It was a cool and cloudy day and I was looking forward to making some good progress on the van. However, things don’t always go as planned. Last night Elizabeth and I took the van to Lowes to pick up a bunch of bags of mulch, so Elizabeth could spread some mulch today. However, we underestimated how much mulch she needed and ended up taking two additional trips to Lowes this morning for more. That slowed down the progress on the van this morning.
I focused my day on installing the deadbolt lock into the driver’s side cab door. This is the last door that I have to install a deadbolt lock into, and I am looking forward to puting these lock installations behind me. The driver’s door install is the hardest, and that is why I saved it for last. I was able to get the door panel off and install some sound deadening into the door before our first trip to Lowes in the morning. Here is a picture of the door with the panel off and the sound deadening installed.
It was interesting driving the van without the door panel installed. I couldn’t open the driver’s door, so I had to go in and out of one of the other van doors. Also, the driver’s door wouldn’t lock.
I got the deadbolt electronics box installed and the deadbolt installed before the second trip to Lowes. Then I installed the deadbolt catch. All of these tasks were very similar to what I did on the passenger’s side door. What makes the driver’s side door harder is that I have to install a manual deadbolt release mechanism. This manual release is used if the batteries die, to be able to get into the van when there is no electricity to the deadbolt lock control box. It was tight work trying to get this manual release installed, and I cut up my hands a little. But after some struggles and swearing I was able to get it done.
I replaced all the screws with rivets now that all the mechanical parts were installed and working properly. The next step was to do the wiring of the lock controls. However, it was getting late and I needed to cook a dish for a pot luck that me and Elizabeth were going to tonight. So, I thought this was a good stopping point. I’ll pick up with the wiring work tomorrow. I was hoping to get the door completed today, but that’s the way it goes sometimes….
The mulch hauling truck. Multipurpose!