| Author |
Message |
Gary McFarland (Gearheadgary) (198.88.152.22)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, August 16, 2003 - 10:18 pm: | |
Greetings All,
I'm Gary (Aka Gearheadgary). Myself and my wife Sara are converting a 31' '83 Bluebird Ex-Municipal (Manatee county, FL) Transit bus.
I once worked for Country Coach, and Later, Sara and I both worked for Monaco, She in paint, Myself in the warranty service department, I did mechanical/Electric and Steel fab.
We always wanted to convert our own bus, once coming very close to purchasing a mid-engined Crown.
We wanted a short bus, manuverability being the primary issue. Our other desires, by priority:
1) Airbag suspension
2) Diesel Pusher
3) No "Skoolie" windows to remove
4) high ceilings
5) Alloy wheels
When taking an Associate to the airport in beautiful downtown Calexico, CA, we saw the exact unit. A local farm had two for sale (It seems Airbag busses suck as farm worker transport vehicles).
Six Grand later, we had the bus, with a Newly installed Remanufactured 3208 Cat engine, new wheels and tires (22.5's) and a Allison MT640 4-speed trans. Oh, yeah, it has big RV-Style windows to go with teh six-inch "Bump" in the roof.
We have stripped out the interior (Ok, I seriously underestimated how long THAT would take), removed the Nuclear Air Conditioning unit of death from the rear cap (forklift job), and stripped out all of the wiring. Unfortunately, the rear "Bench Seat" was all busted up and basically had to rip everything out from the back of the floor aft.
I've re-run the taillight wiring in the Frame (Where it belongs), had my buddy Randy the bodyguy make a new cap to replace the wound left by the A/C unit, I just finished the Bed/Engine room enclosure.
Next step is to re-skin where the windows are, also I'm removing the front door, opting for a Mid-entry layout. Luckily, I found a place that had fatory overstock coach doors for $25/ea! I have 3.
I just drove from where I live in the San Francisco Bay area to where I live in the Eugene, Oregon Area (I have sort of a dual-residence). I had 5 breakdowns on the way, 3 electrical (Found the real problem on the 3rd failure) a stupid plastic airline blow, and a jury-rigged piece of pipe for the chassis heater crack in the threads. luckily, none of these repairs were difficult to repair, so we did fix some stuff on this "Shakedown" cruise. Clearly, I have to go over all the systems and look for "Modifications" that should be returned to some semblance of reliability.
At this point in my quest, I'm looking for some inexpensive sources for windows, (Factory overstock?.....Anybody?) Also, really haven't decided on a total floor plan, only have some desigh elements at this point.
In any case, this is a long introductory post, My apologies, this looks like a pretty comprehensive conversion group. I'm looking forward to assimilating vast amounts of knowledge here and avoid some pitfalls along the way.
thanks for reading--
Gary |
brmike (209.166.89.172)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, August 17, 2003 - 2:40 am: | |
northwest rv supply in eugene had lots of windows.just about everything else you will need as well. lots of good stuff at good prices I thought.
Mike |
Steve (162.39.136.176)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, August 18, 2003 - 12:31 am: | |
I purchased all of my windows for Walts RV in Fontanna, Ca.
Steve |
Gary McFarland (Gearheadgary) (64.134.135.55)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, August 31, 2003 - 10:27 am: | |
Delayed Reply to the helpful posts--the Detroit area (Where I am now) blackout followed by the MSBlast worm, followed by the SoBig.F virus has taken quite a bit of my time.
I am planning to check with several of the RV supply places in the Eugene area, of which Northwest RV is one--I have shopped there before.
thanks all--this is a great forum.
Gary |
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