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Old 11-04-2010, 12:51 PM   #41
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Re: the akitabus

Hey Dogfinn, Just seen your post on my stuff. Question on electricals. That panel in the overheads is a Fleabay unit. ($45) it houses all the 12 volt fuses as well as the 120v breakers.
On the 120v side there is a 30A main breaker, then 4 15A breakers for outlets. Bedroom,bathroom, kitchen and dining area. On the 12V side are all the things seperate from the actual operation of the bus. All these circuits are controlled by a 30A master switch on the dash console. So when I shut the bus down I can turn off one switch and it would kill power to everything and not come back a week later to drained batteries.
Powering the 12V side are 4 trojan 6V batteries (950Ah) and the two 12V starting batteries. The 120V side is powered by a 4500 watt genset with an 1800 watt spare gen.
I used a 3000 watt inverter and have a 750 watt also wired in for smaller 120V loads. I did not use any kind of an automatic switch over from the inverter to 120V. I have three plugs coming into the bus. 1 for shore power, 1 from the genset and 1 from the batteries. These plug into the main power supply. There can be no screw up from, say having the inverter going and then starting up the jenny.
The stereo system is wired in with the vehicle side of the system, as are the running lights, mirror heaters, wipers, cab heat, etc.
I did run an extention wire to the house batteries from the alternator to provide a little charge juice while running down the road.
The bus has also been prewired for a solar charge system down the road.
The majority of all the electrical needs are 12V. When the batteries need charged (for now) I'll fire up the little jenny (less noise and fuel)and run the 3 phase charger.
That bout sums it up. If I can help answer any questions just ask.
P.S. Love your bus body and the 466 is a great motor. It's called by mechanics "the million mile motor" Also an avid 4-wheeler myself. Good luck!

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Old 01-17-2011, 10:36 AM   #42
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Re: the akitabus

Well, we have taken a break from bus building for the holidays and now we am back at it, be it right or wrong we decided on a 28" pocket door from HD for the bathroom and a 24" x 32" shower pan from PPL. Spent Saturday looking for bed frames to make brackets, like many before me to hang the tanks, Black Grey and fresh water. Found a king frame that will work for all three plus some cross members from my scrap pile. Hanging the frames with 3/8" all thread, each rack will have 6 hangers, 3 per side. Now we just have to figure out how to make all the connections, uniseal slip fittings and fernco couplings I guess. what size vent pipe should we use? what do others use 1 1/2"? should you vent the system at each convience (sink, Shower) or do you just wet vent it ?
and hve one vent for both grey and black tanks?

Pics to come shortly.

Will from "The88" came to my house to check out the AKITABUS, Nice fellow and gave me a chance to show him what we have done. I hope he approves cause no matter what you do there is allways a better way.


Till next time.


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Old 01-17-2011, 11:29 AM   #43
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Re: the akitabus

Quote:
Originally Posted by dogfinn
should you vent the system at each convenience (sink, Shower) or do you just wet vent it ?
and have one vent for both grey and black tanks?
You still need to vent to waste tanks themselves. You can pull a vent up off your grey tank and then pull a vent off your black tank then tie the two together and run a single pipe thru your roof. Mark has a pretty good page on plumbing a system

http://www.marxrv.com/plumbing/plumb.htm

We plan to pull our wet stacks (2) up thru partition walls and use an AAV (air admittance valve/Shrader vent/Cheader vent on the washing machine) because our tanks are on each side of the bus.

Don't forget to add a cap on the vents.. while you need to allow air out, birds and wasps do like the pipes and find them homely... apparently (had to clean dirt dobber nests out of the RV's) and you end up having to clean them out.
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Old 01-18-2011, 11:48 PM   #44
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Re: the akitabus

Thanks Lorna, but do I just vent the tanks.... or do you need vent each convience IE kitchen sink. shower and bath sink .... in normal plumbing it goes through the pea trap and where the waste line goes down to the tanks or sewer the vent line goes up at that point. Do you need to go up with a vent at that point like in our homes or can you wet vent and just have the vent that comes out of the tank?

Any input would be good.


Thanks

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Old 01-19-2011, 07:21 AM   #45
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Re: the akitabus

Might try this Air Admittance Valve thingy that another skoolie here uses. I'm thinking of going that route myself. Less things sticking through the roof the better.
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Old 01-19-2011, 12:55 PM   #46
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Re: the akitabus

Quote:
Originally Posted by dogfinn
Thanks Lorna, but do I just vent the tanks.... or do you need vent each convience IE kitchen sink. shower and bath sink .... in normal plumbing it goes through the pea trap and where the waste line goes down to the tanks or sewer the vent line goes up at that point. Do you need to go up with a vent at that point like in our homes or can you wet vent and just have the vent that comes out of the tank?

Any input would be good.


Thanks

Dogfinn
The buses are so small (unlike a house nowadays) that you can get away with venting the tanks (water enters tank... air exits someplace else NOT the same pipe) and not every drain. If you are going to have a washer in there, Then slap an AAV (air admittance valve). Even an auto DW will NOT need an additional vent. You need to vent the tanks to the gases that build up in them will escape.


The reason you see so many AAV's on commercial RV's is that they use flexible pipe for drain lines and they loop the lines over and under things... which make little saggy "P" (or "C"... looks more like a "C") and the valves allow air into the drain lines so the water drains (mostly) with out "burping". In most cases, AAV's are a fix for inadequate plumbing or poor plumbing (and why some folks call them a cheater valve). Unless you keep a stopper in all your drains, then you really shouldn't need an AAV. But venting your tanks is a whole other thing as an AAV is a ONE WAY VENT... air goes in but not out so you would not be venting your tank with an AAV. Just a open ended pipe placed to where the tanks vent ABOVE the roofline (holding tanks stink). We need two vents because our black tank is on the drivers side of the bus and the grey tanks are on the passenger side. On the RV, our waste tanks are side-by-side and the vents tie together into one vent thru the roof.
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Old 01-19-2011, 03:17 PM   #47
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Re: the akitabus

Lorna and others, thanks for the input, I was planning on venting both grey and black tanks by tying them (vents) together and going through the top of the bus.... I was just not sure about the vents on the sinks.... etc because I am so used to working on the house and a building inspector had questions of how I was venting a shower in an additon.... He called it a wet vent because the vent was by the sink and not the shower .... any way I think I got it figured out now.


Thanks foor the info.
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Old 03-28-2011, 06:22 PM   #48
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Re: the akitabus

Well, it has been awhile since I have posted anything, so I will give you some updates and try to post some recent pics, bathroom and shower are nearly done, I have hung both grey and black tanks under the bus, one on top of the other on all thread. so if I have to remove the black tank I have to first remove the grey tank. In hind site I think I should have just gone with one tank for both.... but ,,,, each tank holds roughly 36 gallons, not sure if I am going to put any sensors of them but it would certinaly be nice if there was. In our shower i used ply wood sealed the chalked the FRP or FRC panels, it turned out pretty nice if I do say so myself. We are now working the little sink in bathroom and cabinet that will house it. Drilled a hole through the roof for the vent and bent the vent pipe so that it exits at the right angle as done by many before me. Stayed tuned and I will try posting more pics for any that care.


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Old 03-28-2011, 06:29 PM   #49
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Re: the akitabus

Oh yea, I almost forgot to mention the pex water supply that I have installed, I love working with that stuff, but I am going to hook it up to my house water supply to test the fittings before I close any of the walls that I have ran it in and through.

Found a nice one handle shower diverter on ebay for 34.00 (free shipping) that fits into a 3" thick wall so that worked out great.

Till next time.

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Old 03-29-2011, 11:52 AM   #50
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Re: the akitabus

Heater painted and replaced, we are going to build a new box to house the instrument panel (driver switches), most likely build it out of wood and cut the down the metal frame work to organize and reduce empty switch holes in existing panel
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Old 03-29-2011, 12:04 PM   #51
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Re: the akitabus

This site will only let me post 2 pics at a time, not sure if us or them, may be the pics are to big. what ever I will try to post as we go.

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Old 03-29-2011, 12:20 PM   #52
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Re: the akitabus



I don't know if a pocket door is the best idea, but we really did not want a door that opens in the conventional way for obvious reasons... there just is not enough room unless the door is facing back or front, opening out into hall was just not going to work.
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Old 03-29-2011, 12:28 PM   #53
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Re: the akitabus



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Old 03-29-2011, 12:43 PM   #54
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Re: the akitabus

Quote:
Originally Posted by dogfinn
I don't know if a pocket door is the best idea, but we really did not want a door that opens in the conventional way for obvious reasons... there just is not enough room unless the door is facing back or front, opening out into hall was just not going to work.
That is why we are going with a folding door. They are vinyl/PVC and we will use one for the "shower curtain", one for the toilet area door and one to divide off the bathroom from the galley/front of the bus. Because our shower opens out into the hallway that leads to the bedroom, I may add another door to close off the 63" section because it will help hold the heat in from the CAT heater while taking a shower. At $27 its pretty cheap and takes up very little room.


http://www.lowes.com/pd_35854-259-VS...folding%2Bdoor
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Old 03-30-2011, 02:47 PM   #55
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Re: the akitabus

That T connector at the showerhead , if it is zinc attached to copper you may have a problem with galvanic currents in the future.
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Old 03-30-2011, 05:50 PM   #56
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Re: the akitabus

Great catch Pipopak you get an A +, it was a test and you passed, should i put a brass fitting between the two to act as an isolator ?
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Old 05-06-2011, 03:10 PM   #57
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Re: the akitabus

Pics of the bathroom sink


Sorry, the board attachment quota has been reached.


what does this mean? i get this message when trying to upload pics.....HELP
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Old 06-02-2011, 12:20 PM   #58
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Re: the akitabus

bathroom sink before tile

After tile

Next comes the ODWH (on demand water heater)
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Old 06-02-2011, 12:31 PM   #59
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Re: the akitabus

Measure and cut for the water heater

Now the nerve racking part, the cut

And it is in.
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Old 06-02-2011, 12:42 PM   #60
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Re: the akitabus

Rub rails with caps, installation compete.

Next I started on putting vented windows in the back. I hadn't worked on the bus for awhile and in my haste I cut for the back windows as if they were square... DUH

good thing you can glue metal back together... it just added about 2 hours to the process.

window in.
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