion but on my Nuevo I took the live feed through a fuse to the step light using a Scotchlok connector.  I was able to fit the fan using a bracket screwed to the side of the fridge housing adjacent to the top vent.  I also wired it through a thermostat with a remote sensor positioned with some stout garden wire just below the top fins that I found on eBay for a few pounds.  It works a treat. This is the unit and it has the advantage that you can adjust the hysteresis (temperature differential between on and off).  When I bought it was only about £3 inc postage from HK.  That was also mounted to the wall of the fridge housing.
I did contribute all the details including photos to a fridge fan topic several years ago but I guess that it bit the dust when the host for photos moved away from Photobucket to ServIMG

I used the genuine Dometic fan kit, bought through ebay from USA for half the price in UK. It fastens to the pipework and blows upwards to cool the fins. The thermostat is built into it  and can be positioned along the fins, to the right end (hotter end) if you want it on almost permanently or moved along to the left to make it come on less often. The temperature  is fixed for the thermostat at 30°C.

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Relaxez-Vous wrote:My thanks jennyandpeter for sharing with us your modifications, you like many others on ASOF have without doubt contributed lots of super suggestions 

I'd like to second that, I do like a good mod 

Great timing re the discussion on fridge fans, I too have just bought the genuine Thetford kit and will be fitting it soon.

Watched a couple of videos on YouTube on how to fit and I think it's going to be fiddly for sure.  Very limited room to manoeuvre when reaching in through the vent holes eh?  Also unsure where to pick up a 12v feed from at the moment too.

Thanks @paulmold for the tip on simply sliding the thermostatic switch along the pipe in order to tailor the cut-in point! 

Whoops - I did not put in the link to the thermostat which was just as well because in finding it again I found the same product cheaper. Here it is:
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Hope that helps
I've also now found the photos that I took in 2014
First photo taken into top vent showing fan and mounting, Second, through bottom vent showing the thermostat and the third shows the location of the thermostat probe suspended just below the top fins (viewed from below with the gas exhaust flue in the top right corner and the fan at top left with the suspending wire from the unused fan fixing holes.  The stat is set at 45C with hysteresis of 2C
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It may look somewhat Heath Robinson, but as I said, it has worked very well.  It even alerted me earlier this year to the fact that, when de-winterising the van,  I had forgotten to remove the pieces of vinyl flooring that I fit inside the vents as winter covers. I heard the fan operate when the outside temperature was in the high teens!

jennyandpeter wrote:Charger works well keeping the vehicle battery topped up on solar and mains.

Jobs for today.

Wardrobe has never been the best use of the space as stuff gets piled up in there and the things that need hanging up are too long, so shelves needed to be fitted. 
Why don't autosleeper give this as an option, and supply removable shelves? 
 
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Spare bits of kitchen units with triangular wooden pillars in the corners so it can all be removed without any holes drilled.

Recently shelved the wardrobe in th WXL using 12mm ply and angle brackets. SWMBO has said how much better she felt it was as a use of space on our last trip. Leg for small table still in wardrobe, table top is wrapped in travelling rug until SWMBO makes s cover from a bath towel, site in overcab storage area and wedges nicely with large table, no rattles and very secure.

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Due to poor design the fridge vent in the warwick duo is lower than the cooling fins of the fridge. Hence our fan extracts air rather than blowing over the cooling fins, think of a desktop pc you need to exchange the air rather than moving it around.

jennyandpeter wrote:Due to poor design the fridge vent in the warwick duo is lower than the cooling fins of the fridge. Hence our fan extracts air rather than blowing over the cooling fins, think of a desktop pc you need to exchange the air rather than moving it around.

I don't doubt it but have to say our fridge has performed brilliantly since doing the mod. We fitted it after the record breaking temps of 2019 when it couldnt  cope and everything defrosted. We were at Aberystwyth couple months ago when temp hit 30 and it was freezing down fresh food in the icebox and making ice cubes.  This was without ehu.

Bilbobaggins wrote:Recently shelved the wardrobe in th WXL using 12mm ply and angle brackets. 

Can you share a picture of said angle brackets please?

jennyandpeter wrote:Due to poor design the fridge vent in the warwick duo is lower than the cooling fins of the fridge. Hence our fan extracts air rather than blowing over the cooling fins, think of a desktop pc you need to exchange the air rather than moving it around.

Precisely - That's exactly whay my mod does - and as I say - it works very well!

RogerThat wrote:

Bilbobaggins wrote:Recently shelved the wardrobe in th WXL using 12mm ply and angle brackets. 

Can you share a picture of said angle brackets please?

Will do over the weekend, WXL away for a few days with my daughter so can't take pictures today.

Picture as requested.

B&Q 25mm zinc plated corner braces, pack of 20. I have used some of these to strengthen microwave unit.

For shelving two used on each side and two at rear, also used hardboard strips to prevent screw coming through ply.

Don't intend to put large amount of weight on these shelves so feel they are strong enough for our purposes. Probably be used for clothing, towels etc.

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Great!  Thanks for the pic 

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Does not seem great but massively better than it was before.

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Added a 12v socket to the load on  the controller, timer set so we can either use it as power to the fridge fan or just charge stuff directly from the battery.

Hetty has another new toy, normally I just use a phone but will give the garmin tourer two a try to see how it compares. 
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Replaced some of the gas struts today with german 250n ones after one of the ebay 150n ones failed, lifts and stays up now. 

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Small thing, but a number of times I have been scratched by the sharp spring clip that holds the bench stay in position. Also the rod can rattle in position.

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Replaced by 2 plastic coated ones that hold the rod tight.[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]