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By Sylverstone, on December 18th, 2009 and then, on to the bed…
so the plan for this is to have the desk at the very back of the bus, and just deep enough for 3 lcd monitors (caris is a “1337 c0d3 h4x0r”)… the bed directly in front of it, and set up so that the bed can be raised up out of the way when he’s not in it.
so we started with building the lift platform…
welding in 4 vertical supports with stops, to hold it in one place (both side to side, and off the floor)
and a bit of magical pulley…
and cable…
and winch
arrangement, and a lot of welding…
and it now goes up and down with both myself, and the fleet engineer sitting on it.
actually, that’s a 2,000 lb winch, so it’s perfectly capable of breaking the entire thing if he’s not careful…
(this entire project has a red light warranty anyway… first red light, and the warranty expires (be that brake lights, traffic lights, or whore house) >:)
so with that out of the way, on to messier things…
to be continued…
-stone
By Sylverstone, on December 18th, 2009 one of the things that annoys me about the bus is that there is no room for a passenger seat…
there is a vertical steel bulkhead in the way…
so…
it’s kinda structural, but kinda not, and it’s really hard to tell what’s going to happen if i just cut it out… (i’ll be putting in a new one that’s not as “passenger space” intrusive, but i have to get the old one out first…)
so with a little (okay a lot) of angle grinder work, it’s apparent that this is not structural when the bus is not moving…
and it looks like i can make a new brace before we pull the old one out… (yay!)
so here’s part of it welded into place. i can’t seem to find the good pictures of this… sorry :/
to be continued…
-stone
By Sylverstone, on December 18th, 2009 since caris is planning on making a regular thing out of burning man and the like, and he’s going to live in this rig, i felt that he would need a much better oil cooler than the rig came with…
and out of jegs we ordered a perma cool 4 pass cooler with the 5/8″ turbulator tubes, and a dual remote filter mount and the block adapter…
i’m glad it came with all the parts, but i can’t say i’m happy about the damaged fins…
after 20 minutes with a couple butter knives and a careful bit of massaging…
all better. 
… but the adapter parts are obviously cast…
… as you can tell there’s a lot of rough spots where the molds come together…
but all in all it’s not a bad starting point…
this should work out pretty well, but it’s going to take a few hours…
this should flow better, with less pressure drop and turbulence
caris returns with the bus, so it’s time to get started on it…
to be continued…
-stone
By Sylverstone, on December 18th, 2009 … so one of the main reasons i thought this bus was a good choice is the automatic air ride…
but the compressor that runs it was stolen sometime in the past, so it rides like a jeep. 
so caris called champion bus co and they want 800 bucks for a replacement and won’t tell us what it is.
… dream on.
so i hook my ratty home compressor to it, hook my honda generator to that, and sent caris to randy’s ring and pinion to get a detroit locker installed in the dana 80 hd rear end that’s under it. with the open diff that was in it, he’d be lucky to get out of the driveway…
in the meantime, i start researching what will work and what won’t…
i settled on the viair 450c because of it’s 100% duty cycle @ 100 psi, and a lot of good experiences with this compressor…
so it shows up broken…
but at least i can start building out the air system…
this pile of parts quickly turns into…
an air manifold that does multiple duties.
1) air input (to air up the bus with the shop compressor if needed) with a valve to keep it closed.
2) air output (yes, you can run air tools off the bus, anywhere
3) air pressure shutoff switch (compressor turns on at 95 psi, turns off at 120psi)
4) pressure gauge so i can see what it’s doing
5) air connection to air tanks (which then feed the level and ride height valves)
and 50 feet of air line…
and temporarily hooked up to shop air…
so i then give the big list to caris for his summit racing order…
to be continued…
-stone
By Sylverstone, on December 18th, 2009 or, a modern day gypsy caravan for the wastelands…
and ya’ll thought i wasn’t doing much… >:)
so the fleet jeweler (caris the gypsy)
and the fleet bling mistress (captain tempestra de la bling)
spent the lions share of the summer landed in the bowl at rear admiral somadina’s place outside of yelm…
sometimes i really should keep quiet when someone asks me how i would do something
… so once upon a time, i had advised caris that he needed to buy a bus to tow his castle with…
what he settled on wasn’t what i had in mind, but i had a summer job once, so i can handle this…
so after him and i spent a day looking at high mileage rigs people wanted way too much for, and thrashed hippie rigs with poorly thought out veggie oil conversions (that they also wanted way too much for) i remembered a place that had a rig i wanted to buy once…
so we hit paydirt in fife, and caris bought himself a ’97 ford superduty access bus:
7.3 litre turbo diesel for the win
i’ve never liked asymmetrical vehicles… i mean, really… i literally burst out laughing the first time i saw one of these:
(it’s a nissan cube)
ugh. at least the bus has potential…
the rig has very poor ground clearance, (sits too low, and the steps and underbody storage make it worse) not only that, but it only has one front seat
but it’s a solid runner, and the price was right.
i can fix this.
i can turn it into a house on wheels that 101 would love…
it’s a lot roomier than a van, but nothing like my warbusaur…
(for those of you who are playing the “sylverstone has an intimate relationship with the word overkill” home game, yes, that’s my 1956 greyhound super scenicruiser parked next to it …)
i love emergency exits
see what i mean by low?
lots of space inside though…
handicapped lift is going to have to go… (man that’s heavy, i’m glad fayd pulled it out, i try not to lift things that weigh more than me
and for thermal stability and efficiency we’re going to have to cover up a few of those windows…
to be continued…
-stone
By Sylverstone, on April 13th, 2009 so… my dear friends caris and audrey from Art Thou Glorious? are living a life that, frankly, i’m a bit jealous of.
they get to travel and go wherever they like.
so last year we did some pretty serious changes to their castle, (moving the batteries dead center under the floor and over the axles, redoing the kitchen, etc.) while sitting in somadina’s driveway…
… and one of the things we discovered is that, between the cold gray skies and the refrigeration, the solar panels just aren’t keeping up in the winter, so we needed a way to create 14.4 volts at a high current flow, fairly inexpensively and quietly…
the honda 3000eis generators i love so much only do 12 amps…
i’m thinkin’ more like 95…
… so of course i have an answer (quit laughing, i’m not always wrong …
so i’m building a 12 volt generator to rapidly, and quietly, recharge the bank of trojan deep cycle batteries they have under their castle…
without further ado…
this particular flight of fancy is brought to you by kawasaki, napa, and the number “haxor”.
the power plant is a kawasaki forced air-cooled, 4-cycle, vertical shaft, overhead valve’d bit of kit that came out of the industrial equipment catalog…
cylinders: 1 (cast iron cylinder liner and chrome piston rings
bore x stroke: 2.6 x 2.1 in (65 x 54 mm)
displacement: 179cc (10.9 cu. in.)
compression ratio: 8.5:1
maximum power: 6.0 hp (4.5 kW) / 3600 rpm
maximum torque: 8.7 ft. lbs. (11.8 N•m) / 2400 rpm
fuel capacity: 1.9 U.S. qt. (1.8 liter) standard
oil capacity: 0.6 US qt (0.6 liter) w/filter
forced lubrication with oil pump
electronic spark ignition
automatic compression release
dual element air cleaner
internally vented carburetor
combined crankcase design
large sealed fan
here’s a couple pics of the important bits:
the easy spark plug access, multiple mounting point base, industrial crankshaft, easy access valve cover, etc.
and here is the low tone exhaust (we’re going to have to do something better, it’s not quiet enough) and the electric starter:
i thought the crankcase heatsinks:
were a nice touch, as was the air prefilter:
and air filter:
assemblies (although a velocity stack would be kinda neat
this did not come with an oil filter kit, although it has provisions for one, shown here: (yes, they forgot to send us one of the bolts):
basically, you remove a plate on the side of the crankcase, and bolt this to it like so:
and put the filter on it like so:
and then reroute the fuel fill line like so:
more as i get the time, i need sleep.
-stone
By Sylverstone, on September 1st, 2008 so when i was first asked to look at caris’ castle, i followed him for several miles over a bumpy road, and realized that the entire thing was yawing quite badly whenever the suspension compressed.
this would make railroad tracks an adventure, and was quite dangerous.
the culprit?
about 500 lbs of batteries (for the solar) in the left rear corner, in the closet.
yeah, not good.
the floor plan pretty much prevented them from being mounted anywhere else inside, so i decided this:
was the best solution.
the rack allows for mounting 8 trojan deep cycles over the rear axle, keeping the weight as low as possible and still up out of harms way.
low and centered made a world of difference.
as you can see, it’s built like a tank, and at full suspension travel, it sits 1/4″ above the rear axle.
the ratchet straps are temporary.
battery removal consists of put a jack under it, pull 4 bolts, pull the 4 spacers that go between the bottom of the rack and the top of the “c” channel it’s bolted to, then lower it to the “c” channel, which allows enough space to pull them out one by one, or put the entire rack on jack stands and roll the trailer out from over it.
on vardo’s i build, the rack will be along the centerline, fore and aft, with the batteries in sideways, so they can be accessed through a hatch in the floor instead of having to mess with the jack and such.
not a bad retrofit
-stone
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