Monty's English Invasion

[wildebus]

I know it's to far north but at Falkirk and Stirling petrol stations that just look normal

This fuel shortage is working out very expensive! Spent £150 on diesel in the last 30 hours
When I got to Hawick I went into Morrisons and filled up there (I would anyway as best price generally). No queues and no fill limits. But the Sainsbury's in Kelso and the Jet station are both out apparently

 

[wildebus]

Motorhome in the garage at the moment having (hopefully!) the timing belt replaced.

Once back, I have a few adaptions to work on following my 3 weeks away. Spotted one or two things to do to enhance the usuability, and also found a couple of things that did not work as well as I had expected.
The Autotrail Motorhome generally and the Layout especially of the Cheyenne 635 Model (Overhead Cab Bed, Rear Bathroom, and Central Lounge and Kitchen) I found very comfortable and am pleased with my selection. I don't think for my needs there is a layout that would be better in the same kind of length (the only other layout I really liked was the Autotrail Cheyenne 840SE which has a Bedroom between the Kitchen and the Bathroom, and the additional length of that version (~2M) was just too much and would have been too awkward I think for non-campsite stopovers)

Assuming the numbers of the on-board computer are correct, I thought the overall economy of 25.9MPG over the touring mileage of 1,250 miles reasonable enough given the weight and frontal aspect of the Motorhome. I did think the cab seats themselves were rather too firm. I am not sure if the padding has compacted over time or if it is my own lack of built-in padding, but I think I need to look at the seat bases and plump them up a bit

 

[wildebus]

I stayed at Henley Farm Campsite (Henley on Thames) on my roadtrip.
This was a bit of a luxury site (Fully serviced pitches, Pool, Badmington court, playing field, etc,) and one thing they had for each pitch was a TV aerial point, which could have been handy IF I had a lead (or an external point to connect to).

Didn't take too long to find a transmitter (complicated by other peoples aerials pointing in 3 distinct directions) but it did make me think it could be handy to be able to just plug in a lead (I know lots of folk like to get away from stuff like television when they go away but I enjoy TV )
So decided to fit a little extension kit ...

I went for a Maxview box that had a connection for both Freeview and Satellite TV (Sat lead showing in picture above) to give the maximum options.

Inside I moved the roof aerial lead from the original location to a little surface mount box hidden behind the TV and fitted a new plate with TV and SAT in its place with leads to the external box (hence why it is located where it is - nice and easy to run the cables )

To use an external Freeview aerial, just need to move the Co-Ax lead from the little white box to the combo plates TV socket. I don't have any on-board Satellite Dish so that input is just left on the SAT socket for when an external Sat signal is available.

I thought I would have to do a tune or something, but as soon as I selected "SAT" as the signal source the TV instantly showed BBC 1 and going through had all the usual FreeSat channels, plus a load of continental channels listed, but no signal on those - Not sure how many channels were listed in total but could be close to 1,000?? I am guessing if I am in Germany say, I will get the various SAT1, RTL, etc channels (I used to watch a lot of those before Satellite went all digital ) so that could be good fun.
Thinking might look at used portable Sat Kits actually

 

[wildebus]

Something that I bought for the Motorhome but was not very happy with was the external Thermal Screen. I had previously bought a screen for my VW LT (Sprinter) and that was brilliant and at a reasonable price, so I thought I would get the same result from a Ducato screen of a similar price. .... Nah
Fitted it for the first time at Stratford and was rather disappointed at the fitting of it. It was ok but really expected better considering the size of these cabs don't tend to vary so really just a matter of making one right and then duplicating it over and over?

Took it off after a day or two and just relied on the Remis interior screen instead for privacy purposes.
I also have a fleece that is fitted to keep the overhead cab bed tidier and this I found is very handy ....

Normal view from the lounge to the cab with the bed extended ...

If I want some instant privacy, I can just pull over the fleece and drop it down behind the front seats

I find this really useful if parking up somewhere where you may want to chill out for a bit or even overnight, but don't want to look like you are in the van, or just want a quick break at the services. Not blackout level or anything but certainly useful and I am finding I am using this quite a bit instead of the Remis blinds.
Might look at a thicker option to provide a blackout feature but to work in the same way as I like the way I can just drop this down and whack it back up in a couple of seconds to be totally out the way rather then taking out a curtain and popping it on hooks or the like.

 

[SquirrellCook]

Watch out for the van with the curtains down and the van a rocking, the owner might be watching football! (or getting excited monitoring his electrical kit)

 

[wildebus]

Posted the rest of the post-trip updates here .... https://motorhomebuilder.com/threads/not-a-self-build-but-a-tweaker.67074/page-13#post-878697

 

[nabsim]

I have been doing a similar thing for most of this year David. My external screens are really good but I like to leave the cab open so I can see out and I rarely bother with my internals either. I have a piece of wood that fits across the cab between the cupboards and I just hang a fleece from that. Keeps the cold from the cab out now it’s getting chillier but main reason I use anything is so the dogs can’t see out or they will bark all through the night at potential burglars