BUS QUESTION

Wayne · 05-27-2012, 11:35 AM

Hi:
I would like to ask you professional schoolies a question please.
If you were to buy a school bus to take 6 month road trips that would consist of terrain like the Blue Ridge Mountains the Big Horn Mountains. Traversing the roads in Northern British Colombia over the Northern Rockies, light trail riding in the high desert, what school bus would you buy?
If you already drive a school bus and drive on these kind of terrains what school bus do you own?
I’m very interested in getting feedback on a long bus versus a short wheel base school bus and who do you think makes the best School bus for long drives, but not necessarily long highway driving.
I have done a few long adventure drives, but this time I have two children and a dog to take into consideration. I do not want to pull a camper. I do not have the money to buy an Earthroamer, but I have thought of buying a dual cab utility truck and putting a truck camper in the bed and making an adventure truck. I have thought hard about an extended 4X4 van but I doubt whether I will have the room and I keep coming back to a school bus, just not sure what size.
I would also appreciate what you think about the fuel - gas or diesel??

bus-bro · 05-27-2012, 12:50 PM

How about a dog nose bus 30 feet or less, turbo-charged diesel, lock-up auto transmission?

(...and some way of installing an "engine brake".)

keith · 05-27-2012, 02:38 PM

get a northern bus 25 ft with 4 wheel drive they do make them, blue bird ships them to canda or alaska..

gbstewart · 05-27-2012, 03:25 PM

one thing is the engine type, the 466 is whats every one wants , my thinking is if your in any tim buck two town how hard would it be to get any parts for it? i have t444e (7.3 powerstorke) these motors are in hundereds of different trucks easy to find parts for junk yard ford dealer, after market. not the best motor but pretty good all a round.

just my 2 cents
gbstewart

Wayne · 05-27-2012, 03:36 PM

Thanks. I appreciate the input.

bus-bro · 05-27-2012, 06:53 PM

The bus I should of bought, and about 5 of them went to auction a couple of years ago, was a dog-nose 25-30 foot bus. They had dt360's and mt643's. They went for about $2200. That bus would of made a great boondocker.

chev49 · 05-28-2012, 09:59 AM

You only want FE ones. And like 30' or less. 4wd helps. Manual trans with low range... that's what i would want.

chev49 · 05-28-2012, 10:02 AM

n winch.

Wayne · 05-28-2012, 11:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by keith

get a northern bus 25 ft with 4 wheel drive they do make them, blue bird ships them to canda or alaska..

Great I will check into that, I was wondering if the was a 4X4 bus.

Wayne · 05-28-2012, 11:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chev49

You only want FE ones. And like 30' or less. 4wd helps. Manual trans with low range... that's what i would want.

Sorry - what do you mean by FE?

syke · 05-28-2012, 12:00 PM

Check out http://www.ExpeditionPortal.com if you want some more "overland" rig ideas.

I was just at Overland Expo in Flagstaff, AZ a few weekends ago.... saw some awesome rigs. One that really stuck out with me is the 4x4 Isuzu NPR style trucks with either a cab over slide in camper or even just a bumper pull camper off it's frame and onto the truck frame. Totally home build able and really versatile. I'd say the only big draw back would be the standard cab and possibly not being able to access the camper while driving. But that could probably be over come.

For our overland travel we base camp the 36' bus in the forest and take our Land Rover into the bush for extended periods. (we've only done that twice now as we're still in the final stages of bus construction)Once the bus is finished we will be full timing in it. It works great for our lifestyle but kinda defeats the purpose of continued overland travel.

FE = Front Engine

We run a RE = Rear Engine. Not as much ground clearance overall but we keep it to the graded FS roads so it works fine for us.

Bottom line.... just get out there!!!

Tons to see and so little time.

Wayne · 05-29-2012, 01:18 PM

I just looked at some of those rig on the net, very cool. Gotta be expensive?

bansil · 05-29-2012, 01:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wayne

I just looked at some of those rig on the net, very cool. Gotta be expensive?

Check out some of these http://globalxvehicles.com/vehicles/

lornaschinske · 05-29-2012, 02:45 PM

We have a 40 ft FE All American (BlueBird). It has a fairly high ground clearance. About the same or higher than my 4WD Jeep Grand Cherokee. Our bus came out of the Blue Ridge/Nantahala/Ocoee area (think Great Smoky Mountains... actually the area the map for the Moonshinner 28 covers). It was used to haul whitewater rafters prior to our purchase. We like to travel on the primary highway system (non-interstate roads). while I wouldn't try to put it into WildCat 1 & 2 or up War Woman (unless they have fixed the roads) or down roads that truckers have been banned from (like Tail of the Dragon or part of Moonshiner 28 between Franklin & Highlands NC), I can see no problem with pretty much any primary road. Pick up a Truckers Atlas in a bookstore or truck stop and look thru it (or buy one). You really don't want to put a bus or anything largish down a banned road. Use your towed for that.

We brought the bus "home" to Franklin from near Almond on Needmore Rd with ran on the west side the Little TN River...on the map below it was from Hillbilly Pop, MuleKick Korners, Catdaddy Cliffs. The road was a wide gravel road (much nicer than it used to be) but about as curvy as the corresponding section of Hwy 28. It's has a great deal of what type of roads you are used to driving on. They have signs here in NM on curves that wouldn't have a sign in the southern Appalachians.

Now a Scenic Byway like the Cherohala Skyway would be no problem.