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How to install a Ford Transit High & Mid Roof Vent Adapter for 14" x 14" Opening
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May 2, 2025
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View Video Transcript
0:01
[Music]
0:28
he
0:34
[Music]
0:58
he [Music]
1:20
hey everyone welcome back to the live stream tonight we are going to glute in our Max ban adapter um it's essentially
1:27
an adapter ring that we got from DIY van so not sponsored but uh I think
1:34
this product is awesome super cool uh and let me just pull it up here so we
1:41
can see what I'm talking
1:51
about so DIY van I found them about maybe three years ago or something like that and they make a lot of
2:02
uh I want to say odd Parts but specific parts for specific Solutions so for
2:09
example they make a adapter ring for the dedic RTX 2000
2:16
and it's specific to all the grooves in the in the ceiling of the van so it doesn't matter if you have a sprinter
2:21
ProMaster Transit um this plate will fit right
2:27
into the top of the van and make a nice flush flat mount to mount pretty much
2:32
anything you want um for this uh would be a specific AC unit which is nice but
2:39
if you wanted to do something more General so for example in our situation we're going to be using it for the max
2:45
fan and we're going using the same one for the nomatic cooling X2 so shop by Van type Transit products
2:54
and you want to go look for Ford Transit high and midroof vent adapter
3:00
so this is what it looks like um this picture is just blue
3:06
because uh when they took the photo white balance was off so it's all it looks weird but this is pretty much how
3:14
it it uh it's CNC cut so it goes down in the groove like that and then it provides a flat
3:20
surface uh you can also have it in different areas of the van so you can have a in the Ford most
3:27
adapter uh where that transition piece is and there's a big dip so instead of taking a bunch of clex or 3 in window
3:37
weld or uh lap sealant and just gush you know filling up that whole entire cavity
3:42
and hoping it dries this is a much better solution much cleaner
3:48
solution now whatever vent adapter you want you can give them a call they'll help ask answer any questions so um they
3:55
have a photo here and depending on where you would like like to get that adapter
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ring made um they do make it to order so it does take about a week or so to get
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it but um like for example they'll figure out where you want the Vans the front of the van the middle the back and
4:15
then they'll get you the one that you need now for uh what I bought is I
4:21
bought one that pretty much can go anywhere in the van it doesn't have a specific groove it just slides in the
4:26
very middle so you can take buy two of them use one for the max van like I'm doing and then use one for the AC unit
4:34
so if we go on top of the van you can see I've got two holes that were cut out we did that in a previous stream um a
4:40
couple weeks back and uh I've already uh we're working on the ceiling
4:47
if you guys are following along in the live streams and we're to the point to where I need to go ahead and mount this so I can kind of move on and then get to
4:54
the AC and stuff like that so we're putting these two trim rings on the top of the van and we're just going to glue
5:00
them down clamp them and then if you guys have any questions we'll go over some
5:05
questions and that'll be pretty much it for the stream tonight the goal is just to get these glued in because I need
5:11
them to cure overnight um and that way I can actually drill in the OR screw in
5:17
the frame that comes with a Max fan on top of this adapter and just you know
5:23
continue with the van build so we're just going to hop up on top of the van
5:30
um show you the products we're using uh when we take the tape that is masked off
5:36
for the painting to get that rust preventive down or going I take that off uh but then we just want to gently U
5:44
rough up the surface with one of these scouring pads and get some nitrol gloves and then
5:50
the product we're going to be using is a 3M window
5:57
weld so that's that's what you want to get um currently it's hard to find I
6:02
don't know why uh I didn't know I I was looking for this bottle it was somewhere in my toolbox on the shelf and I
6:08
couldn't find it earlier so I went out went to AutoZone which usually has it Advanced Auto Parts but they're all out
6:14
even though they're online it says they all have stock but they're all out so I'm not sure if there's um why but
6:21
thankfully I have one left so in a minute I'm going to open this up if it's good we're going to continue with the
6:27
live stream if not I may have to order some more um oh another uh Pro tip is if you're
6:34
going to use this stuff you're not going to use a lot so for my case I've got two
6:39
openings so it's uh very economical to do it with two openings um this is very
6:46
expensive it's $37 a tube so um yeah if you can put more on your
6:52
roof do two holes uh that's the best and then I'm going to take a little bit of this and we're g to smear it on the
6:58
outside of the um adapter itself and then let that cure
7:03
overnight once we put the Max vanan on we'll go through a video tomorrow about that but the max van will go on we'll
7:10
drill into the sheet metal of the van clamp everything down and then we'll take our uh
7:16
dcor uh lap cyant and this is the self-leveling type and we'll put that
7:21
around the screw holes and everything and this will kind of like ooze down and then uh we'll be done with
7:27
that um we won't do the uh uh we won't do the air conditioner uh
7:33
yet I might put a bead around the around the the uh proximity adapter with this
7:40
but this won't be used on the AC because you can't um so the AC itself has a foam
7:47
gasket around it and that foam gasket is what's going to seal onto the
7:52
uh the plate uh sometimes I put
7:57
um uh let's see what do I put there I put a RTV cylind like a black RTV cylind so I
8:05
I actually might do that um just as extra precaution because once you put the AC on there if you
8:11
don't have really anything seed up except the gasket um you can't really get into there like you can with
8:17
other uh units like for example the max fan I'm sorry the nomatic
8:24
cooling there too many air conditioning units the doedic 12vt
8:30
I raise it up on a Ford Transit so I have about two Ines where I can get in there and then I actually seal the sides
8:37
but this one is only going to be maybe a quarter inch or a half inch and um so
8:42
just doing an extra bead uh with some RTV is usually a good
8:49
idea all right so we're going to open this up and get a gun I might as
8:55
well show you how this thing opens up it's kind of it's kind of weird
9:02
make sure I'm focused there we go so you see the top has this uh thing that you're going to
9:09
need to
9:15
pierce um and I'm actually going to do this on top of the van because uh what
9:21
this stuff does is once you open it up that's why it's not like a normal gun it's sealed down here cuz if you
9:28
break the sealing this the whole entire can will cure and um so it cures really
9:33
fast it's it's because it's for a glass window so it's made so that when you put it around the glass window like if safe
9:40
light went to replace your Auto Glass um that's how they can do it same day so this is that's why it's called super
9:47
fast urethane um okay I'm going bring this
9:52
stuff up to the top of the van and then we will get started and as usual if you
9:59
guys have a question ask them in the chat I'll have my phone up there and I'll be able to get to your
10:28
questions
11:01
all right as we're coming up here on the roof there are cross members and that is
11:07
where your knees go so you do not Dent the roof of your
11:13
van so I've got a knee pad here and I'm putting my hands where the cross members
11:19
are really important that we do that all
11:27
right so this is uh our tape so we've already
11:33
taped everything off we did a rust preventive around here so everything's good to
11:39
go so now what we're going to do is take off our
11:49
tape it's the only downside to masking tape I like it because it sticks really
11:54
well but if you leave it on too long it's kind of like painters tape
12:01
it's a pain to get
12:27
off
12:58
I'm going defin come up here I'll go back down and going get some denatured alcohol and we're going to clean the surface after we scuff it up um just so
13:07
we get a really good
13:22
Bond what's nice about the nomatic uh cooling unit behind me is
13:30
the X2 is awesome it's very very lightweight and it's very power
13:36
powerful so uh it's good if you're doing like a solo build you can pick it up on the
13:42
roof by yourself um the Dometic was a
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stretch I had to rent a like a ratcheting forklift from
13:53
sunbuilt a rental company and I got it up here um pretty pretty
14:01
easy but this one I was able to just carry up with a
14:06
ladder so this is the trim ring so be careful it is thin but that's to your
14:11
advantage and uh you can see how this is uh this piece of material is CNC
14:27
cut
15:00
if you guys have any questions about anything van related or anything about the roof up here you can
15:07
definitely ask me in the chat or if this is not live just put in
15:14
the
15:27
comments
16:13
okay let's get that a scuff pad and we're just going to
16:20
do um see there we
16:27
go it's just going to do about a half inch
16:33
in so we don't want to get too much of the
16:40
uh paint scuffed up this one I'm using is pretty it's pretty
16:55
aggressive okay that's all you got to do don't go
17:24
crazy okay we're going to clean it up and then we'll grab our
17:30
Weld and we got all of our clamps ready too I've got uh 16
17:40
clamps they're are various sizes they're not much of big ones all right where is our Rags
17:57
at
19:27
for
19:52
all right it's pretty easy and going to go grab those clamps
20:00
and we'll put them over here on the little moving blanket that we
20:22
got actually I'm going to do this from the inside that's right that's why I have them
20:29
they're easier to clamp from the inside that way we can get off of this get off this roof um okay so we're going
20:38
to go ahead and I'm going to show you how to put there is this particular way you
20:44
need to put it on here so you need to do
20:50
um uh actually let's see
20:57
here
22:39
okay let's get our insulation a little bit out of the way so what we're going to do is we need to
22:47
make uh three thin passes around here um to make it nice and
22:56
even and I'm actually going to make those
23:02
down and then I'll come back up
23:15
here I was going to do it on camera but I think it's just easier to do it down there and then bring it back up I think
23:22
you guys will get the point when you see what it looks like
23:56
I won't be in Focus but you you can see what I'm
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doing
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they've got this tip kind of standardized but you may want to open it up just a little
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bit so what you're going to do is you're going to screw this
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in nice and tight and then you'll take this back side just pop it off like a
25:29
can and exposes the inside so that's how you'll put it in your
25:56
gun
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so we're going to do 38 inch
26:56
passes
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my camera does this every time I'm
27:22
working now the corners of these adapters is where if there was going to
27:29
be a place for it to leak that's where it's going to be so you just want to be mindful and just put a little bit of an
27:35
extra adhesive or window weld in that
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location
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for
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now I haven't done two of these at the same time I've always done these one at a
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time so I'm hoping we got enough for two frames I'm pretty sure we
29:14
do because I think Thomas's van
29:19
we definitely did to I'm pretty sure maybe use two bottles though because we
29:25
did two trim rings two Max fan rings on his
29:40
install because this is making the seal between the van sheet met on the outside
29:46
because uh there's an area on both of these where the water does pull up on the roof it's just what happens when
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you uh Mount you cut a hole in your roof
29:58
you know the water doesn't flow the way it normally does um luckily for this van there is
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this massive solar panel array on top so the roof is not really going to see
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that much rain but the gutter system on the top of a Ford Transit on the the
30:19
channels on the side they still going to operate the way they do and if you're parked at a
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certain angle water is going to pull up and just sit on the front of this
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trim ring until it act until it dries or you drive off or drive down a hill or
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whatever um there's nothing you can do about it but what you can do about it is really
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make sure that this thing is you know triple sealed and then you won't have an
30:51
issue so my personal van it's going about three and a half years now and I've had
30:59
um I had one issue in the corner but that's what I learned from and so I've
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taken that learning and applied it to all my customer Vans and so any
31:10
corner of this I put extra ceiling on basically the same place where uh
31:17
there was a little bit of sealant lacking on
31:26
mine
31:55
okay so I know you can't can't see it I'm just talking through this but I'm already done
32:01
with it now I'm putting that extra on these
32:08
Corners the inside Corners you'll see when we get up on top of the
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roof
32:31
and it's okay if this stuff oozes out it'll be cuz we're going to clamp it down that
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way we make sure it gets really nice and
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even
33:15
okay so now let's go up to the top and we'll just put both of these on so we're
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just going to come down we're just going to do one at a
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time all right so if you guys could see this
33:32
is what I'm talking about see in the corners where the dip is that's where I put extra and then we got three rings of
33:39
nice even beads all right then we're just going to turn this
33:46
around and lay this right down in
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place then we're just going to
34:01
gently get it in
34:11
place you kind of see how I'm just kind of like massaging it into place just like
34:18
that and then when we clamp it we're going to get some strips of wood and those wood strips are actually going to
34:24
make sure we got a nice even flat surface so that the clamps don't make a a
34:31
bow in the adapter
34:43
[Music] ring same thing
34:55
here yeah but these right here those are going to be like right here those will
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be the leak spots they won't be on this one because we've sealed them with extra sealant
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but if you don't put that extra on there then you will have an
35:18
issue okay all right so now we're going to get some wood blocks
35:25
and get these
35:37
mounted oh man come on Nick didn't change the
35:53
camera I'm not going to take him off because it'll mess it up but we're going to do it again on this so I'll show you
36:00
on that one so yeah probably should have changed the
36:05
camera anyway these are the corners where it's going to uh leak if it does
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leak but I can't really fix it right now cuz I have to this stuff cures pretty
36:17
quick so we need to go ahead and get um get to
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clamping
36:55
for
39:12
[Applause]
39:25
it's
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so we're not clamping these down really tight yet we're going to come back around and we'll
39:57
slowly get these clamp we just need to
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uh start getting it held
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down
41:06
[Applause]
41:24
now on this rear one you w to uh I'm actually not going
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to uh this clamp in the middle flexes really bad because of uh the way this
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cross memory gets in here so we're going to use a spring clamp on that
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spot
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and just be careful when you're coming back inside the van You' got all these
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clamps those it's like a med medieval something down
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here and then just clamp these Corners just until that stuff starts to ooze out
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but you don't want to go too much because you don't want it to have any type of relief when
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it's not being clamped so like it's it pulls away too
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much after you unclamp it if that makes
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sense okay so use spring clamps
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there
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for
44:00
I know he missed that camera angle uh for what I was trying to tell you guys but I'm pretty sure I have that in
44:06
another live stream or Max fan
44:12
install I've got a I got a I got my first max fan install uh believe it or not I have I
44:19
still have that video so I think I'm going to upload
44:24
it cuz it's it's really good it's when I had a lot of time to
44:36
edit that's why I like to do live streams is because uh it's pretty much the editing plus it gives you you a
44:42
chance to ask questions if you guys have
44:54
questions
45:16
all right looks like we're pretty even up there I might put something over here looks like it
45:24
needs to be squeeze down a little
45:41
bit Yeah so just look around in any place that looks like it needs a little bit more compression just make sure
45:49
you you have something squeezing down on
45:54
it
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for
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we're going to use the rest of that tube up there and we're going to go R the
47:18
outside let's grab two more clamps
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here
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that
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okay now we're going to get into a little bit of the messy part I'm just going to use whatever we can of
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this uh to double check and go
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over the spots especially like the ones here in the back
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um man to be honest this looks really good actually
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yeah so the front and the back are what I want to really get a
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good seal
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on
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yeah but the front and back this is where depending on how you're parking in your
50:13
van uh water's just going to sit there until it
50:22
uh comes off the van or
50:50
dries now when we go to wire these solar panels we'll take this off and we're still going to do lap
50:56
cyant but at this stage there's a little bit of this stuff that's oozing out
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anyway and we can just use this opportunity to have them dry
51:24
together
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for
53:06
what's nice is if this stuff gets on your van once it dries you can just you can rub it
53:12
off now if you do all if you mess up big time like I don't I can't I can't promise you that it'll come off that
53:19
easy the small places will come off
53:54
for
54:33
also depending on your roof some of this stuff is not going to lay down super flat so like this area back
54:39
here it's not laying down super flat so we need to put some
54:48
extra adhesive around this back
54:54
corner
55:24
for
55:35
so I'm doing it extra on this back one um once we get the solar panel when
55:42
we plug in the solar panels these will be all lifted up but this back this AC
55:47
unit is not going to see the light of day again so we really want to make sure it's
55:54
sealed
56:23
for
56:53
for
57:23
for
57:53
for
58:23
for
58:53
for
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for
59:53
for
1:00:21
also denatured alcohol take it right off
1:00:37
okay we're going to let that dry uh again the most important one is this one over here by the AC
1:00:44
unit um this one's going to get laps uh put
1:00:50
all around it but this one um we just have the that uh RTV as
1:00:56
its final
1:01:23
seal
1:01:53
for
1:02:25
okay all we got to do is just wait till tomorrow this will be all set up to go
1:02:32
and we can actually um we can mount our trim ring uh we can
1:02:40
cross our fingers if this uh does not cure all the way which I think overnight
1:02:48
it won't I think the other can that I had was a little bit older anyway the point is
1:02:55
um this we can put on that uh ring for the max
1:03:04
van uh because it does need
1:03:09
this so but if it doesn't work we'll just have to wait to get some more from the store but like I
1:03:15
said like a Amazon takes two weeks and then the uh
1:03:21
auto part store they say they're in stock but when they actually go to check it on the Shelf it's empty
1:03:29
so um but that won't hold this up we'll switch over to RTV if we need to do that um that's no big
1:03:37
deal okay let's close out this stream and see if anybody had any questions
1:03:45
probably not it's late um yeah what I'll do guys is I will
1:03:53
uh I have an old video of me putting on the the sealant so if you missed that
1:04:01
um essentially what I missed I'll just draw it really quick on the
1:04:07
notepad just so it's captured in this live stream but what I missed uh because I
1:04:15
didn't change the camera is this is the whole opening this is the this is that uh trim
1:04:21
ring the one that's special specially
1:04:30
made and what I what you need to do is uh these are the danger
1:04:38
areas it's where the it slopes down so it slopes down like that that's just an
1:04:44
OV exaggerated example so when you put the uh sealant down you need to do uh
1:04:53
three e inch passes so
1:04:59
one two and DIY van uh says to do this and
1:05:08
this is three okay like three passes like that
1:05:15
and then what I do is I put extra here
1:05:21
here here and right here because the leak uh the leak points are
1:05:28
these Corners um and that's because the way
1:05:36
that the Ford Transit van is you got this crown and then you got this dip and this rise like
1:05:43
that and so what's happening is this trim ring is trying to
1:05:50
seal like that
1:05:56
and so these these spots right here are bad so that one this one doesn't seal
1:06:01
well and that so if you put extra sealant
1:06:07
there in these spots you're going to be going to be all
1:06:15
good all right guys thank you so much for checking out the stream make sure you guys are subscribed give us a like
1:06:21
if you enjoyed this video share it if somebody's installing there trim ring or Max fan and need some help seeing
1:06:27
somebody sealed up on the roof um and before we go check it uh don't forget to check out the DIY van build cheat sheet
1:06:34
Link in the description below also check out van Builder hq.com a lot of blog posts there to help you out with
1:06:40
anything DIY um check it out all right guys until tomorrow we will see you on
1:06:47
tomorrow's live [Music]
1:06:53
stream
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