fabricating a metal frame

I've come up with a plan for my Viking roof bed, but it involves bed boards being mounted on a metal frame that will enable the boards to slide width ways across the van).
What I'm unsure of is what to make the metal frame out of?
I would like to keep things light so would angle aluminium be suitable/ strong enough?
But Would ALU be a pain to get fabbed up ie can't just mig it
Or just go for angle steel but keep it thin?

Would have to support the boards , 18 (?) mm ply plus two adults

 

could you use unistrut ?

 

Had to google that! Looks like a possibility but think might get expensive? Was making my head hurt looking at it as well!
Have you used it?

 

I use it now and again at work, good stuff but It's pretty heavy though!

Some 1.2 mm 25 mm box section would be strong enough and much lighter.

 

yeh it is a bit heavy but v strong and galv and versitile without having to weld , do you not have any ductwork pals darn their that erect it or commercial sparks that use it ? dont think ali would be strong enuff unless you can get some extruded or old ali windo frame stuff ??

 

Unistrut will make your interior look naff.

 

i shall try again...

Is it the Viking roof with the two hammock style bunks?

 

Yep that's the one, just removed the hammocks the other day.

As I imagine it, the frame wouldn't really be seen, it would end up not far visually from the Devon (?) Roof that has big bed boards. But bed would be bigger to make use of the Viking roof size

 

Dexion!

 

Stick up a pic of yer roofy bit, I have s Devon in at the moment and it's easy peasy, the boards are just boards and the slider rails are just angled aluminium

 

You've got the shelf at the rear, are you looking at a series of boards that span the bus sideways then to extend that forwards?

 

Sounds like you know what I'm on about, you got a Viking?
I'm trying to overcome the problem that the board width is restricted while roof is down, then when roof is up and canvas out, the boards need to extend widthways to make full use of the space


@davidoft it would be similar to Devon setup but needs to slide widthways as well, to make use of full width of Viking roof, and also frame needs to be higher up to clear the roof mechanism ( frame that slides out to hold canvas out the side)

 

Is yours a super Viking ? I don't think I ever saw the roof up! Take some pics and I'll give you a solution

 

Firstly, don't sell your existing bunks. You will need them to cover the sides of the bed to finish it off. Like the bits that go from the front cot to the roof on one side and the canvas rail on the other. It actually probably easier to put a solid full width bed at the front. It would be the same width and length as the front sideways cot bed.

Think I would reduce the upstanding on the side of the front cot down so it's the depth of your new bed board lower than the with the bottom of the front bed cushion (possibly remove the upholstery to the cot so you can get everything level) and subsequently you could then fix a rail either side of the roof opening at that height (in timber). Use the bunks to fill the gaps either side but fixed in place to the timber with an ally strip and cut the excess off . Cut as many boards as you need to make the correct length of bed and they would simply rest on the two rails. I think the front bed is about 2 feet wide so two 2 foot boards should make a 6 foot roof bed with a two foot gap to get up and down at the back and easy to climb up.

Alternatively you could do the same at the back but you would lose more climbing up and down space as the rear shelf is much smaller so the boards would need to be bigger and over more of the gap. Am I making any sense at all cosines got it all pictured in my mind but even though I used to have one of thes I can't quite recall how it went together but I have thought this through before. I eventually fitted a westy continental bed in mine. At the rear but they grew out of it pretty quick.

Another method I considered was fitting a hinged board onto the hammock rail on the roof side which simply hinged down utilising one of the hammock poles fixed at the other end which just dropped into the hammock brackets at the sliding door side obviously with a cut out to get up and down or if you just wanted a part width bed you could leave it full length and have the gap near the sliding door to get up and down.

 

I did have one but swapped it as I was fortunate enough to get a super6 roof.

 

Shame you never saw the roof up, you could of got some more work on the big rusty hole under there! Noticed it today . Above the dodgy gutter/rear corner funnily enough
Get some pics tomorrow of roof, it not a super, just the standard jobby

 

i know what you mean with the width as with my hinge down method as the roof goes up the bed board moves outwards with it. You could live with that and have it drop into the hammock supports and then use the hammock over the door reduced down so that this drops into brackets adjacent to where your bed board now ends. If your careful with your measurements you could have the board stick out further than the actual hammock support you've fixed to it to cover the gap. Loads of variations on a theme and it's a bit of trial and error to get it right. Mock it up before you cut anything you can't replace.

 

Plan d.
Bed board hinges fixed to roof . Gap to roof made up using hammock material bed drops onto rail on other side and gap again made up by canvas material. If you do it and make the front bunk part of it then you could have a 6 foot full width bed at the front and still have room to get up and own. Do you gave Viking interior fitted?

 

@Dicky sounds like you got the same sort of idea , just an alternative, possibly easier way of doing it!

Good idea on using the hammocks as part of it, will have a play with them tomorrow see how it works.

If only I'd bought a different bus.......