So everything I've read about has said that carpeting the van is not a difficult job and the carpet from MegaVanMats is very forgiving.  Here's hoping! I figured I'd start with the panel from the tailgate as it was flat and small.  If I made a pig's ear of it, it should be fairly straightforward to remove and start again. Drum roll please....yep, it was as straightforward as I was led to believe, at least on the panel.  Starting inside on the van is still a fairly daunting prospect. The process is:

Spray adhesive (I got high temperature adhesive from MegaVanMats as part of the package) on both the panel and the carpet. It's useful to have somewhere to hang the carpet once it has glue on it and make sure you wear a good mask as the fumes are really not good for you!
Next, after waiting between between one and five minutes, lay the carpet onto the panel, starting at one side and using the roller to ensure there are no air bubbles. If, like me, you don't lay it on straight first time, simply peel it off and start again.
Flip the panel over and mark where you need to cut the carpet so you don't cover the holes when you fold it over. In hindsight, I didn't need to spray the glue right to the edge of the carpet during the first stage as by the time I came to sticking it, I had to use more glue anyway. It also makes it easier for marking if there is no glue on the carpet.
Using a sharp pair of scissors, cut out the excess carpet. You will cut out quite a bit off the corners as you don't want it to overlap when you fold the corners over, otherwise the panel may sit proud of the surface when you put it on.  Don't worry about being neat, no-one will see it and look at mine as an example!
Spray some more glue over the edges of the carpet and the edges of the ply panel. Start folding the edges over. Take your time and use the roller to get a good seal on the glue. Job done! Looks really smart, even if I do say so myself. Next up is to fit the hidden panel clips. As the carpet is so fairly thick, the extra bit of countersink from the panel holes is not noticeable at all, which is a huge worry off my mind!

After a spot of lunch I removed the screws from the piano hinge at the back of the roof bed and then the circlips from the bottom of the gas struts and very carefully labelled them and stored them. I didn't almost lose one - promise. After lifting the roof bed down (heavy and awkward) I could start looking at how I was going to start carpeting. All the advice seemed to be 'It's a two man job'. I'm not two men and Han has enough to do looking after three kids still hyper with Christmas without coming out to spend the afternoon with me. Time to get the thinking cap on. I wanted to carpet in one piece as I like the clean lines. I was going to start on the drivers side as that side will mostly be behind cabinets anyway, so a good side to practice on. I want to carpet the pillars behind the drivers and passengers seats, but don't have a T50 torx bit to remove the seatbelt fittings, so I decided that I would start above the drivers seat and carpet back towards the tailgate. I guessed that the reason it's a two man job was that you need someone to hold the carpet level at the tailgate side, so that when you're glueing it on, it goes on straight. No bother, into the garage I went and grabbed an old Thule roofbar I had lying about. As I had the pop-top open, I was able to balance the bar across the gap and rest the remainder of the carpet on it. So between that, my workbench and some clips, my 'second man' was born.

 I pulled the trim loose behind the seat in preparation and started with the underside of the strengthening bar of the pop-top, as it was a long, flat surface. I did the whole length, right back to the tailgate and gave it a good half an hour to get a good bond. Once done, I started on the top of this panel, where the roof bed rests on and then finally the edge where it buts up to the canvas. For this, I had already left a little extra, so I pushed it in, marked where I need to cut and used a sharp stanley knife to cut it.  The, using a shield from some cardboard to protect the canvas, I sprayed both surfaces with glue before pressing in place. It ended up a good finish. The rest of the panel was fairly straightforward. I just took my time and used the roller to get a good bond. The pillar at the driver side, I just followed the same approach as with the pop-top canvas edge. For the top panels, which will be cut out for windows, I didn't bother cutting the carpet. I just covered them and glued up to the edges of the panels. When the guys at Rockinvans cut out the windows, they will cut the carpet and feed it behind the seams for me.

When it came to the wheel arch, there was plenty of stretch in the carpet and although the picture isn't great, the detailing on the arch came out really well. All in, it took me around three hours to carpet this side and it looks spot on.  I'm really pleased with the result.


Well, that's my time run out. 7:15 tomorrow morning I'm on the bus up to the hospital for a hernia operation, with a minimum two weeks led up and six weeks with no heavy lifting. Can't say I'm looking forward to it, but needs must. It is going to be hard giving up working on the van as I seem to have been at it fairly constant over the last couple of weeks. Maybe I can teach my eldest how to carpet and he can do it while I'm laid up, before he goes back to school?