Robert's Diary

[Robert]

Hello you all,

I have been away for some time and did have loads of fun during that time. In the future I will try to tell you overthere in the States what happens here in Europe, and especially with us and the Buggy.

So, first of all we went for a round trip to Spain, specially the southern part of Spain. We did a 3,5 week trip with aroun 8000 km and we tried to have a "special stage" every day. Because we were just traveling around, we did not bring the buggy and I had doubt about that descision on several occasions. Because there where great "roads" for buggy's overthere.

Anyway, we drove with our VW T3 Van. You call it a Vanagon. And we traveled from Murcia in the East, to Tarifa in the south, and from there again up to Roses again in the East, but almost in France. We saw the cities of Cordoba, Cadiz, Sevilla, Ronda, Toledo and several little towns.

We also visited one the filmtown where most of the Spaghetti westerns were filmed. That was just great. The towns in those films where already broken down, well, they still are.

We did do the Sierra Nevada, we did some coastline, we had a great time just driving off road.

Well here are some pictures and some films off that trip.

http://www.bad-dragon.nl/Fotoalbums/...010/index.html

And some films are here. Please notice, all other films we made are here as well.

http://www.youtube.com/my_videos?feature=mhum

After that we had a nice weekend with our Buggy in Germany. With some new friends we drove up to our Caravan in Bielefeld Germany and had a great ride to a nearby Car museum and also we had a good ride through the nearby sandpit.

Here are the pictures of that weekend

http://www.bad-dragon.nl/Fotoalbums/...lle/index.html

Well, after that we had a nice week in the UK, which was a combination between Vanfest 2010, which is the greatest Vanagon meeting in the world, and a visit to our friends in Wales and some off road activities overthere.

And again, you can see the films with the previous link above to you tube and here are some pictures again.

http://www.bad-dragon.nl/Fotoalbums/...010/index.html

Well, after that our trips are almost come to an end. Maybe just one or two this year. But who knows. We had a trip with our Opel Frontera to a off road weekend in Germany. It was great, although the challenge was a bit tame.
But the views and the company there were great.

Again, here are the results in picture taking of that weekend.

http://www.bad-dragon.nl/Fotoalbums/...010/index.html

After that weekend, we had some rest to work on the Van and the Buggy. Because the front of the buggy was a bit rusty, I put some paint on it.

Here how it looked before

And here after


And I also put a Winch on the back of the Buggy.


So, what is coming next?

Well, loads of work to the Frontera, which will be going more and more to the off road long trip travel. And off course as a back up and service vehicle for the buggy.
It looks at the moment like this

Work on the buggy, we need more extra fuel tanks. I have one of 2ltr, but that isnt enough. And also I need a extra tyre somewere on the Buggy. So still things to do. But that is ok.

Next we will have a off road meeting in Germany. Not sure still, we will see.

That's it for the moment. I hope I will write here a bit more then I did before.


Greetings from Robert

[BuggyMaster]

Man that buggy is awesome!

[SYCARMS]

Ditto , nice buggy. TOM

[Robert]

Hello folks,

After a nice weekend away, but just to friends, we gonna make all te preparations for the following weekend, were we are going to a Off Road meeting in Germany. We are going by T3 (vanagon) and taking the Buggy with us. There is a nice off road route and a off road playground. So I think we will have some fun.

I hope after that I will have nice pictures. So I can show of.

Greetings from Robert

[Robert]

Hello folks,

Well, we had a great weekend in Thuringen Germany. It was an Off Road Weekend, which was organized by www.adventure-offroad.de. It was a meeting for old customers, new customers and just people who are a bit interested in an Off Road adventure. Well, the last category was ours.

On friday we had a bit of trouble, because our Vanagon had an electrical problem. That is been solved and we could go. After a 7 hours drive we arrived and did put our van in place and went in for a drink, a bite and lots of talk.
It was fun.

The saturday we had some training sessions about software and GPS. And a nice plce to have some fun in the field.

Here are some films we made with our on board camera


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyE3TAP2Fuk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTvYGDonv8M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pK_CenKv1w

and some pictures





On the sunday we went back home and had a nice long trip with no problems.

Greetings from Robert

[SYCARMS]

Awsome.
Tom

[metalstudman1]

Nice terrain-Big up's for getting any traction in tall wet grass.

[EJ Mac]

Nice vids and scenery. Sweet buggy.

[Robert]

Hello folks,

Just a quick note. We had a great off road weekend again. It was an Opel Frontera meeting, but we had the buggy with us. And they loved it. It was again great fun.




Greetings from Robert

[joshstep1]

Wow... I. Want. Your. Buggy.

[Robert]

Hello you all,

Well now the winterseason is coming up, we are going to make some updates to the Buggy.
Next year we would love to take it on our holiday and besides that, we like to have a few great trips in advance with it.
So what we gonna do;

1. Resize the bench
Our dog must have a bit more space to sit, stand and lay down during our trips.
That part is the one I am busy with at this moment.
2. We need a place to put a spare tyre. Or maybe two.
That will come up soon.
3. We need two places to store two jerrycans with petrol.
That will be done after the bench is done. This because the bench and the jerrycans will be located beside eachother.
4. A roll cage will be build over the Bench and on top of that there will be some storage room. Just for a tent, an inflateble matras, sleepingbags and such stuff. Just for one or two nights.
5. I will weld some tow points on the buggy
6. Whatever will come up my mind during this proces

Here are some results.
This is how it was;

Without the bench


The upper part of the bench behind the buggy

The holders for the tank cut loose from the barr.

And the tank, just that.

After that I made the tank a bit further forward and a bit up. So my dog does have a bit more space. The bench has also grown in height about 3,5 cm. So, he will have loads of space.
It now looks a bit like this.
Upper part in place


A barr for holding the bench

And the front part of the lower bench

I made some plates for the sides to cover the holes on the side. And I made two new floor plates wich we will cover with artificial leather.
Then just some small stuff and the new bench is ready.

Well that is that for now.

greetings from Robert

[Robert]

Hello you all,

Well after a few days of work and some days somewhere else these are the things I made with the buggy.

first I made the bench ready. Except for the floor. But that is a detail that will come a bit later.







After that I bought myself a tubebender and that made work a bit more easy to do.
This is the bender;

And this is the result of the first try.

After that we had to weld again. Which isnt te best job I can do. I know.
So after a while it looked like this, just look for the progress.



Just a bit to high, so we had to do something about it.



See next topic.

[Robert]

After that we had to do the finishing touch.

When finished, but not sprayed it looks like this.



And this is the look of the buggy before spraying that Roof rack and Roll cage.


It has been sprayed now, but I think due the weather and darkness there will be some drippers. Tomorrow I will make some more pictures.

Greetings from Robert

[metalstudman1]

Nice work- so happy to see that you made it removable. The dog is going to be riding in 1st class seating now.Are you going to have the second tire over the canopy on a rack too?Hope you round up some spare rims- I'd hate to have to do a tire mount out in weeds.

[Robert]

Hello,

One Rim will be bought soon. The second one isnt sure yet. It depends what on what I will do more with it. And yes, there will be a kind of rack for the spare tyre over the canopy.

Greetings from Robert

[JakeTheSnake]

Robert, Great job on the extendend roll cage, nice to give the dog some safety features too.

[Robert]

Hello you all,

At last, the rollcage and the bench are finished. Now I can work on the other parts. However it is freezing cold here. At least cold for us dutchies.

As we are making this buggy into a expedition vehicle we needed some sandladders. However, most of them are too big, too heavy. So at last I found the right ones.

These are the ones.



We will transport them this way. At least that is the plan at the moment.


Greetings from Robert

[SYCARMS]

Nice work.How cold is it there?
Tom

[Robert]

Hello Tom,

somewhere between -5 and -15 degrees Celcius.

Greetings from Robert

[SYCARMS]

Well I figure that, unless your from somewhere like Siberia, thats cold.
Tom