UP or DOWN Lifting? XRV Lance Update 10 Nov 2024
Happy to be bringing you the latest update on progress with “Lance” our 2017 Medium Duty Kenworth T270 truck chassis with a Horton Ambulance box or “habitat” that we are in the process of transforming into an eXtreme RV so that we can continue our adventures eXploring the world around us by wheels now rather than by sea as we had been. Before I get to that though, some other updates for you on what else has been keeping us busy the past two weeks. 
The biggest news for us this past week is that we found and purchased a 25 foot travel trailer that we will setup as temporary living quarters on the 10 acre Nevada property. Fun bit of coincidence is that this is a 2012 Model 2385 of what is apparently one of the best built travel trailers built by who else but ………………………… Lance!! 
We have not come up with a name for it yet so for now have two “Lance’s”. It has a slide out on the drivers or left side that really extends the size of the interior. 
This will give you a good sense of the layout with the Queen bed and U shaped settee on the slide out and a very spacious U shaped Galley in the front. Being accustomed to living in our sailboats this is eXtremely spacious for us and we can’t wait to settle into our new “land yacht”. 
Here is a shot of the bedroom in the front that includes a ready made office for Christine. 
The U-shaped settee, also very spacious for us and room for family and friends when they visit as well. 
and the Galley up front. We have not seen it in person as it is in Tucson Arizona, but we had a video call with the couple who have owned it for over ten years and got a good sense of what it is like. I’m flying out there on Tuesday for in person inspection and then I’ll tow it back to the Nevada property with a rental truck and should have it set up and ready for us by end of this coming week. 
Also VERY pleased to update you that the sale successfully closed on the 10 acre property we recently purchased down in the very southern tip of Nevada, just north of the tiny town of Searchlight. If that’s news to you, details are in the previous October 20 update “You went WHERE??? and you did WHAT??” This will be our Southern Home Base as we migrate into two snowbirds during the winter months. 
I will probably situate Lance the Trailer in the space between these two 40ft containers that are on the property already. Makes it easy for us to move the trailer and try out different locations and orientations as we live there and see what suits us best for the tiny home we are likely to build at some point in the future. For now though, this trailer will be our “tiny home” on our Southern Home Base so I can continue working on Lance the XRV and Christine can continue writing her new books.
Finding and buying the Nevada property and Lance the trailer has kept us rather busy but I have managed to get a bit more work done on Lance the XRV so here’s the quick update on that.
I left off in the previous blog update with the installation of the finished floor and that allowed me to start building the framing for all the interior cabinetry starting from the rear and moving forward. 
For more perspective, here is the layout minus the bed looking at the Passenger or Right Rear corner of the “Happytat” with the Galley on either side in the middle, Head and Shower on the far Left DS corner and Fridge and Mini-Split AirCon on the far Right. 
Moving a bit forward on the right side and adding the bed back in and putting it in the “UP” position you can see how this works. 
To maximize living space, the Queen bed travels up and down overtop of the settee and I’ll cover this in much more detail when I start building it. For now, this is what I’ve come up with for the electronically controlled lifting of the bed using Track Actuators on each corner of the bed frame. 
I have ordered four of these PA-18 Track Linear Actuators from Progressive Automation in Vancouver BC and they are now customizing them with the addition of Hall Effect sensors that will synchronize all four as they lift the bed frame up and down. 
Difficult to see I’m sure (click to enlarge any photo) but this “skeletal view” of the XAL eXtruded ALuminium T-Slot framing I’m using to build all the interior cabinetry that everything fastens to. 
Zooming in on the PS Front corner of the bed this will hopefully give you a bit better idea of how this works. The gray cylinder at the top is the motor of the PA-18 Track Actuators and the gold/yellow block below is the part it powers up and down. There is a flexible joint I’m designing to attach the gold block to the bed frame that is in light blue, mattress in dark blue. 
A bit more zooming and turning off some of the XAL this might give you a better idea of how the bed lift will work. 
Meanwhile, back in the real world, here are some of the first lengths of XAL going into the two rear corners of Lance’s Happytat. 
One of the big benefits of having the ambulance base is that it is almost 8 feet wide inside and so we will sleep East/West and this Driver Side or Left Rear corner will the the head of the bed. The XAL framing you see here is for a series of storage boxes or “cubbies” for clothes and such. 
This is about where I’m at right now, with the XAL framing pretty much all in place for the bed and dinette area. You’ll note the pair of vertical posts in each corner which is where the attachment point of the Track Actuators will slide up and down with the actuators themselves hidden from view in the boxed area behind.
Looking forward along the PS Right side you can see the settee bench in the foreground and the pair of posts for the Track Lift in this corner. Behind that will be a countertop that goes all the way forward to the side entrance door. I’ll be framing that in next so stay tuned.
For those who have been asking for more details about building with this eXtruded ALuminium T-Slot material, this forward DS Left cabinet corner shows some of the different ways of joining each XAL piece to the next. 
Depending on what goes into or around each frame I use different connectors such as the 45 degree cast external corner on the Right here and an internal L bracket on the Left. 
These internal L-brackets are working very well in places where there will be cabinet doors or drawers that need to the full space in the corner. 
I will leave you with where I’m at right now. I’ll be away next week picking up Lance the Trailer and moving getting him all setup on the Nevada property and then be back here in Klamath Falls to pick up from here and continue working on Lance the XRV.
Hope this gives you a reasonable update on where things are at and what we’ve been up to. Thanks VERY much for taking the time to join in and hope to see you here in about two weeks for the next update.
Thanks!
Wayne
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