I have a hard drive full of video content that I wanted to stream in the Vanagon. Placing an iPad on the table works, but it is not as handy as having an iPad permanently mounted and out of the way. I purchased this iPad magnet mount with hopes of being able to mount it in several places throughout the Vanagon. The magnet was not strong enough to hold the iPad because there isn’t enough bare metal in the van. I then moved to the second option of modifying the mount to fit my needs. Click through to see how we did it.
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The fluorescent light in the hard top Vanagon comes with a push button switch. I have always wanted a toggle switch instead, but never gave it a thought until my push button switch died. One of my lights was getting increasingly more difficult to turn on so I knew we had to change the switch. We decided to change from a push button to a toggle switch and results are fantastic. Hit the jump to see how we did it.
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The back hatch of the Vanagon does not include lights and we decided to solve that little problem. Whenever you open the hatch to get something out of the back it’s just too dark to see. I’ve stored flashlights and magnet lights back there for years, but we came up with a better solution. I purchased a couple of dome lights from Go Westy, and some LED interior lights from Van Cafe and we were ready to go. Click through to see how we did it.
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The Vanagon lighter plug has always us because it was loose. Even after installing a new plug it still felt loose when you pulled out an accessory. Searching the Internet gave us few clues about how to solve this problem. Some people have tried adhesive, or clamps behind the dash, but none of the suggestions seemed right.
We finally found the fix, courtesy of our friend Joel. By removing the plug assembly and placing an O-ring around the outer green assembly, the problem is solved. The O-ring sits behind the dash and keeps the lighter plug in place. Ideally, the plug should have a threaded nut behind the dash instead of clips, but the O-ring is a nice substitute for the nut. Hit the jump for more the rest of the fix.
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Everyone who owns a Vanagon should have the GoWesty Auxiliary Battery Kit installed. The kit allows you to have a second battery to run your lights, stereo, etc., while parked without draining your starting battery. We installed the kit with an Odyssey PC1200 battery (44ah) and it works quite well, but the battery is pricey ($250) and it only gave us 44Ah. Ken from Van Again has a brilliant hack for using the GoWesty Kit.
As you can see in the video above, Ken uses deep cycle wheelchair batteries in parallel along with the GoWesty kit. He is able to get more amp hours for the buck that way. There is room to add 4 batteries under the driver’s seat which gives you a total of 88Ah — double the GoWesty battery.
We have purchased several things from Van Again. Check out their website for accessories, and their Facebook page for more videos.
Here are the batteries used. You can buy them from Amazon and have them shipped right to you. I love this hack!
66 amp hours (or more) depending on how many you buy.
