Garage Size!

[stickman]

We are looking at purchasing a Camper next year but hope to have a garage up in time to keep her warm and dry.

What size garage door is required taking into account the pop top. Any advice would be welcolme!!

[bedstead]

do you know exactly *what* kind of camper ?

i'm going to plump for bay window, based on an analysis of your handwriting, and the fact that they're the only ones i know the size of... six foot five without a pop top, then you've got a choice of bizarro fibreglass boat-type roof adding about two feet (i'm not kidding) down to the svelte westy roof adding about four inches... the side hinging devon roof might be even smaller, but i've gone beyond concentrating tonight...

basically they don't really fit in 'normal' single garages, esp. ones with 'up and over' doors, but you can always do what i had to do and take the door off ; just remember that they're spring tensioned and will try and guillotine your hand off when you remove them... kind of like a giant mechanical venus fly trap.

mike.

or, read your post properly in the first place... you're hoping to build one ? how long's a piece of string etc. but seven foot is about right :rolleyes:

[Clem]

My moderatly lowered non pop top goes in my up and overed doored garage ok. I just need to push it right the way in, and then shut the door and roll it back again to do it.
Its a long term option, for the winter, and would be crap on a regular basis. It also writes off the garage for almost any other storage.

So, all in all, a good job. :rolleyes:

[Bus Doctor]

My westy conversion with it's pop top will go under a 6ft 6" clearance barrier with ease. my own garage is 7ft to the eaves, that gives me a bit of scope for lifting the elevating roof in the garage slightly if I need to. :)

[teedubya]

I am just negotiating a new garage door to take my Autosleeper T25 with pop-top. The vehicle height is around 2.2mtrs (just over 7ft) and the standard max door height is just 7ft. I have plenty of height inside the garage so will probably have to settle for a roller type.
Another option may be to lower the suspension and settle for a 7ft up&over door. :D

[Martha]

I had a "Hormann" up and over section door fitted to my garage last year complete with rubber seal to keep out the dampness! Martha sits quite happily in there with her friend ... the dehumidifier, for company.
Martha is a 71 Devon Moonraker with a "poptop"
She just gets under a 2 metre barrier. :cool:

[bedstead]

bloody hell, replies... it's like a real forum :eek:

upping the ante a little, i've just bought a house with an attached garage with, er, at least five foot eleven headroom... perhaps the previous owner just kept snakes in there, or limbless lizards or somesuch... so what do i do ?

the smart money so far is on me breaking out the industrial sized grinder and hacking a swathe from the path to the back of the garage... sewers be damned, and just a twelve inch step for me to fall up ; drop engines down ; insert comedy vw failure here.

any better ideas ?

i saw the channel tunnel boring machine on ebay but the postage was prohibitive... it's in a conservation area so they'll laugh in my face at any heath robinson style roof extensions... ooh it's a concern...

mike.

[Snowdrop]

Look at http://www.danburymotorcaravans.com, they have dimensions for the (new) campers they sell. I guess other conversions may differ slightly 'cos of the pop tops. Good luck

[Clem]

bloody hell, replies... it's like a real forum :eek:

upping the ante a little, i've just bought a house with an attached garage with, er, at least five foot eleven headroom... perhaps the previous owner just kept snakes in there, or limbless lizards or somesuch... so what do i do ?

the smart money so far is on me breaking out the industrial sized grinder and hacking a swathe from the path to the back of the garage... sewers be damned, and just a twelve inch step for me to fall up ; drop engines down ; insert comedy vw failure here.

any better ideas ?

i saw the channel tunnel boring machine on ebay but the postage was prohibitive... it's in a conservation area so they'll laugh in my face at any heath robinson style roof extensions... ooh it's a concern...

mike.

Ive a plan.

Get some spindles, and remanufacture them so theyre sort of lower. Then put an adjuster into an old beam, you may need also to narrow the beam at this point, for clearance, this will ensure the front end will fit in. Oh, you may end up modifying the front arches and cab doors to obtain correct tyre clearance. Lo profile tyres at this point will also help.
The back end is easy. Just either modify the existing rear spring plates, or make new from scratch, in a dog-leg design. This will have the effect of lowering the rear end, but not affect ride quality. The only issue may be removal of rear wheel, so some sort of removeable rear wheel arch would be a good idea.
Any way you'll end up with a van that will easily go inton the garage.
Finally, you could remove the pop-top? Theres a guy up north, I recall on Volkszone, who is looking to swap a solid top with a factory pop top ..... this will entail reving both roof section, best done at the body swage line, and rewelding in place.
When alll this is done, you'll be in and out of your garage without a care in the world.

Good luck.

[bedstead]

hmm, i think i understand what you're suggesting... some sort of elaborate suspension lowering device, whereby instead of me actually increasing the size of the aperture through which the van must pass, i instead decrease the actual size of the van itself, by taking up some of the 'slack' in volkswagen's admittedly *generous* ride height allowance ?

an intriguing solution, which you've perhaps tried out yourself ?

if so, is it the sort of work that a keen but frankly hapless amateur mechanic could undertake, or would i be better off taking the van to a local back-street garage and having the owner's sixteen year old son lash me something up in his lunchbreak ?

all this raises a somewhat paradoxical situation of course, whereby i cannot undertake any 'lowering' work until i've got the van into the garage, but i can't get the van into the garage until i've undertaken some kind of lowering work... it's hardly schroedinger's cat but it's giving me a few sleepless nights, i can tell you :(

mike.

[Clem]

An odd conundrum.

Are you looking for winter or regular storage?

If simply winter then invest in 4 skateboards, remove the pop top and then remove each wheel at a time and lower the van onto the 4 aforementioned skateboards. Be careful to brace the van body during this to avoid warping of the chassis. Then remove the pop top, and you find that the van will probably fit in, and then work can commence. Store the wheels under the pop top in you gargen, noting which wheel matches which hub/disc as appropriate, of course.

If at this stage the van still wont fit in, the Id quickly erect some tarpaulin lean to, under which the work could be undertaken. On non windy dry days.

[baldfatgit]

Oh come on guys its simple..............




Fit a pop top to your garage!!! :D :D :D

Pop it up - drive in, then pop it down :p

[Mechanoid]

Ive a plan.

Get some spindles, and remanufacture them so theyre sort of lower. Then put an adjuster into an old beam, you may need also to narrow the beam at this point, for clearance, this will ensure the front end will fit in. Oh, you may end up modifying the front arches and cab doors to obtain correct tyre clearance. Lo profile tyres at this point will also help.
The back end is easy. Just either modify the existing rear spring plates, or make new from scratch, in a dog-leg design. This will have the effect of lowering the rear end, but not affect ride quality. The only issue may be removal of rear wheel, so some sort of removeable rear wheel arch would be a good idea.
Any way you'll end up with a van that will easily go inton the garage.
Finally, you could remove the pop-top? Theres a guy up north, I recall on Volkszone, who is looking to swap a solid top with a factory pop top ..... this will entail reving both roof section, best done at the body swage line, and rewelding in place.
When alll this is done, you'll be in and out of your garage without a care in the world.

Good luck.

Wouldn't it be easier to just let the tyres down?!