TOWING AN UPFIT T1N SPRINTER: YOU NEED TO KNOW THIS STUFF

The story I tell below, I already knew it.  And I knew that everyone who has experience with T1N Sprinter towing knows it, if they happen to be upfitted.  But here it is in detail for the record, so that it will hopefully save someone else some pain, anguish and expense:

1. T1N upfits can never, ever, EVER be dragged.  They have to be flat-bedded.  Whatever they have in their rear ends cannot be subjected to a near-ground experience, be it a generator, water tanks, whatever.  If it's a T1N upfit, by definition it's packed with stuff under there.  Just forget the whole idea of dragging it.  
2. Every time you call a tow, even if you are successful in getting a flat-bed on first request, you are probably going to get one which is almost unworkably small.  The one shown in the pics below can take up to a 22 foot vehicle and 10,000 pounds, and that's typically what they send in scenarios like the one I had today.  BUT - and this is the important part - inexperienced tow operators often don't know that they need really, really big shims to accomplish a successful tow of a 22' upfit T1N Sprinter.

It's that simple.  Shims, or you're screwed  - take your pick.  

By shims, I mean lengths of really heavy lumber, preferably hardwood because we are talking about one ton per tire, which can shallow up the tow bed angle enough to get this kind of job successfully done.

Let me walk you step by step through my mishap so that you can understand exactly what I mean.

So this afternoon, I'm heading east on TX-71 between Bastrop and Smithville when all of a sudden, my engine blows up, basically.  By the grace of God, I manage to get safely off the highway.

How many times have I seen this particular view?  Ugh.

If your T1N unexpectedly blows up for no apparent reason despite the thousands of dollars of bulletproofing you've done on it, the best thing you could do is get your lead mechanic on the phone ASAP.  For me, that is Joel Sell, aka Million Mile Sprinter.

I emailed Joel a 6-second video of the engine plus a description.  Clearly it lost turbo, but it didn't feel to me like a normal turbo issue.  The van was running rough like I've never seen it do, and I had even less functionality at my disposal than I would during a regular limp home mode (LHM).  I've driven a hundred miles in LHM.  It's ugly, but it can be done.  This thing I was confronted with today... I was never going to make it down the road. 

OK, so, Joel's recommendation was to flat bed it the hell out of there.  I concurred.  I got with my roadside assistance (I use Good Sam) and arranged for a tow.  

It actually showed up as a flat-bed, but not the larger size I was hoping for.  Technically, this size can haul a T1N Sprinter as I said.  It's just a poor idea to try.

You can immediately sense a departure angle issue. 

Incidentally, I'm not revealing the tow operator, because I feel bad for the guy.  He was a really nice guy and he tried his best, but he was young and inexperienced, and he didn't have the right materials in his kit.  I'll tell you what - he will be a lot more experienced when he wakes up tomorrow vs. waking up this morning.

OK, so, both the terrain and the substrate were favorable for the load-out despite the departure angle problem.  The van's skid plates dug in, but this part of it was do-able without too much drama, as you can see here.

Uh-huh.  You see the problem.  That angle is just way too unforgiving. 

In this next pic, you see what a T1N looks like on the back of this kind of flatbed.  It's really too big even if it's legal.

There's just too much hanging off the back of that tow truck.

Because I was remaining overnight with my van, Freightliner would not allow me within their fenceline.  Therefore, the tow operator had to deposit this load on the public street in front of Freightliner.  That's where things got ugly, because the off-loading environment was not as forgiving as the on-loading environment had been.

Uh-oh.

I say again:  I haven't spent the last 4.5 years on internet forums for nothing.  WE KNOW from experience that we need shims for this.  I went into the Freightliner business, and scrounged up what wood scraps I could find.

There's a little piece of wood, but that's not going to get this job done. 

Not this either, although that was a nice piece of hardwood dunnage.

Next!  Nope; not this either.

Here's a close-up showing the skid plates and how they were carving out their own little trenches in the asphalt.  On an ordinary day, I would have gotten down on the ground with my wrench and removed those skid plates.  But once the thing is in tow under someone else's control, for liability reasons, I can't touch it.  So we were stuck with this status quo.  

Then things went from bad to worse, as this picture suggests.  Do you see how there is a GAP between the bottom of the flatbed and the top of the pavement?  That's because, without proper shims, the operator had no choice but to basically roll the tow truck out from under the T1N Sprinter.  This is highly dangerous, but given the materials at hand, it was difficult to identify an alternative in the moment

It was not going that badly, until he lost control of it.  Remember, the Sprinter has to have its transmission in neutral during this process.  And it's on this angle.  So, without his ability to keep tension on the tow line, that Sprinter is going for a ride under the power of nobody.  Which is exactly what it did.  It dropped off the flat bed, rolled backwards, and plowed arse-first into a Freightliner that happened to be parked at the curb behind us.  It literally bounced off the Freightliner and landed in the position you see here.

I have to have my husband evaluate this further, but at first glance, the score was Sprinter 1, Freightliner 0.  The Freightliner's bumper wasn't nearly as robust as the custom hitch carrier that my husband had welded up to be as strong as a proverbial brick shit house (excuse my language, but there's no other way to put it).  The bumper cover ended up askew.  Do you see how it's gapping at the far left, more so than on the right side under the headlight?   Uh-huh. 

Anyway, frankly I'm glad the Freightliner was there to serve as our collision post, because I'm not sure where my Sprinter would have stopped rolling otherwise.  

My front end (ground effects) was also damaged by the tow cable during this run-away event.  It's nothing that can't be fixed, but it's a pain. 

Fiberglass mess.

MORAL OF THIS STORY:  T1N SPRINTER TOWS NEED SHIMS IF THEY LOADED ONTO THE SMALLER FLAT BED TRUCKS.  WEIGHT COUNTS FOR ALMOST NOTHING IN THIS ANALYSIS - IT'S ALL ABOUT GEOMETRY.

When roadside assistance is paying the bill, the tow companies are going to want to send the smallest flatbed they can to do this job, and it's a penny-wise pound-foolish decision.  Whatever they save in equipment costs, they are highly likely to incur ten-fold in damages.  Unless they carry really long heavy wooden shims, stuff like this is always going to happen.  

Of course I knew that years before today, and obviously after today I'm going to consider transporting MY OWN shims, possibly under the chassis.  Because my van, you see, keeps breaking down.  No matter how hard I try, nor how much money I spend on it, it just keeps happening.  So far, at least.  Maybe when I finally get to Million Mile Sprinter later this summer, I can finally make some bulletproofing headway.

Oh, and by the way, I don't know what's wrong with it yet.  I'm camped out in front of a Freightliner that is unknown to me, in a city that is not mine, waiting until they open in the morning so that they can look at it. 

REPLACING A PILOT BUSHING IN A 2006 MERCEDES SPRINTER

By way of explanation for this blog post, I'd first like to reproduce my corresponding animated entry from Instagram:

Rant:  Multiple times, I have challenged both local mechanics and online forums (more than one!) to HELP ME CREATE A LIST OF EVERY TINY PART THAT WILL DISABLE OUR VAN WHEN IT INEVITABLY FAILS DUE TO AGE.  I would gladly pay someone to replace ALL such parts preemptively, if only they could be systematically identified!!  But all my efforts to date have been an absolute failure in this regard.  Seriously – I’ve taken this van to an MB shop and explicitly said, “Please replace EVERYTHING you think might fail, because one way or another, I will be doing those replacements, and I’d prefer to do them in one fell swoop right now.” With all the expertise I’ve tapped to date, every set of suggestions has totally missed the mark, including at MB.  Our latest headache is the failure of this $10 part that nobody called to my attention previously – but it isn’t even a $10 failure, it’s really a 3-cent failure because it’s the o-rings *ON* the $10 part that are the real problem.  This despite paying MB for a transmission servicing just 16 months ago!!  How do I surmount this barrier to efficient T1N Sprinter ownership? Maybe @millionmilesprinter will be the one who develops that elusive comprehensive list and offers that preemptive service to those of us who don’t want to keep repairing, and repairing, and repairing, ugh (fingers crossed).  

This replacement has been covered by numerous YouTubers and forum participants (the offending part is sometimes called a nag plug or transmission adapter housing - see here).  I just wanted to throw in my own pics and observations to round out the efforts of those who have come before me.

So what's the very first thing you do when confronted with the fact that your transmission has been leaking for an indeterminate period of time?  You check the oil level.  But guess what?  Mercedes Benz doesn't provide you with a dipstick.  Not if you own a T1N Sprinter, that is.

Why on earth would they not include such a basic piece of equipment?!

This is why.  "MB Workshop Only".  Which might not be such a bad idea if they were competent and could be trusted as a result.

It's because they don't want DIYers working on these transmissions.  But guess what??  I paid a Mercedes Benz shop several hundred dollars to service this transmission just 16 months ago.  Obviously they didn't do it properly if it began leaking fluid so soon.  

Listen to The Picard.

So then what do you do in a situation like this?  Well, having no idea how much oil leaked out of the transmission, you can't risk driving with too little, and you can't get it fixed unless you drive it to a place where it is fixable (I was not going to pay for a flatbed tow because of this fiasco).  So you take an educated guess.

Ultimately, our educated guess looked like this, which we found out several days later when an aftermarket dipstick arrived from Amazon.

Here's the description of that dipstick as it appeared on Amazon:  TRANSMISSION DIPSTICK TOOL w/INSTRUCTIONS & FREE LOCKING PIN Mercedes 722.6 Transmissions – Replaces OEM 140589152100

It takes a while to get the hang of this dipstick.  I can see why MB would not want uneducated DIYers trying to mess with it, because it's easy to get an erroneous reading.  But with enough iterations on both hot and cold engine states, you can get the "feel" of when you are getting a good reading.

It does not insert all the way in like an engine oil dipstick does.

OK, now on to the leak itself.  @MillionMileSprinter told me in an email that there was about a 99% chance that the pilot bushing was the source of the leak (with oil spread everywhere, we could not tell by looking).  So we ordered one of those.

Another reproduction from Instagram.  Why are we having to learn so much of what we know about our vans from a photo sharing site, for crying out loud?!  Theory says I should be able to pay one or more mechanics for that knowledge. 

By the way, failure of this $11 part is more serious than a loss of oil.  If the leaking oil wicks up into the transmission controller, it can put the Sprinter into permanent limp mode until fixed.  And of course, ours had to obey Murphy's Law and begin leaking in earnest shortly before a planned Christmas trip (we noticed it less than a week before).

Here's where that little device mounts on the curb side of the transmission:

Photo center.

It's a very easy job to swap this thing out.  Search for it on YouTube vids for more detail, but basically you rotate that thumb tab downward, pull out the black plug-like object with the wires attached to it, and unscrew the bushing:

Pop the new one in, re-tighten the screw, re-insert the wired module, and tighten down the thumb tab to seat it properly.

OK, so did the replacement of this $11 part solve our issue?  The proof is in the Christmas pudding:

Explain this crap - why couldn't Mercedes Benz have done this simple, simple thing 16 months ago when I paid to have the transmission serviced?

Either one of two things has to happen here in order to make the management of this issue professionally defensible:  Either Mercedes Benz has to include the replacement of such a common known failing part in their routine transmission servicing, OR, they have to tell customers, "By the way, it is not our policy to replace this $11 part on the transmission when we are doing a servicing for you.  You should expect that to fail shortly after you leave our shop."

Either one of those needs to happen to do right by customers.  But this example is just a symptom of a far wider phenomenon, and that is the paradigm of "We'll fix it when it breaks".  The paradigm is NOT what it should be, which is "We'll do what is logical and common-sense necessary to help you keep your van running reliably given that you are a paying customer."

As I said in my Insta-rant above, we are just not there yet.  Here's a screengrab from the resulting comment section, and I think this sums the whole situation up nicely.

"Local dealers are merely parts installers." Ouch.  But I have to wonder what the explanation is here.  This part commonly leaks on MANY Mercedes Benz vehicles - not just Sprinters (e.g., see here).  How could any MB shop either not know, or simply not bother, to replace this part as a matter of course?!

20190203 EDIT:  We checked the transmission control module to see if any oil might have gotten into it from the previously-leaking bushing described above.  Not a trace was seen.  This examination has been well-described by other sources, but here's a reference pic anyway:

ADDING A REFLECTIVE ROOF COATING TO AN AIRSTREAM INTERSTATE

This photograph reflects my boundless despair and says everything that needs to be said about this common van-related predicament:

That's an infrared thermometer pointed at our Airstream Interstate's roof and reading 146 degrees.  Conditions when the photo was taken on March 27, 2017 1:40 PM in greater Houston Texas were as follows:  85 F ambient air temp, sustained 3 mph west wind (I was facing west) with gusts to 10 mph, partly cloudy.  I took the photo at a point where there was more than a momentary break in the clouds.  I wanted to see what full-on sun would produce in the way of temperature.  

The interior ceiling below this point read 110 F at the same time.  This is an obscenity.  I knew it was hot, but until I bought that thermometer, I had no idea it was that hot.   Many Interstate owners complain that their vehicle air conditioners can't keep up with cooling demands in the summer months.  This is a big part of the reason why.

Obviously something had to be done to improve the situation, or at least try.  After a lot of research that produced no clear answers, I settled upon a product offered by Hy-Tech Thermal Solutions of Melbourne, Florida.  Why did I choose them?  First, I was guardedly encouraged by what one James Wong, aka Instagram user Eagle2232, had published, and I'm adding a screengrab of it here because content does tend to disappear from the internet over time:

Tap to expand for read-ability.  But then don't take this Instagrammer's instructions as gospel - also see what I have to say in the sections below about application strategy.  

James's vehicle is almost identical to ours, and that's important - a product that might work well on a Class A with a different roof material construction (rubber, fiberglass, or whatever) is of little use to me as a comparator, because I have a standard metal automotive roof.  Unfortunately there's a limitation associated with user forums and other social media outlets - little to no retrospective reporting and follow-up by most users.  At the point where I screengrabbed that image above, it had been posted for 40 weeks.  Well, we don't know what James's roof treatment looked like after 40 weeks (he contacted me on Instagram and I asked him, but I'm still waiting for a reply).  We won't know what it will look like after 150 weeks, or 250 weeks (Hy-Tech's main product Bus Kote is supposed to last 5 years before re-application becomes necessary).  But again, at least this was an example of an application on the same vehicle.  It was the best I could do, research-wise and evidence-wise, at this point in time.

And as an aside, may I observe generally that we Class B DIY owners never, ever pass up any opportunity to increase effective vehicle insulation.  Every small opportunity for gains is seized.  Proceeding from one James to another James, this was demonstrated nicely about a week ago when James of The Fit RV published this post describing how he fabricated a new interior cabinet.  I was only minimally interested in his new cabinet.  I mostly wanted to see the insulation that he added in the process.

Before and after.  It seems that every Class B out there has crappy OEM insulation - why is this?  I don't know - it makes no sense because it's SO IMPORTANT!!

Screengrabbed image pair courtesy of The Fit RV.  

The other reason why I chose Hy-Tech Thermal Solutions is that I phoned them and the person who answered the phone (Trish) took the time to walk me through the products plus the application strategy that she felt would be most appropriate for my particular climate of residence (i.e., near the Gulf Coast, as this company itself is).  So this phone experience further increased my confidence (or perhaps I should say that it increased my hopefulness) that maybe this would prove to be a good-performing set of products for our Sprinter-based Class B.

And by that I mean, this set of products.  I actually needed somewhat less than one gallon of Bus Kote but Hy-Tech had recommended I get two. 

Trish recommended that, following initial surface prep, I use Aqua-Prime #15 as the primer.  Something different is currently stated on their website.  Furthermore, instead of recommending the type of clear coat that James Wong had used on his Sprinter, she recommended that I simply do one coat of primer followed by at least two coats of Bus Kote, and no clear coat, because they (Hy-Tech) aren't entirely satisfied with the way that the clear coat is aging in subtropical environments (honesty in a vendor = points scored).  Then, when the Bus Kote starts to show visible signs of aging, clean the roof really well and add one more layer of Bus Kote on top of it to refresh it, which is an approach that cannot be used if a clear coat is in place.

I will state categorically that I typically will not attempt any project using water-based products, especially on metal.  I'm not a professional, but I've done a lot of painting in my time, and I've just had too many bad experiences with those types of resins.  They often weren't developed because they offered superior performance - they were largely developed in response to environmental initiatives - vendors were forced into creating them by environmental regulations that restricted volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions from coating products.  And then, not wanting to lose money, many of those same vendors tap-danced frantically trying to convince their customers that the performance of the resulting products is still acceptable despite the forced reformulations.

One of my clients whose entire job for the past 40 years has been to track the real-world performance of industrial paints has told me that I'm misguided, and that some water-alcohol +/- synthetic amine type products have actually advanced to the point where they are performing on par with their petroleum-solvent-based analogs, even in the case of metal applications.  To which I replied, "That may be true - but the problem is that we as consumers have no practical way to tell an effective product from a bucket of crap, and therefore I'm sticking with solvent-based compositions."  

However I was unable to identify a solvent-based alternative to Bus Kote.  If you think there is one out there, you would receive my heart-felt gratitude by emailing me to tell me about it (interstate.blog at gmail).

In the meantime, I felt that I had to move forward with some kind of thermal application, experimental or otherwise, and so I chose to go forward with this.  Should a worst-case scenario subsequently develop, I'll spend a lot of future time stripping it back off again and hopefully will find a better alternative.  Sometimes, ya just gotta iterate, as time consuming as it is.

As a final note on my digression, I will also say that I don't necessarily take the performance claims of products like this at face value.  Bus Kote contains a ceramic compound that is claimed to increase its insulation potential (tech data sheet here).  There are specific quantifiable reasons why I question those claims but I won't get into them right now because this post is already lengthy.  I suspect that this product realizes the vast majority of its efficacy by simple virtue of its sky-high reflectance.  But with or without any "high tech" ceramic actually performing a function in the product, I still needed an elastomeric that was designed for an automotive application, so I chose this one irrespective of larger claims.

Now, back to my procedure.  Here's what our roof looked like in its original state.

Sheet metal with several layers of a primer-like paint applied.  To the best of our ability to tell, this is the original Sprinter cargo van roof.  Airstream added the automotive paint everywhere on the vehicle except this central roof patch. 

Of the products you see in the product line-up photo several paragraphs above, I only used the coatings (Bus Kote and primer), the gray roll of 180 grit sandpaper, and the tape.  I deleted the other sandpaper and tack cloth.

I got the tape from our local Tasco Auto Color store.  I walked into the store and asked the proprietor, "Which of these tapes should I use?" and he replied, "Well the blue tape is complete crap, and the yellow tape works very well but will deposit a residue if you leave it on your vehicle for more than 2 or 3 hours."  I had to do three to four coats, so green tape was the best choice for my application, given that it had to remain in place for more than 24 hours.  It's called Scotch 233+.

I strongly recommend that you wash and hand wax your rig before attempting this project, perhaps the day before you are scheduled to begin.  The polymer coating (wax) that Airstream recommends for our vehicle is called Rejex, and I've been pleased with its performance.  Note that the Rejex motto is, Nothing sticks but the shine.  That's very a propos in this context because you will drip something down the side of your rig as you do this project.  Gravity is gravity, and no matter how careful you are, working on the roof of a van conversion is so difficult and so physically exhausting that some little accident is almost guaranteed to occur.  In which case you want fresh wax on your vehicle (everywhere but the roof, obviously) so that you can remove little roof coating drips and smears and splatters cleanly and easily.

This first phase of work takes a strong, able-bodied person about 4 hours.  I started at 3 PM on a partly cloudy day but later regretted that strategy for reasons I'll reveal below.  I recommend that you begin in the early morning instead.

First step in the process is sanding.  I used a 180 grit automotive paper we had left over from another vehicle-related project years ago, so I cannot give you its brand.

Our roof finish looks shiny in the background of the photo above, but it's really kind of satiny.  Notice the amount of paint dust in the foreground - it is necessary to remove that shine before applying any new coating, because I know of no coating that will adhere properly to a mirror-finished surface, be it latex or an oil-based enamel.  I used a sanding block for the flat areas but manually did all the areas around the roof ribs and penetrations.  By "manually" I mean, I took the sandpaper in my hand and sanded the old-fashioned way.  There really isn't a tool for that kind of work. 

Another view of the sanded roof, near the completion of the process, without all the sanding fines (dust) removed yet, hence it appears chalky.  

There was too much paint dust remaining after this process for it to simply be wiped off, so I did a very thorough rinsing with the garden hose.  Then I gave it a good detergent scrub.  I use Dawn dish soap, original formulation with minimal additives, as a general surfactant in many applications (I even wash our dog with it).

Don't just wash it passively but scrub it by hand, to remove anything that might be loose or still waxy after sanding. 

Then I towel-dried it by hand and gave it about 30 more minutes to thoroughly air dry.  Remember, this is the same roof that was reading 146 degrees F earlier in the day, as shown in the introductory photo to this blog post.  By the time I got done with the sanding, and especially after I gave it two big-time water rinses, the roof temperature had fallen significantly, but it was still warm enough to air dry quickly.

After masking the seams, I applied the primer largely using a thin 4-inch roller.  I used a brush to reach into crevices such as under the edge of the roof a/c unit.

Again, I had to grit my teeth and bear it, suspending disbelief as I was applying a latex-based product over prepared metal.  I worked counter-clockwise around the vehicle, pushing the paint tray ahead of me (be careful it doesn't flip off the roof in a stiff gust of wind while doing this - that would be a full-on disaster).  By the time I made it all the way around, the first areas I'd painted were dry to the touch.

It's a good idea to be physically fit if you are attempting this job.  I cannot tell you how many times I climbed up and down the ladder during this whole process, and on top of that, there's the need to contort the body around all those roof appurtenances.  It was tiring.

View looking diagonally toward the rear, primer coat. 

Now comes the reason why I recommend you start this project in the morning.

I had intentionally timed this primer application to give it at least five hours to dry prior to the setting of the evening dew.  That should have been sufficient, but we happened to have a heavy dew that night.  The result is that it softened the newly-laid primer and lifted it off the metal in a few areas.  I knew that this was a possibility but I thought I had allowed sufficient set time so that it wouldn't happen.

So much for my day's plans.  I had been hoping to put the first layer of Bus Kote over the primer early in the day, but the primer was just too soft.  That navy cloth you see there is an old T-shirt that I used to carefully sop up the worst of the dew.  You can see that it took some of the primer off, chalky-like.  This is one reason why I generally don't use latex products.  

In retrospect I should have either started first thing in the morning, or driven it back to its garage to spend the overnight hours in dryness following an evening application.  Live and learn.

Rubbing my hand over the dewey primer produced this effect.  Did I mention that I despise latex products, with or without dew?  

I should qualify that "despise" statement above.  The right elastomeric in the right application is a tremendous asset.  Years ago, I researched elastomerics within the context of house painting.  I was staying at home with my baby at that time, so I had lots of time to vet products thoroughly.  I did a ton of reading, ordered samples from paint manufacturers, applied the samples to my stucco house, and ultimately I special-ordered a particular elastomeric that proved to be amazing.  We subsequently moved, but when I look at that house on Google Street View today, I think my original paint job might be still there, 16 years later!  That kind of durability and longevity is unheard of in our Texas climate.

But the key words are right, and right.  I don't yet know whether this combination of products, the primer and the Bus Kote, constitute the right coating in the right application.  Obviously I'm obsessing over my own trepidation here.

OK, onward.

I did the roof sanding, prep, and primer on March 27, experienced my dew-related dismay sequence early on March 28, did primer touch-ups that morning and allowed that primer to harden in the sun all day on March 28.  Then, I added the first coat of Bus Kote late that day, after I was sure that the primer had set properly.

It's a thick sucker.  As with the primer, I recommend a 4-inch roller.  

Stir well before using.  

I put the van in our storage unit that evening (March 28) to protect it from additional dew.  In fact I did that between each successive coat, allowing each of them to set overnight in dry conditions before proceeding with the next.

On March 29 we had a tremendous storm that produced 3 inches of rain, so the van remained enclosed and nothing got accomplished that day.  Work resumed under the blue-bowl intensely-dry post-frontal conditions of March 30 and 31, when I added coats 2 and 3.

And here are some pics of the finished job.

I still have some touch-ups and smear-removals to do - yes, I also painted the wet bath vent cover (photo left). It still needs another coat. 

Aesthetics are not a huge concern, because the roof is almost never viewed by anyone.  But aesthetically I do prefer white over the original gray.  The King Jack antenna (foreground) and the Ultra Breeze Fantastic fan cover were already bright white.  The diamond pattern on the solar panels was already bright white.  The gray and black tank vent (upper center beside solar panels) was already bright white PVC.  Everything hangs together now that the roof is also bright white. 

I left the original adhesive pads for the solar feeds on the roof and painted over them, because they were stuck on ferociously.  Then I used a small pointy tool to clear the accumulated paint from the zip tie holes, and ran new zip ties through them to re-secure the lines. 

It's a challenge to get good art shots of a van roof, but this is my favorite. 

The big question is, how about performance?  What results were achieved relative to that ghastly photo of the 146 degree F roof reading at the beginning of this post?

For comparable environmental conditions (time of day, sun angle, ambient air temp, and parking orientation held roughly constant), my exterior roof measurements were running in the range of 108 to 116 F, probably averaging around 112 F to 114 F.  On March 31 when I made measurements following my application of the third coat, I started seeing erratic readings in the infrared thermometer because it was overheating under an unusually hot sun (we'd had a front come through, the air was very dry, and the sun was scorching).  So don't take the numbers as gospel; it's probably better to regard them in rough relative terms.  But there was a definite decrease in temperature.  It could be felt qualitatively with the hands as well as registering on the thermometer.  

Interior ceiling temps averaged around 97 F.  At the point where I had measured the 146 F roof, the interior ceiling below that spot was reading 110 F.

So it does indeed appear that I've made some comfort gains by doing this project - which I would expect to, based on the much higher reflectance of this roof treatment vs. the original paint.  Based on that fact alone.  And I may have more to say about the technological claims associated with this coating product at a later time.

In closing, I caution readers that, at this point, I have no idea how this product will either wash or wear in this application, on a sheet metal van roof as opposed to a more common RV application with their fiberglass or plywood or rubber-roofed constructions.  How well the product sheds dirt and how well it ages are both critical to its performance.  I'll probably edit this post going forward to comment on those factors.

Thanks for reading.

In Houston Texas, it's usually the latter. 

20170410 Edit:  The Sprinter Forum thread corresponding to this post is located here.

REPLACING THE CAB FLOORING IN AN AIRSTREAM INTERSTATE, PART 2: WEATHER MAT OVERLAY

In Part 1 of this post, I described how we commissioned custom carpeting for the cab of our 2007 Airstream Interstate.

It's so danged pretty, I have to show it twice!!

The carpet was a wonderful addition, but we also needed weatherproof matting to go on top of it.  Because we have such a prominent aisle with fresh carpeting on it, I initially didn't want just those little insert mats that go in front of the bucket seats - I wanted a one-piece all-encompassing job.  And here was the overwhelming problem with that wonderful idea:

EVERY mat-like raw material that I found came in widths of four feet only, whether it was on the internet or in brick-and-mortar stores.

Four feet is the reason why the off-the-shelf T1N weather mats offered by aftermarket sellers would be too short for an Interstate.

No matter how skillfully they are cut, they are always going to be a foot short due to those material size limitations.  That is why they would extend only as far as the emergency brake (notch on lower left side shown above) rather than to the seam with the Interstate's main cabin flooring.  Compare this outline to the carpet photo above.  I think it would look ridiculous.  I would have three different types of floor covering visible in the space of twelve inches - the mat, the cab carpet, and the sheet vinyl of the coach.    

I don't think it would look right, and furthermore, David at Sprinter Parts Depot didn't think that such a one-piece mat would fit right either, due to the fact that carpeting had already been installed.  In view of these factors, I completed an exhaustive search for some alternative material that might be adaptable to this application.

For crying out loud, I even ordered samples of dance flooring to see if that might fulfill the need.  Wonderful stuff, but too thin.  

The T1N's cab cannot be be one-piece'd with an uncut raw material smaller than 5' x 5'.  In view of that, the only feasible option that I could find that was cost effective was to buy a garage mat and cut it myself in order to make it fit the cab.  How did I know for sure that the raw material must be 5' x 5' minimum?  Because I got down on my hands and knees and templated it.

Like this.  It was a bit tedious, but it had to be done.    

Again with more detail this time, why go to so much trouble to cover the whole aisle?  I had two concerns here:

(1) I have a dog with frequently muddy feet, plus two humans with muddy feet.  Furthermore, it's not ordinary mud we're talking about - some of our intended destinations have deep black tannin-rich organic mud, the kind that can ruin a carpet in a single day. Therefore, the entire cab aisle needed to be covered if possible.  No side or end gaps.

Fresh, fresh bear tracks, my foot at bottom for scale.  That's the kind of mud I'm talking about.  Even if I don't invite this bear into our Interstate for a snack, I still get the mud all over my own feet.   

(2) Knowing that I was buying a material that was not developed or intended to be a vehicle mat, I wanted to make sure that it was large and heavy enough to stay in one place, and that I could assist immobility by "locking" it against the sides and front edges of the bucket seats and also the seam between the cab and the cabin.

This is what my template ended up looking like.

Well, shoot, not surprisingly, it looks pretty much identical to the commercial templates for T1N Sprinters, except it's a foot longer, duh.  

Alas, that templating work was all for nothing - not every project can be a hit, and this one fell into the category of very big miss.  There just isn't any way to re-purpose a different material to make a floor mat, unless you spend far more money than I was willing to spend.  The garage matting I ordered wanted to curl badly once cut, and I just didn't want to struggle with it.  Furthermore it, too, did not want to fit right.  There were too many irregularities in the cab floor for a larger area to be covered like this.  

So I capitulated, tossed that idea (and my prototype) out the cab window, and went with individual 2006 T1N Sprinter stock mats from AutoAnything.  They are made out of Lloyd's Rubbertite product, which I have in my daily driver and really like.

Driver's side.  The coverage area is limited but the fit is pretty good.  

Passenger's side.  Not going to win any awards, but not offensive either.  

The round circles in the mat material echo the perforated aluminum used in the new computer table I just finished assembling, so at least I've got good design cross-referencing and repetition going on here.

As for those really dirty hiking days and the potential for the aisle carpeting to get soiled, I'll just have to cross that bear-ridden bridge when I come to it.