[fitek]

Quick background: Had a 144" WB high roof Sprinter crew van for 4 years. Got it right before my son was born so I did the interior conversion in extreme haste. The wife tolerated it but was never very happy with it. Quite cramped for 3 and having all the aesthetics of my freshman year dorm room and a cargo van rolled into one. My windsurfing habit tends to soak everything in salt water and mud too. I talked to a boat builder about redoing it right and it was just going to suck trying to get everything to fit into a 144" with five seats so I got a extended length transit wagon.

Major accomplishments w/ the Sprinter:
1) Asphalt type sound deadening added to cover 70% of interior surface area, except firewall. Added insulation too. Way quieter, less file cabinet on wheels feel.
2) Recycled cabinets for storage
3) Storage for windsurf gear, MTB, and "office" space for work
4) DIY sound system came out pretty darn good

I'm heading out for a long road trip in a few days so I decided to get the new T350 to an acceptable state for habitation given I only have a couple evenings. I slept on the carpeted floor on the drive from Vegas to home and it sucked.

First off, the seats had to go. The rear row comes out easy with the easy pull latches, but the other seats need a screw driver or some sort of hook to pull on the metal latch underneath. Rock it forward and lift up. Where to put all the seats... will figure that out when I get back. My shop is now filled with seats.

Next, there has to be some way to carry wed and muddy stuff around without making the carpet disgusting. I decided to put down some sort of floor to create a barrier-- some underlayment with vinyl on top. I scored a bunch of free vinyl flooring when I tried to shoot a 3 pointer with a dirty diaper at an open dumpster and missed. Dumpster was filled with brand new vinyl flooring, more than I could possibly use. Stroke of luck! I went looking for luan at HD but found a paper/wood product with a water resistant barrier for $10 per 4x8 sheet. I decided not to secure this to the floor, it would just be floating. We'll see how that works. If it doesn't some stainless screws should attach fine to the floor...

I had my handyman assistant come by last night and we traced the wheel wells and other bits onto the sheets. The wagon interior is about 69" wide so we just overlapped two 4x8 sheets. We then cut out the wheel wells and other features. It fit. We left an inch of overlap with the plastic threshold near the rear doors.

The vinyl flooring comes in 4ft lengths. I bought the wrong glue. I got white liquid nails because it has worked well for me in the past. It takes too long to set and white glue comes up in the gaps between the vinyl "boards." A brown sharpie will fix that. We ran out halfway and used a general purpose bathroom adhesive I had lying around that worked great. Also in white. Shoulda bought clear.

First, a roll of vinyl would have been easier, but we had "boards". Don't put them down in a pattern. Do it randomly. Unless you like your floor to look like a checkerboard. Start from one end and go to the other, any excess you cut off and take back to the beginning to fill in the gaps. Easy.

The boards secured with liquid nails kept floating apart after a few minutes. I think in a normal room, the walls would provide some compression. We held them in place by lying a plywood sheet down and then laying a washing machine on top.

Took four hours.

For extra credit, I'll see if I can build a cabinet to go along one side. Looks like we'll be sleeping on mats on the floor for now, but at least we won't sleep diagonally (like in the shorter sprinter) or on top of D rings or seat rails.

For the record, the base wagon is pretty darn quiet already vs the Sprinter, so I'm debating whether a full deadening and insulation job is worth it. I can hear a bit of thudding when going over bumps, but I suspect that can be fixed with some spot fixes.

 

[coachtone]

Great Start! I have been debating wether to go with a sprinter or a transit. The biggest debate is that the sprinter comes in the crew option and the transit doesn't. I currently have a ford E250 with 303,000 with the original engine and transmission, so I'm definitely leaning towards ford. I have read horror stories about the sprinter and smog issues, but there are many aftermarket parts for the sprinter. On the otherhand the transit is more servicable, two thumbs up for eco boost engine, just gotta pull some seats out of the passenger model. What engine do you have? How do you like it?
I'm slightly concerned about the side airbags on the transit and what I will be able to build inside the van? Keep up the pictures, I haven't seen any T350 passenger builds, so this is extremely useful info you are sharing. Thanks!

 

[fitek]

The Ford is far more refined. I prefer the Mercedes V6 diesel however vs the Ford diesel, although the latter gets great mileage. The Ford transmissions are smoother but that Mercedes diesel is very linear and I love the sound of it. I'd only opt for the Sprinter if you want the v6 diesel or towing ability.

I think it's a no brainer to get the passenger van if you need more than two seats. The passenger van seems to get a 3k-4k premium over cargo. You'll pay 2-3k for two aftermarket captains chairs and another 1k on windows. Not worth the headache IMO if you can afford a $40,000 van. You can always sell some seats to recoup some money. You also get a finished interior from the start and AC/heat ducting. And airbags.

Remember the Sprinter crew van is a cargo van with a bench and two windows. This always drove my wife nuts. It's very spartan.

One other thing. The 3 across behind the driver/passenger is a bit annoying for access to the rear. I'm going to swap a 2 seater bench into this position; not an option in the Sprinter. I left the jump seats in place for when I need to carry more people.

 

[fitek]

I took off the plastics on the driver side from the 3rd row back and applied Stinger Roadkill and a closed cell foam.

Neither product requires a heat gun and cut easily with a razor and scissors. I previously used an asphalt based product in my Sprinter which ate up razors fast and needed a heat gun... what a pain.

The rap test turned out great. I aimed for 50% coverage but probably only got 35-40%. Seems good enough. The Sprinter has lots of large flat panels which I found required 50-70% coverage to stop sounding tinny, whereas the Ford has "ribs" and connections between the outer sheet metal and interior that make it less resonant from the start.

Onto the cabinet...

 

[fitek]

I started the cabinet. It will be top loading. It will go along the driver side of the van from several inches forward of the rear AC unit to as far forward as will still allow me to use a 3rd row seat (which is about six inches behind the seat track by my measurements... it would be better to get a seat in there to verify but it's just me and my 3 year old son and we can't lift a row of seating into the van ). The overall length is about 69.5"

One down side of needing to get a 3rd row in is that I cannot fit a 13x13" milk crate forward of the wheel well. Leaving 13" open after the wheel well requires the cabinet to come within 3" of the seat mounting which is not quite enough.

The cabinet comes out from the wall about 19-20". This leaves me a few inches past the rear AC unit to leave a hole in the bottom of the cabinet for large pass through items (I'm thinking windsurfing masts specifically).

The windows are about 31" from the floor so I do not want the height of the cabinet to block the windows. I made it about 30" high to leave an extra inch for whatever lid I devise.

The stock wagon plastics protrude about 3/4" from the lower wall (for cup holders and the cover over the cables which run below the window. I used some cutting board plastic scraps to shim the cabinet away from the wall.

After insulating, I removed some of the plastic rivets securing the "wall" to the van. There is one row which runs just above teh wheel well. I inserted 5/16"x3" bolts from the rear side to secure the cabinet. I hope I will be able to tighten nuts onto this. In my Sprinter, I did this by using two nuts and threadlocker instead of a normal locknut. Use a shim behind the wood, but leave it out while tightening the nuts. Thread one nut on until it's fairly tight, then insert the shim with a hammer to get it really tight. Add thread locker and put a second nut on to lock the first nut. Over 3 years only one nut ever came loose.

The frame building is straightforward as I'm just making a long box. For skin, I'll likely use 1/4" plywood on the top and ends. Since I want a bed off the ground, I took an idea from JP4's minimalist build and purchased two 69" aluminum motorcycle ramps. These are 15" wide each. Notice something? Two of these put together are almost exactly the dimensions of my cabinet's front face. I will bolt these ramps together and then add hinges to attach to the cabinet. When down, they close the cabinet. When up, I have a bed that actually perfectly spans from the wall to the jump seats. I'm just going to use saw horses to hold the bed up for now. They make handy benches and tables for camping anyway.

 

[klp]

Looks good! Can you post up some pics of your bed/shelf setup when done? I am a visual learner lol.

I am curious why you didn't do the firewall in your Sprinter. I am in process now of sound insulation and I feel like that will really take motor/tranny sounds down.

 

[fitek]

klp, by the time I worked my way forward to the firewall in the Sprinter, I was out of patience. I'd already had the dash apart a couple of times for electronics stuff and I figured I'd get back to it later, and that later never came.

Updated progress pictures attached. I made a box right before the first camping trip. Not show are the two "lids" which I carpeted and put on top. My wife slept on this as it is 1 inch too short for me (oops). The cabinet is only partially useful since it was missing the flip up long side, so on left handed turns the contents would spill out.

I finally got that on which is good because we're going camping again in a few days. I have yet to get the carpetting on it but think it will look much better at that point. I plan to use the milk crates I use for organization to hold it up for now.

 

[fitek]

Also, since we're sleeping on top of the doors on top of the cabinet, I couldn't attach regular cabinet door handles. I just used some straps screwed to the underside.

 

[fitek]

One other note. Folks are complaining about the built in inverter, but I've been using it extensively and it works OK. True, I can't run my 1500 watt espresso machine or angle grinder from it, but it has powered a couple of laptops and cell phone chargers and even my small tube guitar amp at the same time without any problems. I had a "150 watt" inverter (which is what this is) that I installed in my pickup years ago and it would shut down on laptops that required extra juice (ie quad core with depleted battery, etc). This one seems to be able to run a couple Macbook Pros and phone chargers all at once w/ no problem.

The location of the outlet next to the driver is inconvenient but I purchased one of those big 4 foot surge protectors from HF for $25 and attached it to the floor behind the bench seat. The cable is long enough to route around the wall and then under the drive seat to the plug.

At this point I don't think I'll install a bigger inverter, probably just get a small generator when I come across a deal.

 

[DrJean]

One other note. Folks are complaining about the built in inverter, but I've been using it extensively and it works OK. True, I can't run my 1500 watt espresso machine or angle grinder from it, but it has powered a couple of laptops and cell phone chargers and even my small tube guitar amp at the same time without any problems. I had a "150 watt" inverter (which is what this is) that I installed in my pickup years ago and it would shut down on laptops that required extra juice (ie quad core with depleted battery, etc). This one seems to be able to run a couple Macbook Pros and phone chargers all at once w/ no problem.

The location of the outlet next to the driver is inconvenient but I purchased one of those big 4 foot surge protectors from HF for $25 and attached it to the floor behind the bench seat. The cable is long enough to route around the wall and then under the drive seat to the plug.

At this point I don't think I'll install a bigger inverter, probably just get a small generator when I come across a deal.

Is the inverter pure or modified sine wave dyk? I can't find anyone who knows...but I haven't taken possession of my van yet to find specs.

 

[thirddoor]

I understand that it is modified, not pure sine wave.

 

[DrJean]

I understand that it is modified, not pure sine wave.

Yeah I figured as much... I probably need to replace it or just add a pure sine wave inverter ... too many delicate electronics to ruin with the square wave, imo. Thanks for reply.

 

[fitek]

I'm sure it's modified sine wave. I dont think they would have bothered with a pure sine wave 150 watt. I power an audio recording interface off it and it is noisy too (no more than any other modified sine). I use a rack mount power conditioner which sort of helps.

 

[fitek]

I removed the folding bed. I was never able to get the edges smooth and tore a hole in my favorite shorts. What I ended up doing was using the folding platform part as the top to a wooden box that slides in next to the cabinet. The removable box holds all my windsurf gear, since I only need it a few months out of the year.

I used nylon straps as handles for the top of the cabinet, but this week one totally failed and the other started coming apart. I'm thinking of sacrificing a cheap nylon guitar strap (which has reinforcements around the hole) as handles.

I strapped a rackmount stand between the cabinet and the bench seat. Conveniently, an orange home depot bucket fits perfectly beneath, where I throw all the little odds and ends I need randomly. I'm thinking a plastic organizer box would be better and I can have a place to leave a muddy pair of shoes etc.

I carry three bikes normally, a BMX, MTB, and my son's bike. I've been leaving them upside down and strapping the rear wheels to the rear jump seat with tie downs so they don't turn into missiles in a crash, but hoping to come up with something prettier that doesn't leave the jump seat covered in mud.