Carliving.info - Free information about living in cars, vans and campervans.

I like technology. I even like the comforts of home. I figured that there's no need to live without some of the comforts of home. I decided to buy everything that I needed or wanted with the aim of living in a van.

Power supplies.

In order to run all of the electric gizmos I need to supply them with electricity. Thankfully some of them like the DVD player, one of the laptops and and the printer can run directly from the twelve volt power supply. The printer though needs a specialised power jack so I charge it from one of the two power supplies. One of the power supplies is intended to provide power from 3 volts to 12 volts. I can use it to supply power to one of the laptops and some of the palmtop computers. The other power supply can supply from 15 to 24 volts of power. I use it almost exclusively to supply power to my main Acer Laptop.

Three of the ten 12 volt outlets I have installed in the bus to provide power to some of the appliances I run.

Voltage adapters. On the left is the 3-12 volt unit. In the middle is a 12 volt plug and one the right is the 15-24 volt adapter that the Acer computer uses.

Close up of the computer in car power supply.

DVD player.

I wanted to buy a dvd player so instead of buying buying a conventional 240 volt one I ended up buying a portable one designed for use in a car. It has a battery pack and a little 7 inch screen,and even comes with a car cigarette lighter adapter. It means I can watch DVDs inside the Hippie Bus whenever I want to. It uses hardly any power so I can use it for several hours a day if I want to. It is also versatile in that I can use the screen to display pictures from my little multimedia player. It only cost be about $140 from Aldi, that German supermarket which has opened branches down here for a few years now.

The DVD player sitting on top of my house VCR player. It can run off of a battery pack.

Multimedia Player.

The multimedia player is a little beauty as well. I was looking for an Mp3 player to play my music on. I have converted all of my CD collection to Mp3s now that it is legal to do so. Instead of carting around a big mass of CDs I can instead carry around a small collection of Mp3s on the hard drive of the little multimedia player. The multimedia player can not only play Mp3s, but also Windows Media Audio (WMA) files, videos, and display pictures. In addition I can plug it in to my computer and use it as a removable hard drive. It has a USB port and a video in and out as well as head phone jack. It can play music or videos for about three hours before needing to be recharged

This was another purchase from Aldi, from the Medion brand. It does have a couple of features I don't like though. First is that when playing Mp3s the screen stays lit. This uses up power unnecessarily. I am sure that the battery would last a lot longer if the screen blanked when music is playing. Another niggle is that this device requires power input at 5.5 volts. This makes it hard to recharge in a car. I need to use a special transformer and jack set to recharge it. I could plug it in to the inverter but this makes the inverter screech and hum rather nastily. I don't think this is doing the inverter or the player any good, so I am not using this method again.

The multimedia player with none of it's cables plugged in.

Sat Nav.

Another Aldi / Medion product that I recently purchased is a satellite navigation system. These little babies normally sell for about $700 or more but I picked this one up for $350, half price. I not only want it for navigating around my home town and country but I want it for navigating around Europe if I can make it there in the future. A CD with European maps cost $179. Not bad really. I have yet to use the system, but I hope it proves to be useful. I don't think I'll get lost, I'm a very good navigator. I can see that it would be useful in Europe though where I can't read the language much.

12 volt LCD television / 240 volt TV.

This little 7 inch television is used almost exclusively as a monitor for the Hippy Bus's rear view camera. It can however be used for viewing television. I normally don't use it for that though as I have a small 38 centimeter / 14 inch television. The TV needs to be run from the 300 watt inverter I also own.

The LCD TV primarily serves as a monitor for the reversing camera.

With a little tuning though..

It can serve reasonably well as a TV, particularly with the addition of the external antenna plug.

The 240 volt TV running off of the Inverter which is on top of the cupboard above. Note the fans which are powered direct from a 15 watt solar panel. They ensure that there is plenty of fresh air circulating around the van.

Vacuum cleaner.

I find this little 12 volt vacuum cleaner extremely handy. I think personally I was ripped off when I brought it for over $100. It has the tiniest capacity. It is however pretty handy for cleaning up a tiny space like the campervan. Because I am still working in the van, doing a lot of drilling and producing wood dust. The vacuum cleaner is extremely handy for cleaning up dust, dirt, wood shavings and other crap that ends up over the bus. I like that it can also be used for cleaning dust off of my pillows and covers. It is small, compact and first easily in nooks and crannies within the bus. It charges straight off of my 12 volt power supply using a cigarette power supply. It comes with some add ons like a stand up handle and some different nozzles. In reality these are pretty useless so I use it in the standard configuration.

The little vacuum cleaner is one of the most useful things I own.

Solar and dynamo powered torch radio.

This gismo tends to be my main radio. I like the fact that it recharges itself using the solar panel built in to the handle. I can also charge it using a crank handle. It is both a torch and a radio. It can also be powered by external power or batteries. I can run the radio all day just from the juice from the solar cells. It is obviously designed to be used as a bit of survival gear. I picked it up for $9 at a market. The batteries were flat, but they can be easily replaced.

Solar torch and radio. The solar cells in the handle can charge it up.

The torch end.

The other end showing the crank handle.

Coleman Pro-Cat Heater.

This heater is a catalytic heater which came with the campervan purchase. In theory it burns gas cleaner than typical heaters. It produces carbon dioxide instead of carbon monoxide. That does not make it safe to use in an enclosed space however. I still need to ensure that there is sufficient ventilation in the bus. This is not a problem though as I have a permanent vent fitted to one of the windows. I also have a small hole drilled in the floor in the stairwell of the bus. That hole is required by law in campervans fitted with gas systems to ensure that if there is a gas leak that the gas will drain through the hole. I can safely run this heater all night while I sleep without opening any windows. However this is not something that I would do. I have only run it for short periods of time to heat up the interior of the van in the evening and again in the morning.

While it is an efficient heater, it has a couple of points that I do not like. The first of these is that the jack for 3 volts to power the fan from an external power supply causes short circuits. It seems that the plug I'm plugging in to it does not correctly align with what it expects. The problem is, my power jack is the only type that will fit into the hole supplied. I wonder if other people who own Pro-Cats have also experienced this problem. For now I run the fan on batteries, however I will probably hard wire it with a new power jack so I can run the fan via one of my power supplies.

The other problem is that it takes disposable fuel canisters. You can't refill them, you can't have them refilled. You are expected to just thrown them away. Now for some one like me who is very environmentally conscious that's just not good. Stuff the expense of getting one refilled, it is a throw away product. You buy it, use it once and throw it away. Yet it is still capable of performing it's role if only it could be refilled again. There isn't even a depot where you can drop off empty canisters to be recycled. They just go into landfill. Sure the replacements are cheap, but what a waste.

The Pro-Cat initially smelled a bit when I used it. It was a very distinctive smell, like when you use a heater that has had dust gather on it. I hate metallic or oily smells. I was actually seriously considering selling it at a loss and disposing of it because of that smell. I didn't know if this was due to it being new, or to the smell of the gas. I experimented with using it more and found out that the smell was due to dust inside of the heater's interior heating up. When I started to use it I had not used the fan, just the heater unit. With the fan running the heater had no smell problems. It even smelled quite nice.

The Pro-cat heated up the interior of the campervan quite well. From a cold interior to a comfy warm interior only took a short time. As an experiment I lit up the Pro-Cat one night when the thermometer on the campervan was showing just 20 degrees Celsius. That's pretty cool. As in, wearing thick clothing cool, getting under the duna cool, even getting hypothermia cool if you were exposed to it for a number of hours. I timed the burn. At five minutes there was a noticeable difference in temperature. The thermometer was showing a rise of about 5 degrees Celsius. At ten minutes I cut the gas. The campervan was quite warm and cosy. I could have been naked in there and I would not have been cold. My bare feet were okay. In my track suit I was actually quite warm, hot almost. The thermometer though was only showing 26 degrees. It is however stuck directly to a wooden bulkhead, and measured the temperature of the wood. The biggest sign of the temperature change was when I hopped outside into the cold night air. The difference was dramatic. From a toasty warm environment to a chilly cold one.

Despite the dodgy power jack and the non refillable gas canisters, the Pro-Cat is a winner. It is a modern product. It sits stable on the ground with or without the gas bottle. It is not something that can be knocked over easily. Even if you do, the grille on the front will keep the hot burning surface away from objects long enough to give you time to right it again. The fan really spreads the warm air around well. The fan also means you get about a minute of free warm air after you switch it off. It looks good, it works well and it is about as safe as you can get with a gas fueled heater.

When it comes down to it though, I can stay warm using blankets and hot water bottles.

Coleman catalytic heater for use in winter

Water pump.

I have just installed a Shure-flo self sensing water pump. I have to make some modifications to my pipes yet, but I expect that this will be very useful. Once installed and working this will supply mains like water to the van's water taps.

The water pump is bolted on to the underside of the floor. Yes, I know I need to fix that elbow there.

Atwood hot water service.

Being able to enjoy a shower is a great luxury that a lot of us take for granted. Hot water of any sort is a luxury when you are living in a vehicle. I think that hot and cold running water makes a huge difference to your moral. There is nothing more relaxing than a soak in the shower or bath. In order to provide me with hot water I decided to buy a small 23 litre gas hot water service. The one I brought was an Atwood model. Atwood make a large number of small gas hot water services for campervans.