Camper Van Conversions – A Morning With Mabel
One of the markets that our engineers work within is camper van conversions. Whether it’s a double bed , rock and roll seat, kitchen unit or rear storage drawer, they all need extracting for use or maintenance.This puts us in direct contact with the growing number of VW T5/6 enthusiasts who like to know they have the right kit in their beloved vans.
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Hence the morning with Mabel: Gillian and Paul, along with Brandy the dog, paid us a visit at our Wrexham facility this week. With them was their pride and joy, Mabel the VW T5. Paul had contacted us, after Sliding Systems were recommended on a VW forum, needing some technical advice on a broken rock and roll bed slider. It wasn’t long before Mabel sat proudly in our car park looking for a little TLC.
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Our Technical Director, Jon Lye was at hand and took control of the project….. ”There’s a diversity of slides used by the manufacturers for these vans and we can deal with requirements to suit all budgets within our extended ranges. For beds there’s the economy route and hope it will outlast the warranty type of slide – our ULF D is the top end of this, followed by mid range which offers a more rigid structure- something similar to to our TR7619 300kg slide. Then at the top we have the cold drawn steel DTS40 from our Professional Range which with a low 40mm profile; so strong it can travel 120% of the bed length and still hold 220kg without supporting legs”
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Paul wanted to upgrade the slides but the conversion to the metal framework would have been problematic. We decided to fit the ULF D length 700mm with a 750mm stroke. The sequential mechanism on the slides should prevent the damage they had previously experienced with a standard 80kg rolled steel slide unit. In future he will look closely at the quality of the slides, which will give him a good idea of the overall craftsmanship of the bed.
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So a morning with Mabel broke up the usual routine of projects with fire engines, military vehicles and trains and we all got a chance to chat about camper vans, better weather and holidays……Maybe our Technical Director may be finally swayed to get a van of his own?
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If you would like to contact a rock and roll bed specialist manufacturer who uses our extreme duty DTS40 slides with over travel for double beds, please contact us at enquiries@gsfslides.com. We will be happy to connect you.
