Bright and Shiny Pantry in the Caravan

The new version of Leisureline caravans now come equipped with a flash new pantry fitting, and we decided that we certainly needed one too. Our current pantry is made of timber and rather heavy, so why not get a nice new up-to-date modern pantry, we thought.

Our old timber pantry

So we ordered the fittings from Wards RV Accessories. Same brand of caravan, same style of pull out pantry – it should be a breeze, shouldn’t it? You’ve guessed it, nothing is that easy. First problem was the shiny new baskets, they were just a smidgeon too wide to go in the hole! How could that be? Lex and Noeline from Wards RV Accessories offered to come up and help Robin sort the problem out. Lex brought up his router to shave the little bit required from the existing opening. This was a two man operation. While Lex worked the router up and down, Robin was in charge of sucking up all the shavings with our trusty vacuum cleaner.

Just take a little bit off the side, please

Right, that’s stage one done. Now those baskets should be able to fit through the opening. So we had a test run, to make sure that everything would work as it should, once the fitting was screwed properly in place. The baskets slid in through the newly enlarged opening, but then the pantry door wouldn’t close. What’s wrong now? It was another unseen problem. The oven is situated right next to the pantry, and is fitted at an angle to the pantry cavity just enough to stop the baskets sliding fully in place. “No problem”, said Lex, “we can get the baskets modified. They only need a little taken off the back back corner”. Job over for the day, we all went inside for afternoon tea.

Robin had a bit of homework to do, he had to add a pine support to hang the new upper slide fittings on. That was a job on a wet Saturday afternoon. The next problem was that the bracket to hang the front panel to the metal frame of the pantry interfered with the pantry catch. Another modification was required however this only needed a hacksaw to shorten the bracket and everything then fitted “Sweet As”

A few days later Robin collected the modified baskets from the engineer and could hardly wait to get them home and try them out for size. Success at last, they are a perfect fit. He hung them in place, refitted the cupboard door, and made sure the lock worked correctly. Then he called me to come and have a look at the new pantry. Here it is, all bright and shiny. You can see the modification on the lower left edge of each basket, just a little bit was angled off to make it fit.

Everything fits at last

Our bright and shiny new pantry is now all stocked up for the caravan rally this weekend at Levin. We just hope that the weather clears up by then.