Benivan tweaks and improvments (1 Viewer)

[rwg]

Part of the fun (for me anyway) of a motorhome comes from having something to tinker with and improve. Something to do with your van when you can't actually get away in it So... I thought I would post a thread on the tweaks and improvements that I have made to our Benivan 120. Maybe the information will be useful to other Benivan owners (or to Auto Trail PVC owners for that matter, as in spite of the Benimar name, the Benivan is made by Auto Trail and has a lot in common with their vans).

I'll start with a couple of simple bathroom tweaks...

First, a 3D printed box to hold the hand soap bottle on the sink top. A few strips of double sided tape on the underside to hold the box in place and the soap bottle is not going to slide around anwhere when you are on the road. Another hint - drill a small hole in the neck of the soap bottle just below the lid (2mm or so). This lets air into and out of the bottle. Without this we found the soap was pumping itself out due to the temperature changes over the winter.

As you can see from the image above, the Benivan has a tip up sink unit in the bathroom - the idea is that the water drains out when you tip it up (no plug hole in the sink). This is fine in theory, but if you are a bit swift tipping the sink up then the water doesn't go into the drain down the back, but instead dribbles out down the front of the lower part of the unit and onto the shelves below

Fortunately there is a thing called 'Silicone seal strip' - clear/translucent silicone tape that has self adhesive tape on about half its width. It's designed for sticking to places like the bottom of doors, so that the non-adhesive part reaches to the floor and cuts out a draught, but I've stuck it to the lower part of the sink unit to help catch any dribbles and guide them in the right direction.

It's fairly subtle against the white of the bathroom unit and seems to be doing the job OK.

Next time... strengthening the wardrobe wall to mount a TV.

cheers,

Robin

 

[Wombles]

Like those - very handy mods that may help others Look forward to seeing more in case we can use any of them too as do like a mod. https://www.motorhomefun.co.uk/foru...vc-modding-accessories-discount-codes.184590/

 

[irnbru]

the Benivan is made by Auto Trail and has a lot in common with their vans).

Is that the leaks

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[rwg]

Well, I have no problem with leaks so far, but I guess they are much less likely in a panel van conversion (where the outer skin comes from Fiat) than in a coachbuilt.

As promised, TV installation... The Benivan comes with a TV aerieal on the roof, a booster box and two TV points inside, but the only sensible place to put the TV is on the rear wall of the wardrobe as shown on the right here... Fortunately one of the TV points and a 12V socket is right there under the upper cupboard

The problem is that the wall of the wardrobe there is 15mm lightweight ply and it's not at all clear that it's strong enough to hold a TV bracket. Some suggestions from the Facebook Benimar owners group indicated that the way that Marquis deal with this is to reinforce the wall from the inside before fitting the bracket - I decided to go the same way, but that means you have to deal with the fact that the small table is stored on the inside of the wardrobe wall.

After some thought I decided to go with 9mm ply to reinforce the wall - easily available from DIY stores, and will give a total thickness of ~25mm, which should be sufficient. In theory you can buy lightweight poplar ply (I think this is what the existing walls are made of), but that seemed overkill. Also, since the reinforcement is inside the wardrobe, I didn't need to match the colour of the existing panels.

'Glued and Screwed' always seems a good idea for a firm fix, so I bought some spray contact adhesive (Toolstation). A test on a couple of scrap bits of wood about 6" square showed that after 24 hours I could not separate them, so the glue should be strong enough even without the screws

A good number of short screws (20mm, so they go nowhere near the far surface of the wall) make sure the two pieces are pulled tightly together for the glue to bond. Using the 9mm ply meant that the curved lip at the front will still help hold the round table when it is put back in place - that just required refitting the restraining blocks...

It seemed a good idea to wait 24 hours for the glue to dry fully before fitting the bracket to the other side.

The bracket was another suggestion from the Benimar Facebook group - this one : Amazon product ASIN B07KCDHKF4 . It's quite solid and heavy, but designed for motorhomes with a restraining catch to hold the TV in place while travelling and foam rubber pads to prevent rattles. In addition, the mounting plate is fairly large, so it distributes the load well.

The kit comes with 4 x 25mm mounting bolts - they need a small pilot hole, but will bite well into the wooden wall. I can just feel the tips bulging the ply on the inner wall of the wardrobe a tiny bit (I screwed them in with the table not in place, just in case - if they broke through then a washer on each would solve the problem). Think carefully about the positioning of the mount - I did and still got it slightly wrong (if I had thought harder I would have gone 1cm higher to give a little more clearance to lift the seat cushion and about 3-4cm more towards the window to make it easier to get into the seat with the TV and the large table in place).

As you can see, the bracket has adjustments to for TV tilt up/down and left/right. It also swings out to the left from the mounted position, which is perfect here. I don't think it would work out for a TV mounted on the left side of the van however.

The TV itself - after much thought and more help from the Benimar owners group - was a Cello 22" full HD with built in DVD. The reviews on this TV are a bit negative on the sound quality. It *is* a bit tinny and needs the volume turned up, but to be honest you are sitting at a maximum of about 4 feet away from it, so it is quite acceptable and audible. It's certainly good value for money compared to other 12V TV brands, and the picture quality is good.

The TV comes with some velcro cable ties to help run the cables on the swing arm, but more cable ties are always a good thing to get things nice and tidy. Some self adhesive velcro always helps too - in this case in setting up a spot for the remote to be velcroed to the back of the TV so it has a place to live.

I'm happy to report that a long trip and a number of shorter ones (including some vicious speed bumps) haven't caused any problems, so the mounting must be strong enough to cope with the weight of the TV

Next time... coping with the disaster that is the Ducato's speedometer design.


cheers,

Robin

 

[rwg]

Ok, another one...

I honestly don't understand how the instrument cluster/speedo design in the Ducato ever made it into production, let alone lasted as long as it did. I presume no one from Fiat ever actually drives a Ducato - otherwise they would have stepped out and immediately said 'that speedo is c**p, we've got to do something about that'.

What am I moaning about, well the speedo dial is small and the backlighting is feeble (even at the brightest setting), so it can be hard to see in some lights, but even beyond that, if you are a bit tall (I'm only 6 foot), you can't see all of the dial because the cowl blocks the view. In particular, I can't see the speed ticks for 60 and 70 mph, which is really annoying. This is what I see, even after putting the seat to its lowest height and fiddling with the adjustment of the steering wheel.

Compare that to the view of the speedo in my VW, which is lovely and clear

I tried some things like setting the screensaver on the dashcam to display the speed, but you have to glance up to see it, which feels wrong. Google maps also displays your speed if you run it in driving mode on your phone, but it's really small, so not ideal.

In the end I decided to try one of these : Amazon product ASIN B07P37WY1R
It's a little speed display screen that plugs into your OBD port and can show your current speed from the vehicle data bus as well as a range of other data if you want.

It sits nicely on the dash (I made a little block to raise it up about 1cm to lift it clearly above the steering wheel from my point of view) and has a black cable with the OBD plug on one end and a USB plug on the other to go into the back of the device.

The small size of the USB plug makes it best to start running the cable from the fusebox - it's easy enough to thread the USB plug behind the trip above the fusebox and then bring it out by the far right air vent. From there the black cable sits quite tidyly up to the front of the dash, across and then back to the unit. If you were happy pulling apart more of your dash you could probably route it almost entirely hidden.

So far the speed readout has been reliable, along with the voltage readout. The miles per gallon numbers that the device comes up with are complete rubbish though (I've tried various settings with no real improvement). I keep meaning to change the setup to stop it displaying those...

The display comes on automatically when you start the ignition and goes off again about 15s after you stop. The device will lose all its settings if you unplug it, so it must stay in some sort of standby mode when plugged in with ignition off. If you don't use your van frequently and don't have anything keeping the vehicle battery topped up then maybe this could be an issue. Note that the first time that you start the engine with the device attached, it may take longer to connect, since it goes through an autodetection procedure to work out the right OBD settings to use with your vehicle.

Based on the numbers that pop up on those flashing 'your speed' signs at the side of the road, I'd say that the indicated speed is correct to within +/- 1mph. Unlike the speedo, it *does not* read too high - for instance at 60mph on the device and on the satnav, the van speedo reads 62-63mph. I think there is a setting to do a % adjustment on the indicated speed. I haven't needed to use it.

Anyway, for £36 it's turned out to be a great improvement on the built in speedo. The only thing that I still need to do is construct a slightly bigger 'peak' over the display in black card or similar... The built in one is good for keeping the sun off the screen, but you do see the reflection of the screen on the windscreen when driving at night, and I'd like to block that.

cheers,

Robin

 

[Reallyretired]

Black plasticard is good for constructing sun visors for things.

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[rwg]

Black plasticard is good for constructing sun visors for things.

Hi,

yes, I even have some (although I think it is 1mm, so a bit thick to be honest). In this case I am planning to use black stick on felt I think - looking for a matt finish to avoid any reflections if possible.

cheers,

Robin

 

[rwg]

Ok, this time - a solar charge controller upgrade...

One of the niggles with the Benivan is that the 12V system is a bit 'cheap and cheerful'. The Sargent system (EC176?) contains a single stage battery charger - basically a 13.8V power supply to be honest and although you have a solar panel installed, the controller is a basic PWM one that is only capable of charging one battery at a time. There's a changeover switch to flip between charging the vehicle and leisure battery.

Another drawback of the Sargent system is that it doesn't seem to charge the vehicle battery, just the leisure one. I've taken to leaving the solar panel set to 'Vehicle' when the van is parked up to keep the vehicle battery topped up and then switching it to 'Leisure' when we are using the van - works OK, but a bit of a faff.

As a bit of an aside here, the Sargent display panel shows the voltages for the batteries and a state of charge - poor/fair/good etc. It will also show 'charging' against the battery when it is being charged. To begin with I thought the Sargent control unit must be monitoring whether current was flowing to or from the battery, but actually it's a lot less sophisticated. 'charging' shows up if the battery voltage is 13.3V or above, which is probably fairly accurate as a lead/acid battery doesn't sit above 13V for long unless it is on charge.

Anyway, my goal here was to replace the factory fit solar controller with one that would
* Charge both batteries at once
* Get more power from the panel using MPPT rather than PWM
* Have a charging profile that is good for keeping the batteries in good health
* Fit in the space occupied by the current charge controller and
* Is compatible with a lithium battery if we choose to upgrade in the future.

A good deal of research led to choosing the Votronic MPP 165 Duo Digital, which covers pretty much all my requirements and is from a well respected brand rather than some unknown Chinese brand. Just under £100 and quick delivery from 12V Planet - I bought a few meters of cable that I didn't end up needing to push the amount up enough to get free delivery . Note that at least one brand of dual battery MPPT charge controller (PV Logic) requires batteries with separate ground connections rather than the common ground used in almost all vans - this should be avoided as it will not work correctly in a van where the batteries have common grounds.

So, first things first... removing the old controller.

My first step was to cover the solar panel with an old folded painting sheet - actually there was still obviously enough light getting to it through the sheet to generate an output voltage, but much lower than usual and not enough to run the charger.

Next, disconnect the charging circuits from the two batteries. Turn off the mains at the consumer unit, then remove the 20A fuse next to the leisure battery and the 20A 'vehicle battery' fuse in the little box on the floor behind the drivers seat. You can then verify zero volts at the existing battery charger using a voltmeter with the rocker switch in the 'I' then 'II' positions. Now there is no electrics active, you can start dismantling.

The existing charger has a single central screw holding it to the cupbard wall - pop that out and it comes loose. Now to remove the floor of the cupboard. This is held in with two screws under sticky covers at the back.

Handy hint... Get a hairdryer, set it to maximum heat, minimum blow and aim it at the sticky screw cover for about 60 seconds. Once it's warmed up, it should peel off fairly easily and you can just pop it on a PVC plastic bag until you need it at the end when putting stuff back together.

With the cupboard floor out, you can see that there's a lot of wiring under there!

I also tried to remove the end wall of the cupboard - again two screws under sticky covers, but even with them taken out the wall was fixed - I suspect glued and screwed. Anyway, it turned out not to be necessary.

The rocker switch just pulls free - fingernails might be enough or you might need to carefully ease it out with a flat screwdriver.

The top wire (brown/blue) is from the leisure battery, the bottom (brown/green) from the vehicle battery and the center (brown/orange) connects to the original charge controller. I verified the wiring by connecting each battery back up in turn and checking the voltage from the wires to the battery ground on the charge controller.

Next, disconnect the wiring. The white plastic bits just pull off the back of the toggle switch, while the wires to the charge controller can be simply unscrewed. Label each wire and tape off the ends with insulating tape as you disconnect them to avoid any accidental shorts.

You can then pull the three wires that go to the toggle switch gently from below to unthread them out of the wall.

I'm sure there is some way to dissassembly the white push on blocks that came from the back of the toggle switch, but I just decided to cut the last inch of wire off with the plastic blocks going with it - there was plenty of slack available. The orange and brown wire that went to the center pin of the toggle can be removed as it is no longer needed, and the ground wire (white/orange) can be cut short to match the length of the two wires from the batteries.

Now we get to the fun bit of connecting up the new kit - leisure battery first (orange/white to negative, brown and blue to positive) and also connect the vehicle battery to the start battery + terminal on the controller. At this point you can re-insert the 20A fuses to bring the 12V power back - the 'MPP' light should flash, which is the controller saying 'no power from the panels, ready to go when we get some'. Now connect the panel wiring - observing correct polarity, red to positive - and remove the cover from the solar panel - the controller should kick into life!

Excellent, now just to mount the controller properly and put things back together.

I used some electrical tape to bundle the cables and then fitted about 6 inches of mesh cable wrap I had handy from another project to give a tidy look.

Four small screws mounts the controller on the cupboard wall, nicely covering the hole left by the old changeover switch. It's best to put the cupboard floor back in place first to make sure you right the wiring to go straight up from the hole that was there for the old charge controller wiring. Make sure your screws are no more than 15-16mm to avoid going right through the end of the cupboard and possibly hitting a cable behind. You can then screw the cupboard floor back down and restore the screw cover stickers you saved earlier.

It all looks nice and tidy, with good space around the controller for ventilation even when the cupboard is in use. Note that this model (the 165) does not have a cooling fan - higher spec models in the same case do have a fan that apparently comes on when the controller gets hot.

Everything seems to be working as expected so far - a nice little mod to make the van that bit easier to use

cheers,

Robin

 

[rwg]

Just to report that since fitting the new solar controller, we have made a couple of trips and have had much more reliable 'stop/start' functionality. I think the absorbtion charge period at 14.2-14.4V that the new controller applies each morning has helped keep the vehicle battery fully topped up, which then helps the van decide that stop/start should be available.

It's actually interesting to watch the vehicle 12V voltage, which is displayed on the little speedo display I have added. When you accelerate, the alternator basically gets turned off to save energy, and the electrics run on battery, with the battery voltage gradually dropping to about 12.4V before the alternator kicks in again. When you coast or brake the alternator goes into overdrive and the 12V level rises to about 15V.

cheers,

Robin

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[RioRob]

Great write up Robin. I've recently changed to a new Benivan 122 & was considering the solar controller upgrade like yours. However, when I looked for the existing one it wasn't in the cupboard under the solar switch! I found it in the bottom of the cupboard under the panel and it is an mppt controller. It's a Sargent SK150-12 150 watt 10amp so must be an upgrade. It's still only a single output though so I'm going to see how it performs.

 

[Lenny HB]

Just caught up with your thread, one thing I would say is with the solar controller mounted in the top locker the cables to the leisure battery are way too small. If you change them for at least 6mm sq cables larger if you gan fit them you will get a much improved solar performance.

 

[Old Gibber]

Just caught up with your thread, one thing I would say is with the solar controller mounted in the top locker the cables to the leisure battery are way too small. If you change them for at least 6mm sq cables larger if you gan fit them you will get a much improved solar performance.

Really? 100w solar panel is about 8 amps at max, mostly much less than that. The cabling from the solar panel is about a metre and is currently 2.5mm, so the voltage drop would be reduced by 0.06v. Hardly earth shattering, and will make next to no difference to the performance of the solar panel.

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[rwg]

Hi folks,

yes, the solar controller could certainly do with being closer to the leisure battery and/or having bigger cables. The documentation for the Votronic controller says the cable should be less than 2m, which mine obviously isn't.

If I knew how to safely remove whatever parts of the trim/wall panels/etc were required to run the solar cable down to nearer the battery I'd do it, but at this stage with a fairly new van I'm only taking things to bits where I am absolutely sure I know how them come apart and how they go back together

Sounds like the design of the 2022 van with the MPPT controller nearer the battery is an improvement (unless they have left the solar changeover switch in the upper cupboard, which would mean the cables run up from the solar controller to the switch and then back down to the battery!!!)

cheers,

Robin

 

[Lenny HB]

Really? 100w solar panel is about 8 amps at max, mostly much less than that. The cabling from the solar panel is about a metre and is currently 2.5mm, so the voltage drop would be reduced by 0.06v. Hardly earth shattering, and will make next to no difference to the performance of the solar panel.

Probably over 3m it's in a top locker.

 

[rwg]

Yep, 3m is probably a good guess. Maybe a bit more.

In fairness, the Votronic claims to adjust for the voltage loss in the wires to the battery - I suspect it cuts the power momentarily and measures the voltage on the battery connections, thereby finding the voltage loss in the wires. Certainly the Sargent display reads 14.4V during charging and 13.4V at float, which implies that the right voltage is getting to the battery. So, yes, there will be some resistive losses in the cabling, but at least the battery will be charged correctly.

Not sure if I mentioned this before, but I figured out that the Sargent control panel bases all its battery status on the voltage of the battery. To begin with I thought that when the battery status on the control panel showed 'Charging' there was some measurement of the current to/from the battery going on. Turns out not to be the case... If the measured battery voltage is 13.3V or above, it shows 'Charging'. A bit of a cop out, but probably largely accurate as a lead acid battery will not stay at 13.3V or above for long after the charging voltage is removed.

cheers,

Robin

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[kevingarner]

Part of the fun (for me anyway) of a motorhome comes from having something to tinker with and improve. Something to do with your van when you can't actually get away in it So... I thought I would post a thread on the tweaks and improvements that I have made to our Benivan 120. Maybe the information will be useful to other Benivan owners (or to Auto Trail PVC owners for that matter, as in spite of the Benimar name, the Benivan is made by Auto Trail and has a lot in common with their vans).

I'll start with a couple of simple bathroom tweaks...

First, a 3D printed box to hold the hand soap bottle on the sink top. A few strips of double sided tape on the underside to hold the box in place and the soap bottle is not going to slide around anwhere when you are on the road. Another hint - drill a small hole in the neck of the soap bottle just below the lid (2mm or so). This lets air into and out of the bottle. Without this we found the soap was pumping itself out due to the temperature changes over the winter.

View attachment 623840

As you can see from the image above, the Benivan has a tip up sink unit in the bathroom - the idea is that the water drains out when you tip it up (no plug hole in the sink). This is fine in theory, but if you are a bit swift tipping the sink up then the water doesn't go into the drain down the back, but instead dribbles out down the front of the lower part of the unit and onto the shelves below

View attachment 623841

Fortunately there is a thing called 'Silicone seal strip' - clear/translucent silicone tape that has self adhesive tape on about half its width. It's designed for sticking to places like the bottom of doors, so that the non-adhesive part reaches to the floor and cuts out a draught, but I've stuck it to the lower part of the sink unit to help catch any dribbles and guide them in the right direction.

View attachment 623845View attachment 623846

It's fairly subtle against the white of the bathroom unit and seems to be doing the job OK.

Next time... strengthening the wardrobe wall to mount a TV.

cheers,

Robin

Great tip about the silicone- we’ve just done the same. Thank you!
Added some latches to stop the sink dropping & the mirror doors opening so I’m finished- for today anyway!

Part of the fun (for me anyway) of a motorhome comes from having something to tinker with and improve. Something to do with your van when you can't actually get away in it So... I thought I would post a thread on the tweaks and improvements that I have made to our Benivan 120. Maybe the information will be useful to other Benivan owners (or to Auto Trail PVC owners for that matter, as in spite of the Benimar name, the Benivan is made by Auto Trail and has a lot in common with their vans).

I'll start with a couple of simple bathroom tweaks...

First, a 3D printed box to hold the hand soap bottle on the sink top. A few strips of double sided tape on the underside to hold the box in place and the soap bottle is not going to slide around anwhere when you are on the road. Another hint - drill a small hole in the neck of the soap bottle just below the lid (2mm or so). This lets air into and out of the bottle. Without this we found the soap was pumping itself out due to the temperature changes over the winter.

View attachment 623840

As you can see from the image above, the Benivan has a tip up sink unit in the bathroom - the idea is that the water drains out when you tip it up (no plug hole in the sink). This is fine in theory, but if you are a bit swift tipping the sink up then the water doesn't go into the drain down the back, but instead dribbles out down the front of the lower part of the unit and onto the shelves below

View attachment 623841

Fortunately there is a thing called 'Silicone seal strip' - clear/translucent silicone tape that has self adhesive tape on about half its width. It's designed for sticking to places like the bottom of doors, so that the non-adhesive part reaches to the floor and cuts out a draught, but I've stuck it to the lower part of the sink unit to help catch any dribbles and guide them in the right direction.

View attachment 623845View attachment 623846

It's fairly subtle against the white of the bathroom unit and seems to be doing the job OK.

Next time... strengthening the wardrobe wall to mount a TV.

cheers,

Robin

great tip - I’ve just added a silicon strip, seams to work. Thank you!
Catches fitted to stop the sink dropping down as well so that’s me done. For today anyway….

 

[rwg]

Well, it's been a while since I have done anything to the van - in part because it's been out-of-action for the last month due to the dreaded DPF sensor failure ... Fortunately we had the sensor replaced yesterday, so back in action now and planning on a couple of trips in August

One thing I have been unhappy with from the start is the XZENT head unit/sat nav. I know some people like them, but it's really not a patch on Google Maps via Android Auto, and since our van is a PVC we don't need to worry too much about routing to avoid narrow roads - there aren't many that you wouldn't get a delivery van down... On top of that the XZENT radio is slow to start up, slow to respond and not that good at holding a signal

A good deal of research went into selecting a replacement for the XZENT - in particular it was helpful watching Youtube videos of different devices in action to see how quickly they turn on, how quickly the respond, whether the UI is sensible for basic operations and so on. I also wanted a unit with physical buttons for volume/channel/mute/etc having read that the touch buttons on some otherwise decent units can be awkward to use.

In the end, it came down to a Sony unit based on the need for real buttons and the combination of other factors. The low end Sony units were out as they have resistive touch screens (who knew that still happened in 2022!). I quite fancied the big screen XAV-AX8050/8150, but wasn't sure how the way that it protrudes from the dash would work given how you move between the driving seats and the habitation area. So... the XAV-AX5650 was the head unit of choice. Fortunately Halfords (of all places) had a sale on that put that unit at a lower price than just about anywhere else on line. I ordered at about 5pm and it turned up next day, which isn't bad.

The next problem to solve was how to mount the head unit. The XZENT is an oversized unit, and if you've looked behind it in a van where it is fitted, you will see that the fitting of it involves butchering the quite a bit. The hole it sits in is bigger than standard double DIN, so something is needed to give a tidy fit.


So... more research... it looked like the Connects2 CT23FT21 mounting kit (https://www.connects2.com/Product/ProductItem/CT23FT21#downloads) would do the trick - certainly if you download and read the fitting instructions, one of the dashboards that they illustrate looks exactly like the dash opening shown above with the XZENT unit removed.

The kit is duly ordered, arrives and I pop the XZENT unit out to do a test fitting of the fascia plate. Ooops...

See all those plastic bits on the back that are supposed to clip in to the dash, or screw to metal carrier brackets or whatever - most of them don't fit through the aperture in the dash, and those that do fit through don't clip onto anything. On the plus side, the curved shape is pretty much right and the aperture is a proper double DIN size and it fits nicely over the screen of the Sony unit.

Ok, so all the plastic screw mountings and clips on the back have to go - no problem, a hacksaw blade dealt with them fairly quickly. Of course that means that you can't connect the fascia plate to the two metal mounting brackets that come with it, but that's not really a problem, since the use of the mounting brackets seems to require a head unit that will fit in through the double DIN aperture from the front - the Sony won't do that as it has a wider 'collar' section just behind the screen. All this meant finding another way to mount the Sony unit in the hole in the dash and just using the Connects2 fascia as essentially a 'stick on' cover plate.

Right... mounting then...

Fortunately the Sony comes with a mounting cage - the theory is that you push the metal cage into the approximately double din opening in your dash, bend out some of the metal tabs to hold it in place and then mount the stereo in it. I went with a variation of this theme, adding some packing pieces to the Sony mounting cage to let it (plus packing) fill the space left by the XZENT.
A bit of trial and error showed that 11mm of packing below the cage and 5mm on either side gave a good fit and put the screen in a position that was compatible with the aperture on the Connects2 Fascia. No padding was required above the cage. Having a 3D printer available, I just printed off padding to the correct size and thickness and used some double sided tape to stick them to the metal cage. A trial fit showed that the cage sits snugly in the aperture and shouldn't move.

The last thing to sort out before going ahead with the swap was to make sure the wiring is going to work.

There are a lot of wires coming out of the back of the XZENT, but actually most of them go to a pair of standard ISO car audio connectors - the grey connector with the brown and black plugs attached in the image below. Removing the ZXENT wiring harness (brown and black) and replacing it with the equivalent harness that comes with the Sony covers most of the wiring.


Some other wiring just pulls out of the back of the XZENT and plugs into the Sony - FM and DAB aerials, rear view camera video connection, USB cables etc for instance.

There are a few that you have to think about though

1) Reversing signal - this is wired into the back of the XZENT via a green/white wire - it needs to be connected to a purple wire on the Sony harness to get an automatic switch to reversing camera. I popped a spade terminal onto each bit so they could be plugged together

2) Parking brake signal - there was no wire for this available. I decided not to bother. I believe you need it to watch HDMI video on the unit, the idea being that video will not show unless the handbrake is on. Honestly I don't care about watching video on a 7" screen in the dash...

3) Power - In our van the manufacturers had run the power from the leisure battery so you can run the stereo when the van is parked. I decided not to keep that, since I would prefer the system to turn on with the ignition. If I want to play music when parked there are other ways (via the TV, etc). To make that change I just used the Sony wiring loom which takes power from the ISO connectors and taped up the 12V supply from the leisure battery (note: If you do *not* tape up the 12V from the leisure battery, and - say - just push it back into the aperture, and it touches something metal, you end up blowing the permanent supply fuse in the 12V PSU unit and nothing works in your habitation area until you figure that out...)

4) Steering wheel controls. This is the tricky one. The XZENT takes 3 wire steering wheel input (ground, key1, key2) via separate wires. Those signals come from somewhere deep in the dash via the orange connector block seen above. I suspect that there is some sort of adapter box installed that probably reads the steering wheel inputs from the CANBUS and presents them as 3 wire. Anyway, fortunately the Sony requires the same 3 signals, but via a 3.5mm jack plug rather than 3 separate wires. I bought the cheapest Sony adapter cable I could find on ebay, which had the wrong plug on the other end, chopped off the wrong plug and connected to the cables coming out of the orange connector.


The wiring connections needed are : Key1 goes to the tip of the 3.5mm jack, Key2 goes the the middle and ground goes to the bottom connection.

The other thing to do is to take out the floor of the upper glove box/storage compartment in the passenger side dash - that's the best place to run the USB cables and the microphone cable to from the back of the head unit


Finally, all the prep done, having taken out the XZENT and its mounting brackets, replaced the XZENT wiring with the Sony wiring loom, it's time to start putting stuff back together.



First the mounting cage goes pushes in - it's a bit of a tight fit, but that's deliberate to keep it held in nicely


The actual wiring up at this point is very easy - everything is ready to be plugged into the back of the Sony unit. The only things you could get mixed up are the 3.5mm jacks for the steering wheen remote and the microphone and the two USB cables (only one USB socket supports Android Auto/Car Play) , so take care with those. Once the wiring is done the head unit just pushes back and latches into place.

Do remember to put the release keys that came in the box somewhere sensible so that you can find them if you need them!


In theory the final step of the hardware installation is sticking on the fascia plate and placing the microphone etc. I just tried double sided sticky tape on the back of the fascia, and it seemed to work to begin with and looked fine...



However, the top of the fascia goes a bit too far back, so the clipboard mount thing pushes down on it, which tries to lever the bottom up, causing the tape to give after an hour or so. I've got some VHB high adhesive tape on order to see if that's enough to keep the fascia in place. If not I will have to try to cut about 5mm off the top, which I'm not keen on attempting!

Once wired in, everyting powered up as expected when I turn the ignition on.

Some things I noticed:

* There was a firmware update for the unit from v1.20 to v1.31 which you can download from the Sony web site - you need to put the files on a USB key

* You get a 'don't mess around with this while driving' message every time it turns on. Can't see a way to disable that.

* The steering wheel controls worked, but I had to reprogram them to 'custom' in the Sony settings - the default preset did stuff when I pressed buttons, but not the right stuff

* FM Radio shows the station names from RDS for the station you are listening to, but not in the preset buttons. DAB shows station names in the preset buttons

* You don't get a reversing camera picture unless the engine is running. The adjustments for the reversing camera guidelines are in the settings.

* You cannot turn the unit on when the ignition is off. I've seen some units give you an hour when ignition off, and I'm sure I remember on older cars a first ignition position that turned on the stereo but not the fans/driving ignition circuits etc. I read somewhere that the reason for not having a '1 hour' mode is that the continous supply to the unit may be fused at a low level by the vehicle manufacturer and the unit may draw more than that when in use.

Overall, looking forward to taking the van away and actually using this - we hardly used the XZENT in the 9 months we have had the van because it was so awkward, so this one has to get more use, surely.


cheers,

Robin

PS. Anyone want to buy a XZENT head unit? They're great, honest!

 

[uzsnowdrop]

Thanks for taking time to post these ‘tweaks’ , reall interesting thread , keep on going!

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[rwg]

Well, Amazon delivered my VHB tape before 9am this morning, and while it is definitely very sticky, the fascia panel was still being flexed by the clipboard mounting device pushing down on the top of it. It was fairly obvious that the stick wasn't going to win that fight long term, so the fascia needed to be trimmed of about 1cm at the top.

I was definitely worried about the trimming - cutting hard shiny black plastic has all sorts of opportunities for things to go wrong. After some thought I decided to go with a fine hacksaw blade and a 'slow and steady' approach rather than a riskier but faster job with a sliding compound mitre saw!. I marked the line I wanted with electrical tape to give a clear cut line and also protect (at least a bit) the good part that I wanted to keep from any slips of the saw.


Fortunately the cut went off without problems - managed to get a nice clean cut that needed just a minimal amount of filing to remove excess waste.


This now fits nicely without clashing with the clipboard holder, so can be stuck into place with some strips of VHB tape. I didn't want to use continuous tape as that might make it hard to remove in future - better to use a bit less and maybe have to add more than to find it stuck so firmly that it can only be removed by breaking it in future. You can see the strips of 5mm wide VHB tape (mostly with the red cover still in place.


And that's it - job done...


A nice additional discovery was that it is really easy to remove the clipboard mount (pop it up, 2 T-star screws underneath the back of it). Once removed you have good access to the back of the stereo unit without needing to remove the stereo from the dash.

cheers,

Robin

 

[rwg]

I've been meaning to post this one for a while - a home made rear door shade that would suit any PVC with double rear doors.


Heather made the rear door shade from some spare fabric - it was made in 3 sections, a pouch designed to fit over the top of each door down to the top hinge (watch out, they are different sizes) and a top shade section.

The top section is sewn with a channel down each long side that a garden cane can be placed in to prevent the whole thing from sagging too much. Once you have all three sections made to measure and trial fitted, sew the ends of the top section to the tops of the two pockets and you are pretty much there.

The whole thing will roll up around the garden canes and therefore take up very little space. We would have the canes a few inches longer if we could, but then they wouldn't fit in the locker under the bunk, so it is all compromises.



A great way to help take advantage of the best bits of a panel van conversion - being able to properly open it up to the outside.

cheers,

Robin

 

[ontheroadagain]

At what mileage did your DPF sensor fail?
I believe there was a bad batch which appear to fail at about 2000 miles.

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[rwg]

Hi,

about 1950 miles. I have seen some speculation that the Fiat engine management software ignores the DPF sensor failure for the first 2000 miles (3000km? since it's european) for some reason, then flags it up if it is still misbehaving at that point.

cheers,

Robin

 

[rwg]

Some bits arrived yesterday so another nice morning tinkering with the van

The shelves under the sink have some useful storage space, but there is nothing to stop things sliding off them in transit, which is a shame. I found this particular trick on a facebook group for AutoTrail V-line owners (very similar to the Benivan). Put a bungee rope across about 5cm up from the bottom of each shelf to hold things in place

All you need is some 1/4 inch bungee rope and some rope terminal ends to hold it (something like these : Amazon product ASIN B084TQ55SR).

Oh, actually, you need a right angle screwdriver adaptor too, since the hook at the bottom right is right behind the toilet, and the two inches of space is too little for even a stubby screwdriver. Also, when you cut the bungee cord, pass the cut end through a gas flame to stop it from fraying.


cheers,

Robin

 

[Go_buddy_go_]

Some bits arrived yesterday so another nice morning tinkering with the van

The shelves under the sink have some useful storage space, but there is nothing to stop things sliding off them in transit, which is a shame. I found this particular trick on a facebook group for AutoTrail V-line owners (very similar to the Benivan). Put a bungee rope across about 5cm up from the bottom of each shelf to hold things in place

View attachment 671085
All you need is some 1/4 inch bungee rope and some rope terminal ends to hold it (something like these : Amazon product ASIN B084TQ55SR).

Oh, actually, you need a right angle screwdriver adaptor too, since the hook at the bottom right is right behind the toilet, and the two inches of space is too little for even a stubby screwdriver. Also, when you cut the bungee cord, pass the cut end through a gas flame to stop it from fraying.

View attachment 671086
cheers,

Robin

I bought tension rods and they do the same job

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[rwg]

Another week, another little batch of things to do with the van...

The good news is that the parts to (hopefully) fix our faulty Whale water heater have come into stock at the dealer, so drop the van off there next week for them to be fitted (fingers crossed).

The bad news... Slow puncture, identified as a nail in the tread. Actually changing the wheel for the spare was less hassle than expected, and the tyre is now repaired and ready to go back on...


'Nailed it'...

On the improvements front, a couple of electrics tweaks got completed.

The first was a power source switch for the Sony head unit. When I installed the head unit, I decided to power it from the vehicle supply so it came on with the ignition. That was definitely the right choice, but we have had a couple of glitches where the head unit has misbehaved (no sound, or stuck on reversing camera). Power off/on fixes the glitch, but that's hard if you are doing 65 on the M4 - turning off the ignition at that point is not recommended... In order to make for an easy fix, and to allow the stereo to be used when parked up, I decided to fit a power changeover switch.

A double pole three position switch was only a couple of quid off of ebay - the wire needed to wire it up and appropriate bullet/blade terminals cost more.

Here is the dash with the radio removed and the panel below the heating controls out too (that's where the switch is going). You can see I have run a bunch of five wires between the two... 12V from hab battery (pink), 12V B+ from vehicle/to stereo (2*yellow), 12V ACC from vehicle/to stereo (2*red).


I invested in a set of step drill bits off of Amazon - made drilling a 20mm hole in the trim to fit the switch an absolute breeze. To think of all the time I have spent in my life filing out holes in plastic to the right size... Should have bought some of these years ago!

This is the final view showing the changeover switched tucked behind the 12V/USB sockets on the dash. Looks really tidy...

Position I means that the stereo runs on vehicle electrics and switches on with the ignition. Position II means it runs on the habitation battery and can run when stationary. Position O means off.

Works a treat

cheers,

Robin

 

[rwg]

The other thing I did today was a pair of USB charging ports (the Benivan doesn't have any connected to the hab electrics...)

I picked up a 12V to dual USB adaptor off of Amazon - roughly the size of a cigar ligher socket. A bit of care was needed to pick up one with a *red* LED lighting scheme not blue (this is going to be on at night, after all). Here's what I bought : Amazon product ASIN B09J2LJMY4 . It doesn't charge in all the super fancy high speed modes it claims, but it does go faster than the basic 5V 500mA of old USB, so it seems OK.

The target location was under the high level locker behind the driver's seat where there is already a 12V socket.


Access is under the floor of the locker above - usual tricks, heat the stickers covering the screws with a hair dryer, peel off the stickers, unscrew, lift the locker floor. This is what you find...


Plenty of space, and plenty of wires, including the 12V to the 12V socket, mains wiring, etc.
Interestingly at the other end of the locker floor is a box to handle the reversing camera signal - A Sargent EM2 - I had no idea that was there...



Anyway, the important thing here is the 12V which is connected to the existing socket via a couple of spade terminals.

The step drills come in handy again to make a 28-30mm hole for the USB unit to go through.



Once the unit is in place, wiring up involved a few inches of new wire with appropriate spade terminals fitted to connect to the supply wires, the existing 12V socket and the new USB power supply. The USB supply came with wiring including an inline fuse, so that got kept too (although the circuit is already fused).



Reinstallation of the floor is the reverse of dissassembly as they used to say in Haynes manuals, leaving you with a nice pair of USB sockets tucked away under the locker.



All very tidy

Robin

 

[Sapper520]

In relation to your Xzent Unit, this is what the Specialist Car Audio fitters removed when they fitted our new Pioneer Unit…….they had no idea why it was in there (otherthan the Fiat USB and rocker switch) describing it as cheap…..whatever it is.

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[Old Gibber]

A

The first was a power source switch for the Sony head unit. When I installed the head unit, I decided to power it from the vehicle supply so it came on with the ignition. That was definitely the right choice, but we have had a couple of glitches where the head unit has misbehaved (no sound, or stuck on reversing camera). Power off/on fixes the glitch, but that's hard if you are doing 65 on the M4 - turning off the ignition at that point is not recommended... In order to make for an easy fix, and to allow the stereo to be used when parked up, I decided to fit a power changeover switch.

A double pole three position switch was only a couple of quid off of ebay - the wire needed to wire it up and appropriate bullet/blade terminals cost more.

Here is the dash with the radio removed and the panel below the heating controls out too (that's where the switch is going). You can see I have run a bunch of five wires between the two... 12V from hab battery (pink), 12V B+ from vehicle/to stereo (2*yellow), 12V ACC from vehicle/to stereo (2*red).

View attachment 675786
I invested in a set of step drill bits off of Amazon - made drilling a 20mm hole in the trim to fit the switch an absolute breeze. To think of all the time I have spent in my life filing out holes in plastic to the right size... Should have bought some of these years ago!

This is the final view showing the changeover switched tucked behind the 12V/USB sockets on the dash. Looks really tidy...
View attachment 675787
Position I means that the stereo runs on vehicle electrics and switches on with the ignition. Position II means it runs on the habitation battery and can run when stationary. Position O means off.

Works a treat

cheers,

Robin

Not sure why you went to all this trouble to change the Xzent. Firstly the Xzent will run Android Auto perfectly well, though Android Auto is not a patch on the Tom Tom Motorhome sat nav software standard in the Xzent. Last week mine warned me about a low barrier at the exit to a supermarket in Croatia!

Also there have been a couple of updates to the Xzent which has improved the radio side and the navigation side immeasurably.

Personally I prefer the radio to be powered from the habitation battery which it is as standard. That way I can use the remote to listen to the radio in bed.

 

[rwg]

Hi,

the XZent is definitely not Android Auto - it has its own 'screen mirroring' android app that is fairly flaky, but (if you can get it to work) does show the phone screen on the display of the XZent. The problem is that it just shows the normal phone display, rather than proper Android Auto which has bigger text, bigger buttons to click on, optimized design for landscape screen layout, etc. The difference is chalk and cheese... I have read that the latest update improved DAB reception.

In the image two posts up, the wiring harness (brown and black plugs) is just a converter from standard car stereo sockets to the connector on the XZent. The GPS puck is pretty much standard too. I guess the thing labelled 'active splitter' is something to do with the radio aerials - didn't find one of them in mine, nor the USB socket or switch.

cheers,

Robin

 

[Sapper520]

I had two Xzent A-F270’s fail. Everything on them was flakey and only worked when it wanted to. Sat Nav froze on a fairly regular basis. Niether Unit had Android Auto, updating was a nightmare.

The Specialist company removed the Fiat USB socket (seen in the picture above) and replaced it with a double USB fitted in the hole it left. Both USB’s show on the Pioneer Unit and work easily in conjunction with updates. They changed the rocker switch ( giving power when the ignition is off) for one that they put in all the vehicles they work on. The Motorhome Dealer couldn’t get 3 of 5 (1 x Zenec, 1 x Alpine and 1 x Pioneer) replacement units to work with the steering wheel controls……they needed to fit a ‘Patch’ kit for that to happen). That’s why I gave up and found a company that knew what they were doing.

Following your thread with interest.

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