Another week flies by and another month doing the same and another year for that matter!  One of the many things I got wrong in my youth was the notion that time would seem to slow down a bit as we aged but the opposite seems to be the case.  At least to me and I suspect many of you too.  Not a bad thing other than how I could always use more time because my rate of progress and how long things take seems to be what slows down.  Yet, forward progress is being made, albeit slower than I might like and this week I’ll show you how things have progressed with the insulation and installation of the final surface inside good ‘Ole Lance’s Happytat, the floor.

To the chagrin and no doubt consternation of my Brilliant Bestselling Author Bride, I’ll give away the ending with this photo just after just putting down the top layer of ACM Aluminium Composite Material for the heated floor.
Going back to the beginning a bit, this is where we left off last week having installed all the PIF (PolyIso Foamboard) insulation and the ACM panels on the walks and ceiling.
And going back ALL the way to January when we went and picked up Lance in Illinois, here is what the original floor and interior looked like.
Prep work on the floor began with removing the vinyl diamond plate flooring and then the eXtremely recalcitrant aluminium track you see running down the center of the floor in the photo above.  This track is what the collapsible Stryker ambulance stretcher rides on and locks it in place.  For safety and security this 25mm/1” thick AL track is through bolted into the floor framing below with large high strength steel bolts.
As you might imagine, the combination of aluminium floor plating, frames and track with steel bolts do not play nicely together chemically so they were all solidly seized and took quite a bit of persuasion to be removed but I eventually succeeded and could continue to remove the flooring.
The floor material you see here is 13mm / 1/2” thick ACM that will make a great substrate to embed the 1/2” PEX tubing into the floor later to circulate the hot floor heating liquid through so I wanted to be able to reuse this huge continuous sheet.  To do so I carefully cut through the ACM floor lengthwise along one side of the track’s slot using my cordless circular saw and a long straightedge to get a very straight edge that will later become a butt joint of the two halves in the new floor.
You can see how clean and square an edge the carbide blade in the circular saw leaves on the ACM and will make for a smooth seamless transition between the two halves when I reinstall them later.
The ACM flooring was through bolted to the 2” x 3” AL floor frames below but not glued in place so once I had all those bolts removed I could pry the ACM up to remove it.

I was then able to flip each half of the ACM floor up as you see here.  
When Horton Emergency Vehicles put in the floors in their ambulances, they first glue down rectangles of black tar like material similar to roofing material you can see on the Left here and then they lay down a continuous layer of 4mm / 3/32” rubber matt on top of that before they put in the 1/2” ACM. 
Several of the bolts fastening the ACM to the AL floor frames had sheered off when I was removing them so I brought out some of these Weapons of Mass Deconstruction to remove them.
This shot as I’m removing one half of the floor gives you an idea just how large the original ACM flooring was.  A single sheet about 4.25m / 14’ long by almost 2.4m x 8’ wide!
When I removed the flooring I was delighted and relieved to find that the underlying AL floor plates and frames were in great condition.  The only exception was that at some point in Lance’s previous life there had been a leak in the seals on the DS rear door which allowed some water to be trapped between the AL floor and the sheets of tar material causing a bit of corrosion in this area.
So I spent several hours scraping off the tar matt in that rear DS corner to clean that all up.
Final preparation for the new flooring began with trimming up the two halves of 1/2” ACM I had removed previously.  In order to get a continuous straight tight joint down the middle I turned one half of the floor ACM end for end and resawed this edge to be perfectly straight.
I dry fitted each half in place to get all the cut outs around the external storage compartments along each side and then slid the ACM halves back out and was finally ready to start installing the new flooring.
First layer of the new flooring is this 1/2” thick PIF (PolyIso Foamboard) that is faced on both sides with AL foil.
As you saw me do with the ACM above, I cut and fitted the PIF around all the compartment cut outs and soon had the first layer of the new flooring all in place.
Next layer was the 1/2” ACM so I carefully laid that in place on top and used some lengths of 2×2” square AL tubing for straight edges to compress the ACM to the PIF and make the floor flat and seamless.
That center joint between the two halves of ACM worked out very well as you can see here up at the front wall.
I cut new pieces of 1/2” ACM for areas I had cut out the original external compartments and glued them in place.  This new ACM is the same as the original, just has AL faces that are white.
If you look along the upper left edge of the ACM you will see where the original slot for the stretcher track has ended up after I turned the ACM 180 degrees and now has a new piece of white faced ACM to fill this in.
 The final layer before I can route the grooves for the 1/2” PEX tubing for the heated floors is a layer of new 4mm ACM.  Pretty straightforward; 4×8’ sheets are trimmed to fit around all edges and then the protective plastic is peeled off the bottom surface.
The same DAP/Weldwood Landau HHR contact adhesive you saw being used last week on the walls and ceiling is poured into the electric HVLP spray gun.
Top and bottom AL surfaces are covered with a thin film of this contact adhesive.
…… and with Christine’s help, carefully lined up and lowered the gooey panels into their final resting place as you only get one shot with contact adhesive that grips for good immediately.
Which takes us back to the end were I began this week’s update so I’m going to leave off here for this week and pick up next.

As per all those blue arrows confirm, forward progress is being made.

Just to review (quiz is on Friday) the layer cake floor starts with the solid AL floor panels, then a layer of black rubber, then 1/2” foil faced PIF, 1/2” ACM original and the top layer of new 4mm ACM.

For those wondering, this layered sandwich floor is bolted and glued to the AL floor frames of the 8ft Wide x 14ft Long x 6.5ft High rectangular “cage” which the whole frame of Lance’s Happytat is build upon.  These frame members are made from 2×2, 2×3 and 2×4 inch rectangular thick walled AL tubing which in turn is bolted to 1×4” solid AL bars that are then rubber mounted to the steel frame of the Kenworth truck chassis.  So no need for any concern about strength of stiffness with our dear Xambo Lance!

My congratulations and appreciation for those who have made it this far and hope you’ll return for more next week. 

If you have any energy left please do leave any questions and comments in the “Join the Discussion” box below.

Ciao for now,

-Wayne