- [Jess] This video is
brought to you by Squarespace. - This is it, this is where it begins. We are starting the full van build. There's now a hole in the roof of our van. Why have we just started our van build and things are already going wrong. - [Stephen] Hi, I'm Stephen. - [Jess] And I'm Jess. And back in 2015, we quit our jobs packed our bags and
booked a one way ticket out of Australia to go
and travel the world. Picking up a camera and
sharing our adventures has led to some pretty
incredible memories. Like the time we got lost in Istanbul. - [Stephen] Swam between
two continents in Iceland, and camped in the Sahara desert. - This is Sahara, what? - [Stephen] But none of these
moments could prepare us for our biggest adventure yet. - [Jess] Meet our baby Hunter. With international travel ban
for the foreseeable future, we decided to follow a dream of ours. Buy a van and convert it into a new home. And this is where our new story begins. - So right now, this doesn't exactly
look like much of a home. I feel like I'm inside
like an Imperial Death Star from Star Wars, with all the white, almost construction light
walls at the moment. This has honestly been
such a dream of ours, ever since we first rented
our very first camper van, to now be sitting in our own van, that we're going to be building. This is just an insane dream come true. So, we need to make a plan on how we're going to convert this into an off the grid camper van. It is November, 2020. Let the van build begin. - So, is it officially van build day one? - I think it is officially
van build day one. So, today we're making a plan. (upbeat music) It honestly still looks surreal,
seeing this gigantic beast out the front of our house. It won't even fit into our garage. By the way, this is our
current household toolbox. This is what I'm after. I don't know if you guys remember from our home renovation series, we are
not the handiest of people. I'm pretty sure, we decided to paint the
old orange wall white. And I found a bucket of
paint here in the shed painted it only to realize that that wall is currently
just painted with primer. - So, ever since we had little Hunter, our hands have kind of been full. So, I think we need to
go find some extra hands. And hopefully some hands that
know how to use a power drill. Before any day begins, we need coffee. Morning coffee delivery. - Road trip time. - I think I've decided
what my favorite feature is of our new van. Look, how many drink holders, hold up one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. We can get all the beverages. Oh yeah, if you're wondering why Jess is driving
down in a separate car, we kind of don't have a
seat for Hunter, right now. - [Jess] She just woke up. - [Stephen] Good morning. How'd you find the road trip? She had to deal with listening
to me singing for an hour, poor thing. (laughing) I didn't think you were awake. Hey baby. She's got like a little smirk. Hello. Hey mate, how you doing? (indistinct) - Sorry that we took so long. I think we just didn't
anticipate the traffic, but we just got here. - [Man] All right, lovely. Cheers, see you soon. - Cool. See you soon. - Hunter says she wants the pink camper. What do you think? - That'll just match
some of our appliances. Mate, how you doing? - Good. - [Stephen] Yeah, it's nice. How are you doing? - Nice to see you again. - You too. - Hunter's come along today. - Hello mate. - [Stephen] Yeah. - There's the van. - [Stephen] There's the van. - Awesome. - What do you think? We tried to find the biggest one. This is our friends, Scott and Jason and you may remember them from Stephen's birthday surprise. Where they helped me
surprise him for his birthday by lending us their demo caravan. We drove all the way up to Exmouth to swim with the wild sharks and had one of the best weeks all year. So, how do they fit into the story? Well, about two years ago they started a mobile caravan repair shop called RV Solutions. And now their little business
of two has grown so much. Even to the point where they build the Australian answer to
the Airstream, TOASTA Vans. And they do it from complete scratch. When we saw how epic they turned out we knew they were the right people to help us build our
off the grid camper ban. You guys are gonna have
to get used to this lot, as they're going to help make
our van build dream possible. - So, let's get the wooden floor in. - [Stephen] Cool. - Let's get it laid. Let's get whatever lino, or whatever it is that you
just choose to go with. - [Stephen] Yeah. - Let's get that laid, to get that edge trimmed off and done. And then I'll just take it then and go and get the seats done. - Okay. So, I think one of the
first things we need to do is choose our flooring. How exciting? - [Stephen] This is so exciting,
it's actually real now. - This one here, it's not too thick. It's got a good heavy
duty sort of covering. - Oh my gosh Stephen,
it's a lot of choice. - [Stephen] There's so
much to choose from. - One of these woods. - [Stephen] Go for one of these? - So, we're going either between
classic oak, or Helsinki. Can't even tell much difference. This one's more warm. Maybe the Helsinki. - [Stephen] For like a
cooler beach kind of vibe, rather than the warmth in there? What do you reckon, Hunter? - Maybe this one. - [Stephen] It's a tough decision for us. Because it's like, once you've put it in-- - I know. - [Stephen] I don't think
you're changing the floor. - I think classic oak. - [Stephen] Classic oak? - Yes. I reckon this one. - [Stephen] This is our
first big van decision. We're locking it in? - Yeah. - All right, let's do it. After we chatted to Scottie and the boys and we kind of came up with a rough idea on what we actually want to turn our little cargo van into a camper van. And they kind of had a couple of suggests. They're like if you're going to make this as comfortable as possible, which we do, 'cause we're pretty much
going to be moving into this full time, Scott suggested
that we get a couple of windows installed. - You can go to Mercedes themselves and they have the windows for this. - [Stephen] Okay. - If kitchen's here, than maybe
this one here, or that one. - [Jess] And that also means
that seat there has a window. - Exactly. And so for the seats that are here, maybe just one window in there. - Knock out this, add a window, and then knock out this
wall and add a window. - I've got to see where to find windows. So, I think I'm going to call the guy that sold it to us, Rex and see
if he can make a suggestion. I don't know. I'm going to follow this
like treasure trail, just to see how do we
find an actual window to be installed? 'Cause they're going to need to cut like a couple of holes out of the side. Also, how much does it
cost to install windows? We haven't even started
the conversion yet. Hi, Rex. How are you doing mate? - [Rex] Hey, mate. How are you ding? - Yeah good, thank you. You said maybe you know a place where we could potentially get a couple of windows installed? - [Rex] Have you got a pen and paper? - I do have a pen and paper, yes. Even though we have to do something that is like monotonous as
getting windows installed. It's a little bit exciting, 'cause this is the
beginning of the van build. - [Woman] Good afternoon (indistinct). - Hello, how are you doing today? We're wanting to get a
couple of windows installed. - [Woman] Do you want
it on the rear panels? Is that correct? - Yes, so we want one, let me just double check. Alrighty. We packed up the van. We're heading to our first spot. It's a van window installation company. And this is it. This is where it begins. We are starting the full van build today. (upbeat music) So, I just come and picked up the sprinter from the place that does the windows. So, we went to a place in Welshpool, we were recommended to go here, 'cause they would put
the sprinter windows in and we thought, yeah, we
might as well go for them so they can all just match. And it just looks like it came like this. These windows cost me $800,
which is an insane price. And they put the window
in the wrong place. What we initially wanted,
let me show you guys this. So, this one right here, perfectly fine. This is where Hunter's
seat is going to go. She can look out the window. It's going to bring a lot of light in, but the issue is this light over here. So, this cutout here was
meant to be this cutout here, 'cause when we were
initially designing the van we wanted this to bring in light. And then that to kind
of be where our bed is. I don't know. I don't know what Jess is going to think. Why have we we just started our van build and things already going wrong? Let's go show Jess. All right. - Do I look yet? Oh wait, it makes it look way bigger? That's so cool. Is that where we meant to have it? Did they do it wrong? - [Stephen] They did it wrong. - Oh my gosh, what the-- - [Stephen] It was meant to be here. - And they've put it there. Why? - [Stephen] I don't know. I was looking at the paperwork. - [Jess] Yes? - And it said that it needed to go there, but then I spoke to them and they said-- - [Jess] So, they said the wrong door. So, you said next to the door and they've done the back
door not the side door. - [Stephen] I guess it's going to work. - It's going to have to work, 'cause they've already cut the hole. I know. I'm like-- - That's all right, we'll
just have a better view from our bed. - That's what I thought. I was like silver lining, we can wake up and we've got all these
windows around our bed, but also you had like a
really good idea for a wall, just there. - At least it's not where
the bunk bed was going to be, 'cause the bunk bed is up there. - Oh, it is? - Yeah. - Oh, I thought the bunk
bed was going to go there. - On the other side. Oh, that's okay. I'm sure I can do this,
something to the wall. That's all right. - So, are you sure? I felt so bad when I picked it up. I was like, what have you done? Like how, you can't even just
put like panels back on it. - Well I guess he could,
but there's no point now. 'Cause like you've paid for the window. And we did it with someone else because we knew we would do it wrong. And they still did it wrong. - We could not have got a window up. All right, we're just going
to have to live with this. (laughing) We just wanted to say a massive thank you to our good friends over at Squarespace for their continued
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purchase of a domain or website. Now let's head back to the video. Alrighty. So, today's job is that
we're pretty much prepping the flooring so that we can put the lino that we've actually picked
out a couple of weeks ago. To make sure that we have a sturdy base. So, that's pretty much
what we're going to be working on for the next couple of days. We have Andy just here in the back here, he's going to be helping,
'cause like I said to you guys we need help to put this van together. 'Cause we aren't the handiest of people. (laughing) - Hey mate, if you're going to help out, you're going to need to be in uniform. - Yeah? Alrighty. I'm going to go get changed. So, when you get a van,
pretty much a cargo van, it has all these anchor
points throughout the flooring because of course, most
people buy these vans to either be delivery vans or if they can put some
like threading between it so they can tie down boxes. These aren't necessarily
made for camper vans, which is so cool how you
can kind of turn these into camper vans. My job this morning, got the tools, going through and removing
all the anchor points, so that we have a flat
base to put the plywood on, which we can then apply
our lino on top of it. (upbeat music) I was given one job today, get those out. And yet I was chatting too
much that I threaded it. So, we're going to have to grind it out. So, is this piece of wood going pretty much in this section here? - It's going here. From here, it will be
about, to about here. - [Stephen] Okay. - And I'll do another one. - [Stephen] Is it just hardwood? Is that what it is pretty much? - Pretty much. - If you spill drinks and stuff like that, and it manages to seep through the lino or whatever, it's got a film face on it. - So, Andy has started measuring out all the different wood
and cutting it all up. So they can fit, almost like a
bit of a puzzle into the van. You can see why building a van, I think I'm starting to
appreciate takes so long, because Andy just for
the last like two hours has been going back and forth, measuring slightly, doing
a slight bit of a saw putting in the back
end, see if it fits in. Finding that the sprinter
has an extra screw somewhere. - Got some screws and some sneaky spots. - [Stephen] Taking that out, putting it in so that it's all perfect. - Might have to cut it through here. - So, this piece we're
working on at the moment is probably the toughest piece, just because there's so
many different angles that you need to kind of squeeze it into. Andy said he's been working
on vans for 12 years and no matter what, you're
going to have a sprinter from now a sprint 2015,
2009, same model of car, but they can all be totally different. And we just realized that
the chair kind of tapers up. It's not fitting in. So, we're just going to like slice them into two different pieces and then make like a bit of a joint. So, that it can still work. The things you learn. The edge that it kind of sits
on just needs a little bit smoothening out so it will
just fit in perfectly. We want this as stable as possible, so that when you're walking on it it kind of just feels like
you're walking on the ground, like you would when you're at a house. - [Andy] That's better. - Yeah. Is that piece number two done? - Yeah. That's right. - All right, two done. And then I suppose two more pieces, or one big-- - [Andy] Yeah, pretty much two. We might do the whole lot. - [Stephen] Yeah? Oh, that'd be awesome. - [Andy] Might as well. - So, we've now come up to the wheelbase, Andy had such a genius idea to just get a little bit of cardboard, just kind of measure
it out, cut it up with, just with a knife match it up, and flips both side and then just measure it up onto the wood and then just cut it. (upbeat music) When you're a short person. (laughing) Which way do you want it? It's crazy how much you
can get done in a day, but also how little you get in a day. - We've almost done 200
with the body today. - [Stephen] Yeah. - So, I can cut that back here. - [Stephen] Oh yeah. That's actually smart. Almost clock off time. You're going to work for a bit longer. There we go. Four pieces of the wood down. We have a good base. Next up in know, we're gonna
run a bit of a string line. So we know where to drill all of the different kind of screws. - Put some pressure on it. - [Stephen] Yeah, there's chalk on it. - And that's your line. That's just straight line where, you know, the beams are. - [Stephen] That's cool. Smart way to get a
completely straight line. Just get a chalk line,
give it some pressure, ping it, and then it'll
go all the way across. Now we've got to drill this down, so that this all stays in place. Alrighty guys. It is the next day. I've come in, a bit of
traffic, come in at 10 and Andy's come super early. He's gone and finished all the screws. So, now the main base of the board is completely secured to
the chassis of the van. So, we ended up using some countersunk head Phillips drive screws,
mostly so that when it goes in, there's not much of a top. We did try some other screws before, but there was like this
little bit of a head on it and it's just extra effort. So, we just went down to
Bunny's to pick some up, but now, because there's
like all these screw holes through the floors we're
going to mix up some bog, he calls it, just some like builders, very similar to like gumption, if you're going to be painting. Going to fill this all up, so then we can come through, sand it down. So, it's nice and smooth
ready for us to place the lino on top. There's now a hole in the roof of our van. That was just so scary to watch. Luckily, Andy is so good at this stuff. That is crazy, just to
see how thick the roof is. You guys were wondering when we drive around Australia
we have some very hot States especially the Northern territory. And I think we need to
put some air con on here. Got a bit of a keepsake from the van. Now that the bog is down, it's time to sand it down
to make it nice and smooth. The lino has just arrived,
laying it all down so we can pretty much measure it out. It's about four and a half meters by 1785. So, we've overcompensated and got at least over five meters. So, that when we put it through there's enough space to trim it. You want it to look nice and you don't want to
like get a too short that you haven't got enough to work with. Always get a little bit more, but it's kind of cool to see our flooring. This going to be the back of it. Andy was saying, it doesn't
have to be like as smooth because we're going to just trim it later. But just to get an idea of where to cut and then we're going to measure
it in the cut across there. After giving it a quick vacuum, quick clean down because of course, we're going to be putting
the laminate on top of it. We're going to go and get some cardboard to kind of cut out some different designs so that we have template. So, we can just cut it
once, then lay it down so that we're not just like bring it in, slicing it up, cut it once, get it down. And then we're going to
have our flooring done. - Here's the beginning of the color. - [Stephen] It's already
feeling more homely than before. (laughing) Alrighty guys. That is it. We're actually pausing, abandoning the van for a couple of weeks for a very good reason. It's going to be an emotional one. So, if you did enjoy this van build series it is literally just beginning. This is video one. So, if you're new around
here, hit subscribe. We'll see you guys in the next video. Van builds will resume in
a couple of weeks time, but in the meantime you're
going to want to stick around for the next one. Thanks for watching guys.
