I finally got round to collecting the campervan I bought at the start of lockdown.
With no job and no prospects of anything coming up, I plan on spending the summer biking and kayaking in this old beast:

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New bike/band/party/wizzard wagon

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I have a few questions:

1) It has a mains electric hookup point on it, that looks like the 3 pin waterproof connectors you get for events etc. Is there anything to look for in the cables for them, or are they all much of a muchness?

2) It has a split charger and can charge up a leisure battery. However, it does not have said battery so I need to buy one. What size of battery do I need? They seem to come in a variety of amp hours. I can’t imagine spending more than a couple of days without driving and charging it up. As far as current draw goes, it has a fridge (that can also work off the gas bottle? Some form of magic!?!), lights, plug sockets, a pump for the water tank and a boiler that looks like a mini boiler for your house, so I imagine that works off the gas bottle.

3) It has a little room in it for going to the toilet. But it does not have a toilet – so I need to buy one. Is there anything to know about them? Looks like it is set up for a wee port-a-potty style thing which I am assuming I need to dump the contents somewhat responsibly?

4) There is a cap to fill up the water tank with, It has a couple of small holes above it that seem like they are for some kind of standardised connector. Can I not just fill it up with a hose?

Sounds like a great plan! enjoy. I can only advise what I did so not sure if it is the best options but they worked for me.

1) you want to get a long hook up cable. Not all campsites have one power point per pitch, you might have to go across a number of pitches to get a power point. I had a 20m cable…too long most of the time but was needed on a handful of occasions. Also get a 3-pin connector to 3-pin means plug, handy for home and you can use a euro adapter if you venture onto the continent as they tend to have 2-pin mains plug hook ups rather than the 3-pin connectors. I also had a 1 – 3 branch connector as I also had a secondary reel line, so could get power into the awning when we used it. Might not be handy in your case but handy to know such things exist.

2) My van had a 90AH battery but I think I’d have preferred a 120Ah or so as I was running a fridge. I think the fridge was only good for a couple of days on the battery. Obviously the more leccy you plan to use the bigger battery you’ll need, so if you’re going to be constantly charging stuff and running electric pumps etc then you might need more and maybe some roof solar.

3)I used a small portages potty chemical toilet – so took the bright pink stuff and the dark blue stuff. Was fine but tended to limit to number 1’s only.

4)Not sure…maybe an external shower connection? or a BBQ gas point? Mine had a 20ltr water tank which I filled up with a hose but tended not to use it.

Fridge sounds like a 2 or 3 way.

Do not attempt to run this on 12v when parked up. It’ll flatten your leisure battery in half an hour or less and not get cold.

Cool it down on mains at home.

Run on 12v when traveling.

Run on gas or 240 when parked up.

Looking at the age of it I would go through ths gas system with a fine tooth comb If confident. /competent. Or pay someone who is.

Is there anything to look for in the cables for them

They come in 1.5mm2 and 2.5mm2, bigger is better. The ones occasionally on offer in Aldi/Lidl are 2.5.

What size of battery do I need?

As big as you can afford and will fit! Does it have filament or LED bulbs? If LED fridge is likely the biggest power drain. Remember you’ll need roughly double your maximum use to avoid prematurely killing the battery.

That sir looks a fine wagon.

That looks cool

If the fridge and boiler are gas and the lights are LED (a cheap change) then a 90ah battery will last a while, but as above, nobody says ‘I wish I has a smaller battery’ so get the biggest that will fit, maybe more than one. Has it got a battery charger? Split chargers don’t do a good job at charging long term, good chargers cost a bit but so does a new battery every season.

Get the gas checked +1, there will no doubt be much sucking of teeth. You should see if there is anything immediately likely to kill you at least even if you don’t bring it up to date.

That looks proper ace!!

Mint 🙂

Alright, a couple of things to think over – especially re: the fridge.
Lights are all old fashioned polar bear murder ones so I will look at swapping for LEDs.
In fact, will probably pick up a mains cable, getting it working and run a meter over it while turning things on and off to figure out the current drain calculations then see about the battery size. Might even be better off paying for a good coolbox and ditching the fridge as I live in a flat and can’t really put the van on mains before leaving for a trip. I’d hoped that I could cool the fridge whilst driving to where I’m going.
I am also unlikely to use proper campsites – more likely to be parked up in forest campsites or laybys near good trails for a couple of days at a time.

A gas engineer owes me a favour, so I’ll get him to give it a once over. It’s not a home made job, but it is old, so worth getting an expert in on.

What is the difference between a battery charger and a split charger?

@Matt – it is old and slow, but has the air of a good donkey about it. It’ll get me where I need to go. And was only £2k which I think was a bit of a good deal.

That’s a dream of mine to get a camper van.

Looks a lot better than what I’ve generally seen for 2k.👍

I’m bloody envious, have a great summer touring around mate.😁

Edit: Split charger charges both main battery and leisure battery I believe. Others on here will confirm.

Just cool it on gas then they are silly quick to cool on gas.

Doesn’t use alot of gas either.

A 6kg cylinder* lasts us about 3 weeks with heating and about 6 weeks without

* We use pump lpg as calor cans are like 25 quid a shot. LPG is 6 quid to fill from empty.

Good looking van that. If in no rush I’d recommend going everywhere slowly – makes a big difference to fuel consumption and puts less stress on the old girl.

Re fridge – def keep it. Other good trick is to fill it with precooked frozen meals (as it stuff you have cooked yourself and frozen into a solid block) and leave them in there to slowly thaw keeping the fridge cool while they do it. Part of your ‘pre flight checks’ as you set off every day (alongside locking cupboard doors etc) is switching to 12v.

Hookup – use when you absolutely have to. It often adds quite a bit to a nights camping and also frequently puts you on the regimented row with all the old boys in campsites. Not having hookup frequently gets you a more scenic spot with the cool kids. Without a solar panel you’ll just have to be frugal with your battery use.

Split charger – a bit of kit that splits the power from the alternator to charge your leisure battery whilst you are driving too.
Battery charger – to charge the battery when on hookup.

Battery – there will probably be a vent port in the battery compartment and a tube to push into a hole in the battery. Do this – nothing like being poisoned to death in your sleep or getting a bit explody on start up after a night charging on hookup. We have a couple of 90ah batteries in parallel but our fridge is only electric so that makes a difference. I’d recommend no less than 80ah, ideally more. Only half of that number is actually usable without bricking it by flattening too far so it does not go as far as you think.

Toilet – not much idea about the freestanding ones, our is a cassette job. They are so much better smell wise than they used to be. Most campsites have a separate area to empty them. Sometimes known as blackwater, not to be confused with grey water. Use the eco chemicals as its better for the environment and some places will only accept your crap if you are using it. Sneaking into public toilets to lob down there is a stealth mission- if you go anywhere where motorhomes are common there will probably be bylaws against doing this and lots of signs. They fill surprisingly quickly.

Grey water – this is the used water from the sink – check out where this goes. Might be a tank under the van, might be a system where you put a container outside and catch it as it comes out under the van or it might be a container under the sink. Again campsite have places to empty this or crack open the tap as you set off and let it dribble out as you drive along.

Invest in a pair of ramps for parking if you value a flat bed and don’t want to be too compromised where you park.

Think about what electrical kit you are taking with you. You may well have a 3 pin plug in there that will work when on hookup. You might consider getting an inverter but be a little careful with cheap ones. Our quasi sine wave one like to destroy electronic gadgets but is fine for electrical stuff. If need to charge lots of usb type devices it is more efficient to use one of the little things that plug into the cigarette lighter socket and give you a couple of usb outputs rather than using a plug in charger.

And wild camp if you can but don’t be an arse about it – turn up at dusk and leave after breakfast.

@convert – very comprehensive info, thanks!

Slowly does it – very true. It’s a 1.9 non-turbo with about 50bhp. Will do 60 on the motorway OK but not much more. Not very aero! I’ll not be in a hurry though – I live a patient life these days.

Hookup – wasn’t really planning on using it much, as like you say, I’m not really into the caravan-club style thing. Also, I am in Scotland so am not limited to caravan parks/campsites.

Inverter etc – that’s a good point. It has a few domestic 3 pin plug sockets in it, but I hadn’t considered that they’d only work on hookup – though that seems obvious now. I think the van is designed around an external hookup as opposed to off-grid style stuff.

@trail_rat – how do you fill a gas can from an LPG pump? Sorry if that’s an obvious question! I am new to this.

That looks cool and retro 🙂

• It looks cool and retro, get yourself a steering lock bar and perhaps a wheelclamp as I can’t imagine the security is up to much!
• Whats the deal with that water tank, check its meant to be down at an angle, and that the exhaust isn’t too close to melt it
• It looks either well cared for, or its had a fresh lick of paint. Have a very tentative look under the arches and sills to see if its a rotbox…if it is, you can limit your investment whilst you enjoy it until it can’t get through an MOT!
• As others have stated, the fridge works best on gas or 240v, so do your initial cooling with gas, 12v sucks lots of power so you should switch it over as soon as you park up. The fridge will probably stop working if you are not parked level. Definitely don’t replace it with a coolbox, you’ll regret it after a hot day at come back to a warmbox.
• Get a monoxide gas detector.
• Get your battery, and a volt meter so you don’t run it below 12.1v (50%).
• If you want to camp ‘offgrid’, you can get battery to battery (b2b) chargers that will suck as much as possible from the alternator and fast charge the leisure battery. Standard trickle charge can take many hours of driving to top up your battery whereas a b2b will keep pushing a full charge until its full (i.e. mine is 30 amps, a Ring RSCDC30 which also can also accept solar panels to keep trickle charging during the day) If you want to be free from hookup, (and the more scenic/cheaper camping pitchs) solar is a massive game changer. My van is sitting outside with full batteries and the fridge has been on for two weeks (pure electric) via 200w of flexible solar panels. It only charges from the engine and solar, it doesn’t have any hookup at all.
• Inverters, I would avoid if possible. They simply convert from 12v to 240v, and then your laptop charger etc just coverts it back to something between 12 and 20v. Quite inefficient, better to spend your money on 12v specific vehicle chargers. Especially as most of your other things probably charge from USB plugs running directly from 12v. I have a little inverter, practically never use it. And it likes breaking electric toothbrush chargers…and makes the mouse bounce all over the place when I try charging a laptop.

You can’t fill a regular gas bottle from.a pump.

I have a refillable bottle from gas it.

They have an 80% max fill cut off built in.

Garages will only let you fill bottles from a vehicle mounted fill point

I have LPG refillable. Its a bit of an expensive upgrade so probably only worth it if you into this campervan lark long term. You can move the system between vehicles when you upgrade, although van conversions often have a tank underneath to save space (if you have a gas locker you’d choose a refillable bottle style). LPG filling stations are also getting rarer as pumps are removed so we normally try to top up before getting anywhere too remote.

I have LPG refillable. Its a bit of an expensive upgrade so probably only worth it if you into this campervan lark long term. You can move the system between vehicles when you upgrade, although van conversions often have a tank underneath to save space (if you have a gas locker you’d choose a refillable bottle style). LPG filling stations are also getting rarer as pumps are removed so we normally try to top up before getting anywhere too remote.

Agreed. I put an underslung lpg in ours too and regret it apart from the space saving. I’m still about 20 refills from actually making a saving and having no ability to fill it up when somewhere remote (Outer Hebridies last year for example) could have been a big hassle if we’d run out.

LPG filling stations are also getting rarer as pumps are removed

Very true, unfortunately. There were two local to me until last year – the cheaper one (Asda) went unmanned which meant no LPG.

I just fitted a refillable gas kit to my lorry last week. I went to fill it at the final remaining local LPG supplier (shell) to find that the pump is out of order and ‘might not be fixed if it costs too much’.

Particularly annoying as I also run a gas powered land rover 🙁

@yourguitarhero at £2k that looks well smart, way better than many for a lot more money.

Those LDV’s were never fast or powerful when new, but who cares when your mooching around anyway? From memory (I worked at three outdoor centres that had Pilot/Sherpa’s and Convoy’s) they are pretty simple things, with a few quirks mechanically. Rust was the killer. They drove like sh*te though!

Every Highland postie had one back in the day…I wonder wth yours being red if it’s a postie conversion?

Rad van 👌😊

LPG filling stations are also getting rarer as pumps are removed so we normally try to top up before getting anywhere too remote

Conversely I find the more remote I get the easier it is to find. …… But that’s Scotland.

The lpg finder app is deffo worth having if you go down that route.

I’d deffo second having a good poke under the front end and checking it’s steel not fibreglass

I’m happy with mine overall, we’ve probably only gone through about 5 tankfuls (100 litres perhaps) so most top ups are about £3! It only runs the cooker and heating. But like Convert, the main advantage to me is it saves valuable space in a van, but this is less important in a motorhome style coachbuilt as the gas locker is normally under a big bench seat or the dead space behind the heater/wardrobe. All my seats are vehicle style so a gas locker would have robbed space from the under bed area for bikes which already holds the fridge, batteries and spare wheel.

Good spot by Spooky on the water tank too – good to see what that’s all about.

Sound like re-fillable won’t be worth it for me at the moment.
I’ll take a peek at the water tank.

@matt – van has a year’s MOT on it, and nothing major about corrosion on the MOT history – mostly things like brake lights not working and some suspension parts needing replaced. It has done 170k though and yes – it drives like a bag of spanners – fishing for gears, pushing hard on the brakes and steering like you’re working out at the gym.

it drives like a bag of spanners – fishing for gears, pushing hard on the brakes and steering like you’re working out at the gym.

Sounds like it’s had loads of work since new then. They didn’t come out the factory that good.

Camper is camper. Who cares about the age long as it’s legal and your having fun. I actually like the old style kinda quirky. The modern fibreglas boxes just lack character

You can get adapters on eBay for filling your gas bottle yourself, £7 or £8 if I remember. Takes the cost down considerably.
A few videos on YouTube about it, some scarier than others. If you’re a bit sensible it’s not hard and you’re better finding a sympathetic small fuel station that’ll not give you any grief. You’ll need to do a bit of calculation depending on the size of bottle you’re filling then as long as you fill from empty each time then you’re sorted.

Sounds really Convienant for filling up on the move.

And not legal.

The plug thing above the water point, if it’s two small holes, one bigger than the other, would be a 12v supply for a Whale water pump so you could fill the tank from a container 👍

Those adaptors, illegal. People say they are simple to use but seeing as the Internet cannot agree on tare weights, filling by weight (LPG is an unknown ratio of Propane:Butane) expansion rate of propane v butane, and the 80% max fill, I think it just proves they are not safe. The last video I saw was a guy claiming all the safety issues were rubbish, but then proceeded to film at the LPG pump and produce a handy stick from the top of the pump to wedge the fill button so he didn’t need to keep the button pressed in!

If you need to do maths AND remember to shut the pump off at the right moment, then the risk of overfilling is probable, and the standard bottles lack the level gauge and safety pressure release valve.

What’s handy for filling I find is a 5l water bottle.

Often the places I fill up have all sorts of magical tap connectors or I can’t get close enough for a hose….

A 5 l bottle has just the right size of neck to fit the filler point nicely and let enough air in to fill quick.

We use our onboard water almost always I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t. – we do have 70 l and I do fill it from the hose at home.

On something that age I might run some puriclean through…..don’t be tempted to Milton it or like wobbliscott you might find your self not using it.

Get a carbon monoxide alarm, please! Not spotted if anyone else has suggested one but it is a good idea.
She looks a great, have fun!

Do not attempt to run this on 12v when parked up. It’ll flatten your leisure battery in half an hour or less and not get cold.

Cool it down on mains at home.

Run on 12v when traveling.

Run on gas or 240 when parked up

Do this with our caravan. Using gas to cool it is some kind of witch craft but it works well. I tend to disconnect tge gas before bed as get a little paranoid!

If you cant cool it on mains before you leave just get all the beer cooled well before you leave and use some cool box blocks in it until you get to a hook up or switch to gas.

CO detector is a good shout!
Have to swing by Screwfix today to get a connector to make up a mains hookup cable anyway. I also have a couple of spare fire extinguishers kicking about so will leave one in there too!

Looks like you got lots of great answers already but if you ever need more specific help and don’t want to spam stw with the endless the questions you’ll no doubt have I’d join the motorhome fun forum. It’s a really well built site and even does fancy things like remembering where you were up to on a thread!

Make sure to ignore all the sub forums on there as it’s full of right wing gammon dross but the motorhome section has been invaluable to us as recent 1st time motorhomers. One very knowledgeable guy even came over to ours to help us out with an issue we had.

I believe your van would be classed a motorhome rather than a campervan with the body type you have. Good luck! We’ll be up to Scotland in ours for some wilding next Spring hopefully but until then we are heading to the continent.

1) Get a 20m 2.5mm cable.

2) 100 amp hours or more! Don’t run the fridge off 12v, use the gas or 240v if you have it. Older 3 way fridges draw a lot from a 12v battery. As you have said convert the lights to led bulbs. Solar is great but is a big investment.

3) Thetford PortaPotti

4) You might want to flush the tank with a Milton fluid solution before using. No reason you can’t fill it up with a clean hose.

I would check the gas and electrics on a van of that age and all the belts, hoses etc. Get some breakdown cover as well which at least tows you off the motorway.

Enjoy the adventure, I’m a little bit jealous!

Camper looks good, any pics of the inside.

After spending five years of mainly off grid holidays, race events and most weekends away.

Get the biggest leisure battery you can fit, its no fun without power and a nuisance when you have to run the engine to top it up.

If you can run to it solar would be top of the list, the latest panels will top up on a cloudy day and you should never run out of battery

We started off with calor lite bottles which were a pain to swap abroad so went with the Safefill gas bottles, easy to get topped up and about a quarter of the cost of calor.

We went with the arctic grade extension lead, a 15m and a 10m, if you are using it in the winter the cable doesn’t kink as much. Don’t keep it reeled when plugged in, have seen a few fire.

Pet hates from camping off grid, especially at races.

Inconsiderate campers running generators through the night.

Van campers running engines when it gets dark trying to keep battery topped up, or early hours of the morning when the battery is almost flat.

Get out as much as you can and enjoy it, cant wait to get back out in ours.

@Tracey – did you convert to SafeFill yourself or get someone to do it for you?
We’ve got  Campingaz 907s in our van but I’d prefer to switch to something better for longer off grid trips.

safefills certainly getting better – when i went to gas it the reports were that it was very difficult to get safefills filled without arguement.

You don’t need to convert, the bottles lift in and out just like the calor ones, we got ours from ebay when their was a 20% off deal. The equivalent size bottle is a bit chunkier than the calor lite but still fits in with loads of room.

Fill up at local Morrison’s with no problems, dont know if you are supposed to but we topped up a half full bottle before last years Alps trip. Something you cant do with the calor lite

Some info here, we did look at all the alternatives and they seemed the best option for our needs.

http://www.safefill.co.uk/

thanks @Tracey

having no ability to fill it up when somewhere remote (Outer Hebridies last year for example) could have been a big hassle if we’d run out.

huh ? it was the outer hebrides that pushed me to go LPG as i couldnt get a refil for my calor ANYWHERE out there. but LPG was easy enough at Stornoway – the two alternatives were carry two calorlites or go – gas it cost 200 quid. that was 10 fills to break even – ive exceeded that.

but we digress.

Interior shots YGH