The Roof

After weeks, maybe even months of looking for a “screw grommet” I finally got somewhere.

For the first time I’ve noticed, using the Internet actually caused more of a problem than it solved. The Internet is great at finding things from a million places around the world, but if you don’t know exactly what you’re looking for, it can be a problem. Just looking at images doesn’t always help either.

I still don’t know that I have found. I’m just they’re call screw grommets. They’re a piece of plastic with an 8mm insert that spreads out when you insert a screw in to it.

Went to an auto trim place, that were useless. Another local auto trim place, no help there either. A smash repair place, didn’t have the part I was after, but was at least helpful and took me to where he stored all his trim clips.

Then I went to an auto accessories place, they had an entire wall full of plastic containers with trim clips and that was where I found what I was looking for. The guy didn’t know what they were called or what they were for, but they were exactly what I needed. So, I took the 10 that he had. Now that I had an example, of what I needed it was easier to explain to other people what I was after.

I went to another smash repair place about 10 minutes away and show them what I needed. Yes. Got another 10.

The small plastic screws that came with them weren’t long enough to mount my roof so I got some longer bolts.

Now I has all the pieces I needed to hang my roof, without drilling holes.

I went back to work and measured the factory hold that already existed in the body of the van. Each hole mapped out to the millimetre.

Even tough I probably didn’t need to I drilled pilot holes in the Foilboard and Corflute. Using masking tape I mounted my magic clips to the holes I’d chosen to use in the body. And screwed in the roof. Everything was almost perfect. I did have some problems with a couple of the holes in the middle of the roof, but it was 3am and I was starting to fade. After a few hours sleep and another attempt I got them in.

The roof is slightly “wavy”. I think if I had of used the Corflute so the “flute” was across the van, instead of front to back, it would have made it a bit more rigid and probably stopped the middle of the roof from sagging slightly. It isn’t bad enough for me to redo!

I didn’t want to take the roof off after I’d got it up. Even though the whole point of the way I’m building things is for the purpose of being able to easily dismantle and reassemble all the parts.

Next, I have to spray paint the holes in my floor so it can be permanently set in place. I also have to mount the fan — which meant the roof is coming down. Then it’s the internals I guess — main thing being the bed and somewhere to sit.