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Old 01-17-2017, 06:09 PM   #1
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Hello from Iowaegianville

Just bought a nice 2001 freightliner Thomas bus! Super excited to begin the conversion. I just got the approval letter from freightliner to have my MD 3060 Allison up-rated from 5-speed to 6-speed. Taking bus to Omaha Allison dealer to get 6th gear tomorrow. Talk to Thomas first then freightliner and had the the letter in 2 hours! Amazingly lucky I feel right now, freightliner was super nice and prompt! THANK YOU SKOOLIE FORUM for info tidbits-made it much easier!!!

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Old 01-17-2017, 07:45 PM   #2
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Location: Oklahoma aka "God's blind spot"
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Chassis: 35' Retired Air Force Ambulance
Engine: DT466, MT643
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Just bought a nice 2001 freightliner Thomas bus! Super excited to begin the conversion. I just got the approval letter from freightliner to have my MD 3060 Allison up-rated from 5-speed to 6-speed. Taking bus to Omaha Allison dealer to get 6th gear tomorrow. Talk to Thomas first then freightliner and had the the letter in 2 hours! Amazingly lucky I feel right now, freightliner was super nice and prompt! THANK YOU SKOOLIE FORUM for info tidbits-made it much easier!!!
Please detail the steps you had to go through to get your transmission updated to a 6 speed... I realize you went through Thomas, then Freightliner, and just wondering how you plead your case.

Also, please document the steps you dealt with when you got to Omaha Allison.
My understanding is that others have tried, and been denied.


It's irrelevant to me, mine's all mechanical.... But there's others on this forum that'll be interested.

Oh, and welcome aboard!
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Old 01-19-2017, 08:51 PM   #3
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Please detail the steps you had to go through to get your transmission updated to a 6 speed... I realize you went through Thomas, then Freightliner, and just wondering how you plead your case.

Also, please document the steps you dealt with when you got to Omaha Allison.
My understanding is that others have tried, and been denied.


It's irrelevant to me, mine's all mechanical.... But there's others on this forum that'll be interested.

Oh, and welcome aboard!
I called Thomas and asked about getting 6th gear, and since my bus has a freightliner chassis , I was informed to call them. Called freightliner and asked, they sent me a release form from Allison as well as verified the tire size. My understanding was that they were verifying that my chassis behind the transmission can handle a higher speed(engineering wise). He told me that the chassis is rated for 75mph(mine only goes 65 in 5th). Long driveshafts and low gear diffs tend to vibrate a lot when over speed. Got a signed letter in return......took the letter to interstate power systems in Omaha. Serious bump in the road if the letter isn't signed by an actual engineer. Allison will not send the new software programming over if it isn't.
Allison is overly persnickety about this because of liability reasons and they want to maintain control of their own systems and how people use them. And because it's painted yellow and says school bus. I told them this is a conversion and I don't want this to go faster. I want to cruise at a lower RPM INSTEAD OF 2500. Corey and Chris are the service guys at interstate, good dudes that know their stuff. They informed me how slow Allison works and to be patient. They had 6 other requests for different repairs of other transmissions and Allison hasn't responded. sooooo I wait for Allison to send the program that takes 5 minutes to install. Everything looks good engineering wise just need to hurry up and wait. Interstate said this happens every time they get this done. Hope this helps somebody. If this isn't an option for everybody, maybe need to research adding an axle splitter to gear it up a bit. We used to have those on dump trucks. Two speed axles
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Old 01-19-2017, 09:18 PM   #4
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Join Date: May 2015
Location: Oklahoma aka "God's blind spot"
Posts: 2,446
Year: 1989
Coachwork: 1853FC International/Navistar
Chassis: 35' Retired Air Force Ambulance
Engine: DT466, MT643
Rated Cap: 6 souls and a driver
Great info!
Good luck with it all
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Old 01-19-2017, 10:47 PM   #5
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Welcome lucky19 congrats on the success with the 6th dimension

Looking forward to hearing more about your build and adventure
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Old 01-23-2017, 05:18 PM   #6
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Just got done taking the seats out what a mess! Exciting to have those out. Does anybody really buy these seats or do you junk them
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Old 01-23-2017, 06:22 PM   #7
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Join Date: May 2015
Location: Oklahoma aka "God's blind spot"
Posts: 2,446
Year: 1989
Coachwork: 1853FC International/Navistar
Chassis: 35' Retired Air Force Ambulance
Engine: DT466, MT643
Rated Cap: 6 souls and a driver
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Originally Posted by Bklucky19 View Post
Just got done taking the seats out what a mess! Exciting to have those out. Does anybody really buy these seats or do you junk them
I was fortunate and only had 6 cots to remove... Still took me a while because of physical limitations.

I've read some members stripping the vinyl and foam off, and taking the steel to scrap yard. Perhaps you'd get enough for a couple pizzas?

I see them on craigslist all the time & roughly $20 per seat.
Trouble with that is you'd have to sit on them (no pun intended) until you got them all sold.

Then I've seen a few ads here and there where someone was looking for replacement seats... Then you gotta deal with geographic locations, shipping, etc.

If I'd had more than 6 cots, I'd have stripped them and scrapped the steel. As it is, I stored the cots and the steel pipe frames, but it sure took up a lot less space than 20, 30, or 40 seats!




I'd like to have a couple pair of these.... But not 10 for $1250!
Anybody wanna chip in?
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