| Author | Message | ||
| Jim (Jim_in_california)
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Folks, Picture a situation where as you're walking inside towards the back bumper, you've just passed the kitchen about midships, you enter a door and there's an empty room the width of the bus and about 7ft long. It was designed to have two parallel single beds either side of a central aisle, or possibly bunks each side. At the other end is another door opening to the rearmost area...probably another room about like this one. Bus interior height is sorta "classic", 6'3" or so ...this is a 4104 through 4109 era, or maybe a Bluebird. It's a 96" wide frame so guesstimate 7'6" usable interior width. This is very common in buses originally laid out as "sleepers"...sometimes you see two like this in a 40ft, but we're assuming this is just one room like this in an otherwise full motorhome conversion. So here's what I'm thinking: Run a bed platform about 4ft off the ground, wall to wall. What you get underneath is a "crouch walkway" that has ROOM for a ton of stuff - Splendide on one side next to a huge cube-shaped freshwater tank of as much as 200gal, on the other side you can do a hanging closet of adequate height for a suit and as long as you want...probably put draws on one side. Topside, you can have two single-size matresses that can either be separated or jammed together as needed. Good flexibility, still enough height for..."play"  . Weird? Sure. But when maximizing space on a 35' rig, it seems to me we're wasting space by insisting beds be at the normal 2' or so off the ground level. That may be "normal" but...it ain't efficient. You couldn't do this at the far rear room of most pushers because you need engine access under the bed. You could with a Bluebird/Wanderlodge "puller" or some sort of mid-motor (Crown/Gillig). Only drawback: you're screwed if you become seriously disabled. | ||
| TWODOGS (Twodogs)
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how do you have access to motor if you have a 200 gallon water tank there | ||
| John that newguy Rating: N/A |
They sell bed mechanisms that lower the unit from the ceiling... | ||
| captain ron (Captain_ron)
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Jim I wish you would hurry up and "buy" a bus I'll even sell you mine and I'm actualy starting to get attached to it. | ||
| CoryDaneRTS Rating: N/A |
One of my original designs was to have a queen bed that would fold up to the rear wall, leaving a 3 wall couch/chair system, of which part of it was under the bed when folded down. The problem I had with the design was not the fact that the mechanism was difficult to make, in fact, it was quite easy. The problem was that the RTS ventilation system returns air from the back wall and folding the bed up created huge concerns for air circulation and heating. Nothing like it to open up the bedroom for additional living space, like adding another 8' x 8' room on an otherwise limited space motorhome and exceptionally better than making those slide-outs that get stuck and won't come back in when left out for a campsite or just don't move at all. No need to add any additional problems when you don't need to. The bed folds down my hand and is counter balanced so little weight to deal with. Additionally, there is storage under the seating area as well. Many pluses to such a design. cd | ||
| Jim (Jim_in_california)
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Twodogs: read it again: I'm talking about situations where this bedroom is NOT at the very rear of the bus. There's another room beyond where the engine bay access issue happens. Ron: I wish California Attorney General Bill Lockyer would COUGH UP MY MONEY!!! Jesus, they're WAY late. Judge ordered it released 3/10, we're now in MAY!!! Sigh. | ||
| Brian (Bigbusguy)
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You will get your free money probley in abiut 10 years after you spend more on attorneys then you would have got. Did you realy think they was just going to hand over the money that easy. They will keep it tied up for years and years. SO your new protest mobile will have to wait. Its the Calif way. Brain 4905 | ||
| James Maxwell (Jmaxwell)
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Bill would give it to you but he ain't got it to give unless he can find some more money wells to tap out, and everybody pretty much knows that the State of California has pretty much tapped them all dry. Now, to your latest hair-brained idea. Pullman started doing it back in the 1920's with the "Heavy" sleepers. Country Coach does exactly the same with the Trek motorhome--bed retracts to the ceiling for day time use, becomes the ceiling in the living room and part of the kitchen. Problem is, w/the mattress surface at say 4' of the floor, you have only 2+ clearance. I had a cab-over camper once--no thank you, I want air, and since I ain't in the Navy, be damned if I'll climb to get in bed. I prefer falling into bed and being at a reasonable height off the floor if I fall out. | ||
| TWODOGS (Twodogs)
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jim in ca.....I think you are fantasizeing about how much room you have back there...also...think you are on the money you are waiting for... | ||
| James Maxwell (Jmaxwell)
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Jim: Just occurred to me why Lockyer announced he is running for Treasurer next election: He is running against term limits (and your money) and looking for a way to hold it up another 8. Things ain't lookin' good Jim! | ||
| Jim (Jim_in_california)
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Guys. There's a court order on the money. It's freakin' MINE . Seriously, the $2.6mil is already paid by Diebold to the state. The judge has said my cut is $76k - and the gov't decided not to dispute that. I'll have it soon enough . | ||
| Brian Brown (Fishbowlbrian)
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If you don't mind climbing into bed, do it. My old Winnie class A rig had the pull-down over the driver and I slept there every night we travelled. Didn't mind it a bit. I'm young-ish, though. You're correct: On a smaller rig, you gotta conserve space, or make it multi-functional. I can't fault your logic. BB | ||
| Jim (Jim_in_california)
Rating: N/A |
Hmmm. Turns out the biggest Splendides can fit in a vertical space a hair under 3ft. Call it 3ft round numbers. That opens an opportunity but creates a problem. The opportunity is that the bed over the washer can be just three feet off the ground. That gives you much more vertical clearance in bed than you'd get from a ClassC cabover bed. Much more comfortable once in bed and more..."energetic play area". The bad news: using a passageway space that tall as a walkway back to the rearmost room (which is a lounge, garage, etc) would be idiocy unless you were a midget. Instead you'd have to go up a short ladder to the bed, do a neat little akkido roll and land again on the other side in front of the door to the garage . OK, that's putting it a bit silly. BUT, if you don't have that "walkway" in the middle, then behind the Splendide you could run a BIG freakin' freshwater tank...3ft tall, 3ft wide and 7.5ft across the whole bus. Damned if I know how much water that is but I'll bet it's up near 300gal...definately over 200gal. And as far as weight distribution goes, it's in a GOOD place, just ahead of the rear axle. Then on the other side of that, you've got another 2ft area under the bed to put a couple of tool chests facing towards the rearmost door, a very nice place for them if you've made that last room a motorcycle garage. Speaking of which: I just recently learned that GMC 3751s, 4102s and 4104s all had a rear emergency exit towards the driver's side, very rearmost section. You can see a good shot of one still intact here: http://www.hbindustries.ws/images/1-Greyhound/g1/Bus%2010-26-04%20007.jpg This being the case, it seems to me that as long as the drivetrain is of the original weight or less (671 with Spicer 4sp manual) on these, widening that rear hatch another foot shouldn't harm the structural integrity of the coach much, as long as you properly did a new tubular aluminum frame on this wider hatch and you left it the stock height. That in turn gives you, tada, a motorcycle ramp hatch into a "rear bedroom" converted to a garage. And so far I've seen one conversion for sale that has an open rear area and then this sort of "bedroom" forward of that just like I've been discussing here. Or, take a more convensional conversion of something in this series, turn the living room couch into a decent permanent bed (with enough pillows for daytime "couch use") and just convert the "back bedroom" into a garage/shop area. This "garage/shop" would be big enough to have a Splendide just inside to one side with a workbench over it, and a cube-shaped water tank the other side capped with another workbench. Motorcycle storage for up to two bikes and a 10ft folding ramp fit rearward of the two benches. Probably shouldn't do this with anything that has an 8V71 (original or conversion) or has an auto tranny swap, as the rear end weight may make it unsafe with the hatch present (one reason I suspect it vanished with the 4106, they needed more rear support beef?). Other than a wider rear hatch, nothing about this seriously "butchers" a classic bus. | ||
| RJ Long (Rjlong)
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Rear driver's side emergency door was a option on the PD4106, altho quite rare. Crown and Gillig skoolies have them, too. None are tall enough for an average adult to stand in - you must stoop to use. Keep in mind that the floor line on these models is about 4 feet off the ground, making for a rather long fall, should you lose your balance on the bike. | ||
| Jim (Jim_in_california)
Rating: N/A |
>>Rear driver's side emergency door was a option on the PD4106, altho quite rare.<< Interesting. But I think I'll pass on doing one custom on a 4106, I'm well aware there's an 8V71 "hung from" that metal. >>None are tall enough for an average adult to stand in - you must stoop to use.<< Right, I'm aware of that too. But a bike hatch only needs 4.5' in a pinch, 5' would be plenty. >>Keep in mind that the floor line on these models is about 4 feet off the ground, making for a rather long fall, should you lose your balance on the bike.<< And that's the biggest "gotcha". Still, a 10ft total length ramp (folds in half, rated at 1,200lb is available) that's 24" wide and well designed (good non-stick surfaces) would make it doable, esp. if I put in a modest winch with about 500lb capacity inside for days when I didn't want to "stunt it" in. There's actually an advantage to winching it in backwards and then driving it out nose-first...going in, the front of the bike is towards you so you have brake control. It might be possible to adapt devices made to get motorized invalid scooters in and out of the backs of SUVs to be a "bike crane", hauling the bike in and out no ramp! But...no, don't think so...there's some things that are too weird even for me . |