Converting in CA

[briansbus]

Does anyone have any info on conversion requirements from school bus to RV for the state of CA?

[PhantomII]

Are you asking about California registration requirements?

If so, when I went to register mine (originally titled as a commercial vehicle) I simply requested that it be re-titled as a motor home. DMV's only stated requirement was that the bus is not painted yellow.

The only other issue I had was that the DMV clerk was unable to locate the VIN plate (I didn't know where it was either) so I had to take the bus to the CHP to get a new VIN assigned. The CHP officer however knew exactly where the VIN plate was and so that was all straightened out.

Anyway, as registered, the bus has no plumbing, no bed, no furniture and no amenities of any sort and I had no problem registering it as a motor home.

Maybe I just got lucky so your mileage may vary but outside the requirement that the bus is not painted yellow, there were no equipment requirements.

[crazycal]

I went to the DMV today. I picked up the form for titling your bus as a house car/motorhome. Here is a link. The clerk next to the one I was speaking to said that everything had to be screwed down or permanently attached.

CVC #362 Definition of a house car

http://www.dmv.ca.gov/pubs/vctop/d01/vc362.htm

Form 256A. See section E

http://www.dmv.ca.gov/forms/reg/reg256a.pdf

[Russell]

Screwed down permently attached and approved by the queen ding bat of Ca. Nancy Polosi

[crazycal]

Funny you should say that. I think that's who helped me at the DMV.

[Elliot Naess]

Over the years, I have found that different DMV offices have different... habits. When I registered Millicent, they wanted receipts for the RV equipment I was installing. So I brought them copies of the reciepts for the Thetford RV toilet, and the shower stall, and the foam rubber mattresses, and the several water and waste tanks, and 12 V water pump, and some 20 foot lengths of steel, and some lumber I bought a long time ago, and a few other things.

I think I paid a fee based on the amount those receipts added up to.

That was it.

But I strongly recommend you paint the bus, even if they should forget to enforce that when you register it.