{"id":153,"date":"2019-08-11T01:00:15","date_gmt":"2019-08-11T01:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/?p=153"},"modified":"2021-04-15T14:11:58","modified_gmt":"2021-04-15T14:11:58","slug":"garage-door-removal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/?p=153","title":{"rendered":"Garage Door Removal"},"content":{"rendered":"

A lot of these delivery trucks come with rollup rear doors. It may be great for a delivery truck but not so much when you\u2019re converting it into a tiny home. The garage door takes up quite a bit of space along the ceiling of the interior of the van. They do make these with hinged barn doors but I would say the rollup garage door configuration is more common.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"IMG_0558\"<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve installed several garage doors in the past. There is a big spring that assists in the lifting of the door that you want to be careful of while removing it. It\u2019s under a lot of tension and could potentially be dangerous when it lets loose. Going about the removal in an expeditious way, I partially closed the door to use it as a shield, reached in, and cut the cables from the outside. The spring let loose with a loud racket as it was unwinding and the cables were whipping around inside the van. Now I had the full weight of the door unassisted by the spring. I took the end stops off the track and pulled the door off into the interior of the van. You may want help for this as it is heavy.<\/span><\/p>\n

I never wanted a rear roll up door on a step van but it actually turned out to be a good thing. Once it was removed I had a giant opening that I could frame in however I wanted.<\/span><\/p>\n

I decided to offset the opening for a 32\u201d hinged door (that I will later build). Putting the door opening slightly to one side would allow me room to install a 32 inch one piece fiberglass shower unit along the back corner of the van. I also had just enough room on the other side for a small 5,000 btu window air conditioning unit.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"F7CCC882-1077-42AF-A4C9-02DA82D3F594\"<\/p>\n

I used 1\/2\u201d treated plywood for the exterior sheathing and sealed everything real good around the perimeter. I thought about doing something fun like covering the back wall with cedar shingles, then adding a flower box, and a fancy door to make it look like a little house. But I decided it might draw too much attention. So I am going to cover it with white aluminum sheeting. I would like to be able park it in unconventional urban camping locations without drawing too much attention. The more it looks like a boring delivery van the better. I have been woken up by the cops several times in the middle of night while sleeping in camper vans. They are always polite and I\u2019ve never gotten a ticket, but I\u2019d like to avoid that as much as possible…<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe potter knows he plays with clay but works with space, For the use of the bowl is its empty space.<\/p>\n

It is the same with the room, Made whole by the emptiness between the walls.<\/p>\n

Remember that something is not everything. Nothing is also essential.\u201d<\/p>\n

~Lao Tzu<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A lot of these delivery trucks come with rollup rear doors. It may be great for a delivery truck but not so much when you\u2019re converting it into a tiny home. The garage door takes up quite a bit of space along the ceiling of the interior of the van. They do make these with … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Garage Door Removal”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=153"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":347,"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153\/revisions\/347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vandwelling.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}