New Skoolie Kit

[crazycal]

my wife got pissed off at me after using her nice quilting shears so she finally bought me my own pair so I wouldn't dull hers and have to resharpen them.

How would you feel if you walked in on your wife while she was pounding nails with your expensive torque wrench or some other expensive tool. I think it would be wise to leave her tools alone unless you can use your skills to make yourself a good doghouse.

[nyrockingchairs]

Well I talked to my father, who doubles as my welder, and he is not set up or good enough to handle a fuel tank, but had some suggestions which I followed up on one and would appreciate any feedback.

I scored on 2 "unpainted" 55-gallon closed steel drums for $40 total, pus tax. The plan is to frame one in as a clean oil tank inside the bus and the other will be my collection tank for my pick-up truck. Once initial testing is done I may get a 3rd barrel and increase the bus's capacity.

Has anyone ever used these in a horizontal fashion? Since it already has the 2" and 3/4" threaded bungs I will just get the fitting for the 3/4" bung for the bus supply line and when it is racked out the 2" bung will be near the top, should get at least 40 gallons of use out of it.

If I have to mount the tank vertically I can get a fuel pump designed for these things and do it that way.

This weekend I will be sanding and painting the outsides at least.

[Elliot Naess]

My vote is also for steel tanks. And there are so many steel tanks out there! Used tanks
from retired buses and trucks. All manner of tanks for farming and ranching. Home
heating oil tanks. I'd look for a junk school bus for sure. My gasser had two lovely
rectangular 60 gallon tanks, with mounting brackets and sending units!

[deadhead]

I'm gonna "grease" my bus also. What I'm going to do is use the current big exsisting diesel tank as my vegi oil tank, and get a regular 12 or 15 gallon tank from a car in a junkyard to hold my diesel fuel. The diesel tank doesn't need to be that big, cause once you get converted, you only use the diesel to start and stop the vehicle (start to heat up the vegi-oil / stop to flush the lines.) Using the existing tank that's already molded to your bus helps a lot, cause it's already close to the engine, where you get your heat from. Setting up a small diesel tank is usually pretty easy. You can go on the other side of the bus or behind the exsisting tank. Once you're running off of the small tank, take the large tank out, cut it open, run 1 inch copper coil throughout the tank, and install the fittings, and temp gage. If you have to take it somewhere to get it welded back together, it shouldn't be more than 50 bucks or so since you have all the parts, and you can take the tank to them. Once that's done, just bolt it right back in place, and you're dual tanked. That's my plan anyway. That's 3rd on my list right now. I need to finish my solar and plumbing systems, then I'm tackling that one.
just my 2 cents worth.
peace, Lee

[nyrockingchairs]

My current diesel tank is only 35 gallons and I am looking for a little more grease range than that. We make regular trips to the Adirondacks that are 600 miles round trip and when we go to Delaware it is about 400 miles each way, I want to make those trips on one load of grease.

Thanks for the ideas though.

[nyrockingchairs]

A friend of mine who is in the glass business and does school buses for the local districts is coming over next week and doing my windshields. Costing me $100 per windshield plus $55 for his labor. I called Safelite but they wanted to come take a windshield back to their shop, measure it there and then give me a price quote. So I have no idea what they would actually charge.

My friend is just going to bring some stock lam glass and cut it on site. To order the "actual" windshiels would take a few weeks. Also I went with the cheapest no-frills glass for this, it has a slight green tint but no blue stripe or anything special on/in it.

[Coalforge]

One thing I have not seen mentioned is that my Crown and several other buses I have driven have a button very similar to a headlight dimmer that is the air horn valve. Try to dim the lights with it, then go change yer britches!

[Elliot Naess]

Yeeehah! That would wake a guy up!
That phenomenon is occuring again these days with big trucks. For decades and decades, the
horn has been activated by pulling on a cord, hanging in a loop so it is easy to grab, up in the
left corner. You've all seen kids tug on an imaginary such horn to request honks from passing
truckers. That's so ingrained with truckers that I automatically reach up there even in my
pickup if I want to honk.

Well, the #$%^&* clever people at Volvo Truck seem to have decided that this excellent system
isn't good enough for them, so they have put the horn on the steering wheel, next to the little
electric horn, and with invisible markings that I could maybe find with a magnifying glass.
So when I have to drive one of those trucks, I drive with my fingertips on the outside
perimeter of the wheel and don't dare get anywhere near the center of the
dam*** thing. And if I do need to honk, I have no idea if I will get a
squeeky peep from the electric horn or a real honk. Or if I'll set off
the exploding steering wheel balloon.

That was today's rant.

There are also some other functions that can be on a floor button, such as the Jake brake,
and the steering column tilt.

[the_experience03]

My veggie oil tank is a 55 gallon tank mounted horizontally. I've never run it dry, but I don't think you lose much capacity with that 2 inch difference at the bottom. If nothing else it serves as a final settling area if all else fails. They don't have baffles so they slosh a little, but that's not the worth thing ever, especially if you cut the fuel with something like mineral spirits and for mixing up the warm return oil with the cold oil in the tank.

[nyrockingchairs]

Sounds good on the horizontal mount. I did climb into the bus the other night around dusk and did confirm the button is the high-beam control. I also had to see if my instrument lights work so I could drive at night.

The horn is definitely labeled in the center of the steering wheel, I have not had the gumption to press it yet.

I worked out a WVO system which uses 2 veggie oil tanks but the plan is to use the second tank as a filler for the 1st, so when the 1st starts to get low I start a pump that transfers oil from the back-up to the primary. This really simplifies the plumbing involved.

Planning to use Grundfos UPS15-58 circulating pumps in the WVO system. I installed these all over my house and garage when I redid the heating system last year, drawback is they are 120VAC sucking about 70 Watts, but was planning on an inverter anyway. Can get them for about $90 including flanges.

With the horizontal 55-gal drum, were you able to find a fuel level gauge for it?

[the_experience03]

Interesting that you mention the fuel gauge thing...it would have to be calibrated such that it could deal with the fact that 1/4 of the distance from the top is not 1/4 of a tank in terms of capacity. My solution was a sight tube, but that was a mess and not all that accurate so instead I just smack on the side of the tank or feel for warmth. I can get a pretty good idea just based on miles traveled. 35 gallons means 280 miles and at that point I'm ready for a break anyway.

[nyrockingchairs]

Well the new glass went in yesterday after being set-back by a week of rain.

Started sanding out rust spots and adding primer tumors to the roof of the bus. Problem is I only bought one can of primer and that only lasted for the left half of the roof. Bondo tumors are popping up randomly as I find holes and fill them.

My buddy pointed out that I needed a working horn to pass inspection, which I finally tested yesterday, and neither one works, though I get voltage when I press the button. So today I have to stop on the way home and get new horns. Then it goes down to the shop for inspection this afternoon. I love these buses and the fact that they are easy to work on, you can climb up and sit on the engine while you work on them. Finding the horns on the bus was about a 3-minute endeavour, nice of them to mount them behind the headlights on the hood...had to climb up and almost sit on the radiator for those.

Almost all of the WVO conversion parts are in. Found a deal on the Pollak valves on Ebay, but the seller is out of town til next week and the silicon heating pads for the wvo tank are special order and will take a couple of weeks to get in.

Hope to have a WVO test run to Rochester, NY (90 mile one-way) by the first week of June and then a longer test run to the Adirondacks by the second week of July.

[the_experience03]

I'd be interested in seeing those heating pads. Do you have a link or a picture or something?

[nyrockingchairs]

I ordered them from a company called Hi Heat, http://www.hiheat.com/

I ordered 2 6"x20" elements, which are 600 Watts (120 VAC) each and they are putting the pressure-applied self-adhesive on the pads themselves. They are providing a snap-action 175/157 F thermostat mounted to a seperate aluminum plate, also with the pressure adhesive on it.

Lead time is about 2 weeks for the standard stock items.

[nyrockingchairs]

First photos are up...









Started painting this weekend:

[Ryan Grimm]

Your Skoolie is basically a medium-duty truck with a funny-looking body on it. Any Chevy dealer that works on largish trucks might have the manuals, and I'm sure SOMEONE out there in Google Land has them as well.
Ask to copy the relevant sections out of their manuals....best of luck!