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Old 06-01-2018, 03:49 PM   #1
Mini-Skoolie
 
Join Date: May 2018
Posts: 17
E-450 7.3 Diesel - the S.S. Lilly

Hello, I have resentlly just found this forum and wanted to post about my short bus. I have had it for 2 years now and have been building it out the whole time. Well actually I am currently almost done building it out for the third time. After two road trips in it I have taken out what worked and what didn’t. But am feeling that after this time it will be good for some time if not forever. When I bought the bus I had only three months to do what I could before we were leaving on a road trip from San Diego to Canada then to burning man then back to San Diego. So being time was short I pretty much just slapped it together the best I could. Now I have never done anything like this before in my life or had any wood working experience before as well so I was super wet behind the ears but I loved it. I loved it so much I worked on it everyday until we left. I have built everything on my bus by myself or with help from other people. The one thing I pretty much just bought the metal for was the rack on top. The rack ion too is 8 feet by 13 feet and has a crane with a 8 foot boom and a 2500lb whinch to get everything up on top, because I couldn’t expect my girl to hand me everything that we would end up putting on top of the bus. This pretty much puts my bus in a league of it own when you look at it. I have wood paneling on the inside on the floor and on the roof I also did the walls in wood. It has a boat cabin feel which is why she is the S.S. Lilly. Well that and the fact that on our first trip we had the rack so stacked with stuff that it was top heavy when driving and it felt as if I was sailing. I have since added airbags under the bus to help fight the swaying when I drive. I have added a 3-way fridge freezer and a 1959’s travel camper stove oven that I found for 25$ which runs on propane and works perfectly. I custom built a kitchen area and made a pull out couch day bed for others to watch movies with us. I use a short throw projecror with a pull down screen so it’s easy to put away when not in use. Currently I am in the process of making my bed flip up against the back door when not in use to open up the floor space and give it more room inside when we have company. Also I am going to add a table to under the bed and make that the dinning room when the bed is flipped up. I will be adding pics of all of it shortly. I have older pics but want to post current pics for you all to see, so I need to go take some. There is a lot more I have done and I will post and tell you all about it, along with pics but for now my post is long enough. In future post I will explain how I insured my bus and some of the things I found worked and didn’t work to maybe help out some others who are getting to that point in their bus life. As for now, keep livin that bus life.

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Old 06-01-2018, 04:24 PM   #2
Mini-Skoolie
 
Join Date: Jan 2018
Posts: 21
It sounds like a nice ride, can I talk you into posting some pix?
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Old 06-03-2018, 03:16 AM   #3
Mini-Skoolie
 
Join Date: May 2018
Posts: 17
Oh for sure. I have some pics from the first time I throw all together but I only had 3 months from the day I bought it till I left on a 2 month road trip with my girl so it was what it was but have since did a ton of work so I’m going to take some new pics to post. Hopefully I can get around to taking some good ones tomorrow. I have had my bus for just over 2 years now. I completely addicted to building it out. I work on it almost every day so I would love to post some pics. So keep an eye out pics coming soon.
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Old 06-12-2018, 05:18 AM   #4
Mini-Skoolie
 
Join Date: May 2018
Posts: 17
Pics part 1

So here are some of the pics from when I bought her and did what I could in 3 months before hitting the road for 2 months.
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Old 06-12-2018, 05:31 AM   #5
Mini-Skoolie
 
Join Date: May 2018
Posts: 17
Pics part 2

So that’s about how far I got in 3 months. I probably could have gotten more done but I had never done anything like this before in my life but it is what it is. I didn’t load up a pic of the crane yet because it didn’t get finished until the day we left for our trip. Up next, how I changed it when we got back from our trip.
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Old 06-12-2018, 06:24 AM   #6
Bus Crazy
 
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Join Date: Oct 2017
Location: Ashtabula, Ohio
Posts: 1,494
Year: 1996
Coachwork: Thomas
Chassis: International
Engine: T444E 7.3L
Very nice job on that bus!
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Old 06-12-2018, 06:49 AM   #7
Bus Geek
 
EastCoastCB's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2014
Location: Eustis FLORIDA
Posts: 23,764
Year: 1999
Coachwork: Thomas
Chassis: Freighliner FS65
Engine: Cat 3126
Rated Cap: 15
Cool little bus!
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Old 06-15-2018, 02:51 PM   #8
Mini-Skoolie
 
Join Date: May 2018
Posts: 17
Thanks guys. Yea had no idea what I was doing, was kinda winging it. But not too bad if I say so myself. So these are all old pics the inside has changed quite a bit since I took these pics. I will be posting the updated pics soon.
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