Not sure if this is appropriate to ask on a school bus conversion forum, but if not, I apologize.
I really need the help of some folks who've been around the block a few times RV-wise. I'm helping a friend build his camper. I don't know if anyone here has heard of the Great Dale House Car Company, (
http://housecar.com/)? Well, this fellow Dale built a little over 50 cars by hand, mostly by himself and his wife. A few weeks ago I was contacted by a friend (who directed me to the aforementioned site) and asked me to help him build a camper onto the 1965 Cadillac ambulance chassis he'd just picked up. It's a good car, even after being ram-charged up the rear by a big rig (which is why we assume the ambulance company stopped using it. Too hard to slip the patients in through the drastically reduced roof line.) We plan on cutting the car off just after the front doors and building the new camper body behind.
In any event, he wants auxiliary power from a genset, and our current design leaves precious little space in the body to house one. He mentioned a kit to do this that his father had installed in the family station wagon back in the '60's.
From what I understand this kit consisted of a 5 hp air-cooled gas engine and a pair of electric clutch pulleys, and a double pulley. One of the clutches mounted on the end of the crank shaft where the alternator belt normally ran. The alternator pulley was replaced with a double, and the other clutch was mounted to the front of the aux 5 hp engine. Of course this kit came with all of the appropriate brackets, belts, clamps and hoses (to connect it to the car's fuel line).
The way it worked is while the car engine was running, the crankshaft pulley was energized, and the aux pulley was de-energized. To provide aux power the reverse was true. He told me that his father could start the aux engine just before shutting off the car by flipping a switch under the dash. When the little aux engine was running, a red indicator light on the dash glowed. He remembered his father installing the engine, but could not remember what it was called.
Does this system sound familiar to anyone here? I've tried to search the net for this, but I don't even know how to describe it. Thanks!