Here is my new bus, dubbed The Peat Moss Bus.
She was listed here on Skoolie.net and I had to have her.
She will be me and my girlfriends home for the next few years.
I will post more and more pictures as they become available
Currently I am gutting the inside, taking an angle grinder to the rivets on the ceiling, scraping the rubber flooring out, and already have yanked the seats out.


Here is the first place we filled her up with 140 bucks worth of Diesel in good ol' Banks, OR



Man, she is a sweet bus. She made it to her new home in Seattle, WA with no problems whatsoever. We even got about 10.5 miles per gallon



There were a few seats in the back, and there were 8 seats that needed to be removed in the front...




which the trusty angle grinder took care of with the help of a wrench and a local scrap metal dealer.




it sure is coming along, just having the seats removed.



now to get some of the ceiling out of the way to make room for the hardwood.

congrates on first road trip, and welcome to the madness, money pit, bloody knuckles etc...

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Our build La Tortuga
Accept the challenges so that you can feel the exhilaration of victory.
George S. Patton

Thanks mate. I'm also wondering if anyone would like those heaters I got in there. If someone can direct me on how to remove them,bypass the radiator tubes it would be nifty, or better yet come out and pull them for yourselves

GREAT bus, man! You picked a winner - enjoy!

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Gallery:
https://www.skoolie.net/gallery/v/Skooli ... l_dan_bus/
Conversion Thread:
viewtopic.php?t=4959

Welcome to the world of school bus conversion madness. The tasks never seem to end, but neither does the fun!

There are a great conversions on this forum and numerous people who have come before you. Feel free to ask them for ideas and suggestions. They know the minefields to avoid!!!

Enjoy!

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Greg and Donna Marvel
Danville, California
https://www.transtraks.com

Great looking bus, i live in Lacey, if you need any information or help let me know

Eric

Good looking bus
The simple answer is take the heater out and connect the hoses together with a short piece of pipe. If you take out the hoses that run down the left side under that metal guard you will no longer have heat or defrost up front. There are probably valves back near the engine that will allow you to isolate the heating system so you won't have to drain the entire cooling system. When you refill there is a bleeder screw somewhere near the front heater. Open the right front access door and look for a small fitting or hose coming off of the top of the piping. That hose should have a bleed screw in it.

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Skoolie map
https://www.somewhereinusa.x10.mx/skooliemap.html
My bus website
https://somewhereinusa.x10.mx/

Hmmm...just my input; you might think about removing heaters. Free, abundant heat is a pretty nice commodity.

Another Welcome! --- Great looking unit. The Birds are built like tanks and make terrific platforms to build on. Looks to be a rear engine rig...and if you're gettin' 10+ mpg, I gotta ask what the engine and tranny are. Very sweet numbers for a "big rig". Have fun and keep the pix'a'comin'.

PS...I also have second re-thinking the heater situation. Those are very efficient units. If you can find a spot, just one of them will make a really big difference over the road.

I'm curious: what is the headroom in that bus? What is the measurement from the center of the aisle up to the ceiling? It looks like you have a high ceiling bus but I am curious how high that is in a Bluebird.

Thanks!

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Gallery:
https://www.skoolie.net/gallery/v/Skooli ... l_dan_bus/
Conversion Thread:
viewtopic.php?t=4959

You guys are lucky, I have a Thomas and the fans are so loud, you can't talk let alone sleep. They pull 36 A while running, and that was on low, I could not handle the fans on high.

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William

visvi Cherokee for Journey, Sounds Like Oeesha

https://thejourneyvisvi.com/

My Conversion Thread:
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=464989

Dan...shuuuushh don't hurt his feelings....he might be short

My mom is like 4ft something she was 1 inch taller than a "little person" and then she got old and she said "I am finally a midget" (she can only touch bus ceiling with her cane....normally when she swings it )

My smoke detector was open and I cut my forehead...that hurt

I looked at one of those size at first and said...way too big...now I would like that other 5ft of room

__________________
Our build La Tortuga
Accept the challenges so that you can feel the exhilaration of victory.
George S. Patton

Welcome to the madness!! Keep us posted on your progress. Looks good so far!

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Proud new owners of a 1974 Crown Supercoach - the big rolling twinkie!

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=466562

I was thinking about maybe keeping one of the heaters. It seems that there is a short on both of the heaters, because they are able to be moved now that they aren't being braced by the old seat posts. I could take a multi-meter to it and see if I could determine which wire has the short. Sometimes they will spark where the wires are if I move the heaters. I might keep one and just move it, that sounds like a better idea. I want to do a complete hardwood interior, similar to this style of bus conversion project I found online. Currently we are gutting the roof. I finally picked up a gasoline 5,000 watt generator so I can just buy cheap tools at pawn shops and use those. My roommate is helping me with the conversion and he picked up this 7 inch Hitachi grinder and I haggled the pawn shop down from $100 bucks to $70. Here's some pictures of what we have done so far.

Tons of sparks flying all over the place. That seven inch grinder doesn't mess around.


Here is a shot of the ceiling. Luckily there was absolutely no rust and no leaks. I found out that the origin of the bus is near Madras, OR, which is a very dry area, so I lucked out. It's quite rare that buses here in the Pacific Northwest lack rust or significant water damage. Typically you have to cross the cascades and go around southern oregon to find a good bus. The guy that sold it to me was a total badass and knew what he was doing when he chose this bus.


I found a pretty easy quick method for taking off the rivets, I will gladly make a video for y'all on how I take them out tomorrow when I go work on the bus.

Also, here is the link which featured the awesome wood job that I liked. http://tinyhousetalk.com/school-bus-cabin/

Ahh yes the pic that launched a thousand bus conversions...that was the one that finally got my better-half to say yes

A note of caution, if you are going to keep those windows, the sparks from the grinder will ruin them.

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Skoolie map
https://www.somewhereinusa.x10.mx/skooliemap.html
My bus website
https://somewhereinusa.x10.mx/

Heed this fair warning. I was unaware of what grinder sparks can do to glass and now have little, rusted metal chunks embedded in a bunch of my windows

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My build page: Armageddon - The Smell of Airborne Rust

Yes I found that out quick. I also removed them all before continuing.

Your heaters can be bypassed under the drivers side of the bus, before they enter the cab, just in front of the drivers front wheel well. If you bypass them at that point, all your front heaters will still work.

Lay on your back under the front of your bus and familiarize your self with the plumbing layout of the heater systems. My 92 TC2000 had a honorably, inefficient layout. No hoses were insulated. I was able to remove 4 out of 6 hoses.

Nat

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"Don't argue with stupid people. They will just drag you down to their level, and beat you up with experience."

Patently waiting for the apocalypses to level the playing field in this physiological game of life commonly known as Civilization

Kate's bus is a great inspiration for a lot of skoolies! They've moved back into their bus and changed it up a little:
http://www.busonomics.blogspot.com/

Sounds like you have a crazy and awesome plan. Keep us posted on how things go! Welcome!

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Proud new owners of a 1974 Crown Supercoach - the big rolling twinkie!

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=466562

Thanks for the warnings about the sparks from the grinder, I was a bit too late and hot a bunch in the front windows, but luckily I saw the ports in time and got my hands on some tape and dumpstered some material to cover the windows for when I start grinding again. Whoops. Any ideas on how to get those little chunks of metal out?

So far we gutted the floor, and surprisingly there was BARELY and rust underneath, only in the front end where there were a few screws that rusted through where the seat mounts were [removed]. Two of the boards were pretty waterlogged, and weighed a ton, but there was literally NO RUST underneath them. I checked for leaks on EVERY INCH of the bus and have found none what so ever. Anyhow, Here are some pictures of the progress so far. I sanded down underneath and used some rustoleum primer to cover exposed metal. Filled the old holes with silicone to prevent future leaking and moisture exposure. Here's my subfloor, haven't screwed all of it in just yet, only the panel to the left. Don't mind the mess, lots of tools in there



My buddies that helped me yank up the floor and whatnot


the new subfloor and some insulation.