Sleeper Headliner, FYI

Just a little FYI on you Canadian Sleeper headliner.

If you find a need to replace them due to the foam deterioration... Look at spending almost $1200 for all 4 sections.

Front sections are aprox $330 ea
Rear sections are aprox $240 ea

All with about a 70 day wait... YES 70 days..!

The headline is held in place with a series of heavy duty industrial Velcro strips and the light in the center.

The panels are nothing more then molded Styrofoam.
You can hand clean the old foam off the panels, but don't expect to be able to recover them more then once, so you better do it right the first time.





Finished product





Also there is about a 1/2" black foam rubber attached to the thin fiberglass roof. There is about 1.5" space between the headliner and the roof with a couple aluminum gussets glued to the roof where the light attaches to.



There is NO reinforcement except for the 2 channels the run front to back, that's it.



I am reinforcing the roof with 1/8" aluminum on top and 1/2" plywood underneath to accept a rooftop AC at a later date when my APU unit under the bunk ever bites the dust. However before I can continue, I have to clean and paint the roof, then I'm installing a 12v power vent.

Old paint


New paint (I'll finish repainting at a later date)

 

UPDATE....

It was a 12 hour day, but I got a lot done as you see...

Cleaned the roof of the brackets and bondo used to secure the brackets.




It might be slightly over kill, but I didn't want any of this coming apart for any reason.
The filler strips was glued and screwed together.






Aluminum sealed and bolted in place with Stainless Steel carriage bolts




The underside with plywood in place. I have foam rubber pieces already cut to fill in gaps.




The vent mounting ring is mounted so I inserted the vent to seal the hold for over night.






The sleeper is finished and cleaned

This pic shows the plywood that finished the support structure, light and front sections.
I did change the wiring from a piece of extension cord to a # 3/12 power wire to hand 20 amps.




Finished remodel




A closer look at the fan blades




Unit open and running




I scrubbed the sleeper from top to bottom and under the bunk as well... also found the foam on the 2 filters to the Evaporator and heater core had deteriorated to nothing after I removed the filters, so I had to rebuild them using material from a washable house filter I had saved. I also built and installed a new filter setup for the APU under the bunk as well with this same material.





My next project in the sleeper will be building a cabinet to accept a fridge, microwave, dvd and printer.
I'm also thinking about installing a hardwood floor as well.

 

Thanks, I was very disappointed in their short sightedness in the roof design as well... As you see, I have rubber in my ceilings for insulation.

I just want to make a note that the aluminum sheet is 30" w x 34" L x 1/8" thick.

The finish plywood that you see in the last pics is 45" long which allows me to move the light forward which also supports the front panel up and the ring of the vent supports the rear panels.

Something I'm going to do at a later date is to wrap a 1.5" piece of lattice and mount it on the seems to help cover it and also screw it up into the plywood which will help support the panels as well.

Its not perfect, but it is still nice and I didn't have to spend $1200 that would have cost me if I were to buy new.

So there you have it...

BTW, the vent (10 speed) really...really moves a lot of air.
Also, the interior of the truck is no warmer then the outside temps even with the fan off.

 

Its been 7 months since my remodel and I have to say that I absolutely love the vent... best thing since sliced bread ! But like everything else in life, all good things must come to a end...

My circuit board that controls the heat and AC died a couple weeks ago. Rather then spend $475 on a new board, labor and tax... I'm going to go ahead and buy a Coleman Roughneck rooftop AC unit. I mean this is why I reinforced the roof, just in case of a high dollar repair to the bunk unit.

I spent today tearing it out the under the bunk unit and salvaging the controls as well as building a box to house the circuit board that starts the generator. I still need to remove the fan and AC lines and hook up the electrical.

 

Wow, has it been so long since I've been to this site and made this thread ?

I'd like to fast forward almost 3 yrs later...

I did not buy a Coleman Rough neck, but rather I bought a Dometic Commercial series along with a 4 yr parts/labor extended warranty that will be good til 2017. I purchased the 13,500 btu Dometic for several reasons, one being price, almost $300 cheaper, 2ndly it was more compact. Anyhow almost 3 yrs later and this thing still works great... too good actually. I'd say a 10,000 btu would be more then adequate. The APU cools the air too quickly like having a oversized AC unit in your home. But still, I'd rather have too much then not enough. So yes it keeps the truck like a meat locker...

Also because of the lack of roof support I build a roof support system to distribute the weight across the roof. I'm happy to say that I've had no leakage, cracking or sagging. On the other hand I had to recover the roof panels again because the glue holding the vinyl softened in the heat and drooped. I ended up using a heavy grey felt like they use on speaker boxes and use push pins to help hold everything in place with great success.

If you do nothing else, put a roof vent in. You will not need to reinforce the roof since they are so light to begin with. Allowing the heat to escape before it has time to heat up your truck will make a world of difference. I love my rooftop AC, but at the same time I really miss my vent.

 

I'd like to add that I still have my Starcar, 12 yrs in June and I still love this truck as much as the day I bought it. She only has 983K miles on the original N14, transmission and rears.