Our Touring Past

Well the weather is getting warmer and we have a few historic caravan weekends to attend over the next few months so I thought I had better re fit the fly screen to the Sunliners roof hatch. Our Sunliner had the original flyscreen removed at some stage, and the previous owner had used velcro to stick a flyscreen to the ceiling.
I removed the roof hatch to see what of the original fittings that were still there, and I also had a look at a very original Sunliner that is owned by a friend of mine to compare and see what was missing.



There is meant to be a small strips of timber around the inside edge of the hatch, where the flyscreen is stapled to. I then milled up some 15 mm x 12 mm baltic pine with a small rebate along one edge. The small sections of timber were riped down and the rebate cut in, then the strip was cut off the larger stock.
( saves getting your fingers a little to close to the saw blade. ) I also used baltic pine which is a soft timber and will take staples easily.



The strips were then painted and when dry they were cut to lenght and screwed to the inside edge of the roof hatch.



All of the timber strips in place.



I then hade to make up a small frame out of 6 mm galvanised steel rod that the fly screen gets threaded through and then clips down to the roof of the van



This is how the steel frame gets clipped down.



While I was doing the job I decided to make up 8 new clips that hold the frame to the roof.

The next part of the job is to measure the inside of the timber strips in the roof hatch, mine worked out to be 3.2 m around the 4 sides. I then added 50 mm for a lap on the join.

I then worked out that the screen would need to be 120 mm wide from the metal frame to the timber strips plus 25 mm to form the stiched up pocket.
The screen was then threaded on the rod and the corners were bunched up on the rod to form a neat corner which gets fixed to the timber strips.
Starting at the front of the hatch in the middle, the screen is then stapled to the timber working along the sides to the back.
Once this is done it is a simple matter of refitting the roof hatch to the van and seating the rod evenly on the van, with the clips bent over to hold it down firmly.

Hi Richard,

I don't suppose you have the specs for the original brackets? I am going to have to get them made as our hatch is fixed with no mechanism.

Cheers

Cameron

Hi CamJ
Sorry I dont have the specks for the original brackets, but I could give you the measurements from a bracket that I have as a spare.
Cheers.

Richard wrote:Hi CamJ
Sorry I dont have the specks for the original brackets, but I could give you the measurements from a bracket that I have as a spare.
Cheers.

That would be great Richard thank you

Hi CamJ
Give me a couple of days and ill email it to you.
Cheers.