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The Frog Van's Journey Back to the Road Begins

After a bit of a break from regular blogging I'm back with my Frog Van's journey back to the road. Hopefully from here on in I'll be back to regular weekly posts. So, moving on to the van...

In my last update I said I'd start working to get the van back on the road at the beginning of August so the van would be ready to drive in Australia's Spring time. Unfortunately everything got delayed because I got really busy with animation work.

The good side to that is I was able to match the donations to the project with another $500.00 of my own money. Bringing the total budget to $1024.00.

The project got further delayed when I got fairly sick for a couple weeks during the beginning of September - nothing serious, just a really bad cold.

Anyway the first step of the project was to get the van registered, to give me a deadline, as I explain in the video below. (Hope you like the opening animation of the van, using my CafePress store design).



I was very disappointed that, between the last time I started the van up and now, the rear right tyre went flat for no apparent reason and the battery refused to recharge.

Fortunately the spare tyre was okay (though it doesn't have as much tread) so I swapped the flat tyre over.

The battery was no good so I ended up having to buy a reconditioned second hand battery - saving myself approximately $70.00 as a new battery would've been around $100.00-$110.00. Also had to buy some smaller terminal connectors because the new battery had significantly smaller connection points than the previous battery.

I made the video below to show you that the van is now working. I reversed it up onto my back lawn so I could sweep the drive way underneath it and just to turn the tyres after having sat for so long.



The next stage is to take the van to a mechanic, which I hope to do within the next week or so.
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Comments

  1. Mum60September 25, 2012 6:14 PM

    Sounded like the door was going to drop off when you shut it! :-) Was that a ball on the driveway, as I noticed it had gone after? Glad the van is working again. Hope the mechanic can fix it from back firing etc. Hope the battery lasts too with it being a reconditioned one. Hope it's worth the saving money-wise.

    Lawn's looking good. Glad you're well again. I expect you were well looked after.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. TET (David Arandle)September 25, 2012 8:03 PM

      All the door seals are pretty much shot so it sounds really metallic when you shut the doors. Fortunately, despite their condition, water doesn't leak into the van. I know this because I've driven it in heavy rain many times.

      It was a tennis ball on the driveway. I moved the van so I could sweep the dirt off the driveway from under it.

      Delete
  2. Mum60September 27, 2012 6:00 PM

    You're very meticulous! New door seals then when the major things are finished? :-)

    ReplyDelete

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