Rock My Soul: 2001 Thomas MVP ER

[ism minerals]

some interior pics, still need to do some cabinet drawers and shelves, I have to figure what to do with the front wheel wheels, thinking a spot for a wood burning stove, and a cabinet for some ham radio gear. It is coming along slowly.

[Timeline]

Wow your bus is looking great! I'm going to copy the way you made the wall to ceiling transition. It's a great way to keep the wires accessible. Thanks for posting!
John

[ism minerals]

Originally Posted by Timeline

Wow your bus is looking great! I'm going to copy the way you made the wall to ceiling transition. It's a great way to keep the wires accessible. Thanks for posting!
John

I beveled the edges for a good fit and used a finish nailer to put them up. I left some cut outs that i will use a small screw for access if needed at a later date. The small access panels are about midway down the bus. Looking back. I would use small screws for all the panels for really easy access. leave some pull strings to help add any wires at a later date.

[Just]

Originally Posted by ism minerals

Thank you, yea its been a looong time coming and the end is near. Now we have a toddler, so this needs to be completed so she can enjoy our camp and we can spend much more time up there.



the roof rack is affixed using rivet nuts through/ near the hat channels on the sides of the bus and directly in the middle of the roof. the uprights are welded to 1/4'' plate and 5/16 rivet nut into the hat/skin. the 2x2 box steel 0.085 wall thickness was used. in the center of the roof is another 1/4'' plate riveted nut to the roof on/near the hat channels and sealed with adhesive before tightening down. each bolt was never seized before being put in to avoid any water leaking in through the treads. It is very solid when your up there. some other angle iron is welded across the top to stiffen up the flattened expanded metal. overall it seems very strong.

Nice work. I've got a Thomas MVP-ER and am about ready to install my solar rack. The interior ceiling is complete, so I don't want to undo anything. I was toying with the idea of rivet nuts. Or getting someone with a stud welder to weld threaded studs to the raised parallel rails on the roof... Not sure if that would work though.

[ism minerals]

Originally Posted by Just

Nice work. I've got a Thomas MVP-ER and am about ready to install my solar rack. The interior ceiling is complete, so I don't want to undo anything. I was toying with the idea of rivet nuts. Or getting someone with a stud welder to weld threaded studs to the raised parallel rails on the roof... Not sure if that would work though.

I did not want to weld anything, as there is too much flex/ movement in the body panels/ structure from what I read... hence the rivet nuts, which seem strong enough, I have been rocking the bus side to side with me on the roof and it seems really strong. A possible added bonus is I could remove it if I needed too, but most likely would not be able to get it back on...lol. I was originally thinking in doing it in four sections so could remove and put the sections back on as needed with my tractor, but it would have added some more time to the build and i am behind on my schedule to get it done.

[ism minerals]

Finally got the new tires installed for the steers and took the bus out for its first trip semi completed to our camp around 70 miles away.



I had an appointment for Tuesday, but a leaking oil cooler stopped that. Guess someone tried drilling out a bolt and missed and used some epoxy to fix, it finally gave way, I thought it was a the gasket, and change them out a couple of weeks before. Still had a small leak, but got worse on Tuesday to were I could not drive it. I thought i missed a bolt, as i seen a hole, and stated to probe the area, next start up oil was gushing out. I put in a new oil cooler and oil filter housing, as i did not want to deal with any leaks this time around. I was about 80% sure the old cooler would have been fine.


the new oil cooler had a small nick in it, so i ended up flat sanding it down.



After I picked up the parts, I went to get some rotella for an oil change and the truck decided to blow a power steering hose, luckily I has some in the bed. and kept filling it up to get home.


After all that no leaks form the oil cooler and housing , so off to the local tire store to get new steers installed.



The New steers firestone FS821 11r22.5 were great date code was 09/23, nice road feel to them. A little loud, but not overwhelming. I think I will do them all the way around if we use the bus alot.

[ism minerals]

Had another mishap a couple of weeks ago. Wufe wanted a beach day so we drove out to the beach.seemed like no issues. Got a better campsite in the park and moved to it. I noticed some oil trail behind the bus. Pulled it in the camping spot and had a decent oil leak. Tried to find it.. while camping. One of couple of things it could have been. Did not have the proper sized wrenches to further investigate. Got it towed home...thank you again good sam... turned out oring came apart on the heui pump feed elbo. 16 bucks for the upgraded adapter and 10 bucks for two small orings.. about an hour to put back together. Oh I needed a flexible camera borescope to see which part was leaking. All good to go after that.

[ism minerals]

Got the bus to the local diesel shop to see if anything is wrong as it lacks some power going up some of the bigger hills here in NH. I know it's only a 210Hp high torque motor, but it seems weak to me. They checked it over using the computer and found no issues, says everything seems to be alright. No problems on the highway, just the back country steep hills, .


Finally got the real mileage and hours off the engine.
163K miles with 4538h.. not too bad!


I am thinking about getting the odbii.ltd cat 2023A with code generator