Thread: D4 Storage Fitout

Hi,

I just thought I would share with you all my nearly completed project that involved setting up the back of the D4 with a fridge, storage drawer, air compressor, power inverters and aux. batteries - a Traxide system went in as part of it all.

I had a look at some of the stuff on the market and decided I would prefer to build my own. For the materials I used the Capral Quebloc aluminium tube and some 6, 9 & 12mm marine grade ply. The carpet over the top is something called Wonderwall which is available from Spotlight (not thick like most marine grade stuff).

I removed the seat bottoms of the third row seats to be able to use the space for the inverters, air compressor, electrical bits (fuses, relays etc) and the two 70Ah AGM batteries. The entire rear is covered over with 6mm ply covered in carpet - the forward section from where the seats were removed have two layers of 12mm ply. The idea is to protect the original carpet underneath. The cover is split with a hinge that enables the rear seat back to be lifted to lower the spare wheel if required.

I constructed a frame out of the Quebloc tube to house the ply wood drawer. The draw has inbuilt LED lights on a timer relay - push the button on the front and they operate for 3 minutes before shutting off (stops the girlfriend from flattening the batteries). The drawer unit also has a lift up lid for access if you do not want to drop the tailgate.

I built a slider/stand for the ARB 60L fridge that was the Christmas present from the girlfriend and coincidently necessitated the requirement for putting some extra power in the car. The slider uses 22mm sealed bearings for rollers to move in and out of the back of the car. The slider also has fold down legs, the rear ones can also be fitted with small wheels to make it easy to move. This was constructed from the Quebloc tube. As far as strength goes, Dad and I both sat on top of the fridge when on the stand and didn't budge.

The electrical side was a Traxide battery controller with the power output into the rear cargo area. A marine battery switch allows me to isolate the rear totally, run from the main battery/alternator, the aux batteries or both for charging the auxillaries. The batteries are 70Ah Federal AGMs that are a perfect fit into the foot wells for the third row passengers. They are all connected with Anderson plugs and each battery has a 50A circuit breaker for good measure. All of the power to the equipment comes off copper bus bars. The air compressor, inverters and fridge circuit are all relay operated, with appropriate sized fuses in the circuit. The switch box sits adjacent the fridge and is far enough back from prying fingers. The power from the inverters is presented adjacent the drawer (couple of extension leads at the moment).

The air compressor I had (TJM) is mounted between the two batteries. I had to rotate the head 90 degrees and remove the pressure gauge to make it fit. The air fitting is currently adjacent the right hand side of the drawer at the rear.

There are a few little bits and pieces that I want to tidy up but its time to hit the road for a while and do some testing.

I have attached a few photos of how it looks. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Nice set up. I would like to do something similar with my D4