"Miles" the bus.

[Ross]

His name is Miles, because I didn't want to have to constantly explain why I named my bus conversion "Thelonious".
2005 Freightliner FS-65 Thomas "48 passenger" (built for 22) wheelchair lift bus. Etowah County, Alabama school district origin. Purchased by GovDeals.com auction in August 2017.
Mercedes Benz MBE 906 turbo diesel, Allison 2000 trans, air brakes, 183k miles, ZERO rust.

[Ross]

Initial picture. Learning how to post pics.

[Ross]

Bodywork pics.

[Ross]

Paint, etc.
Days of cleaning and sanding...
Epoxy primer.
Single stage urethane topcoats.
TCP Global products, good paint, good prices.
Colors are Dark Aqua, Light Aqua, Dark Pewter, White.
Removing ceiling panels, put a couple of scrap boards in the windows to hold the panels while taking out the screws.
Aluminum rack for solar panels, 2x2x1/4 angle.

[Ross]

Bus "clean out" finds:
Among the usual pennies, gum and candy wrappers was this Love Letter from Miriah to Cody.
Did they live happily ever after?

[Ross]

Solar panels, combiner box on roof. All panels 36 cell, "180 watt". All parallel to reduce issues from panel shading. Each panel fused. Combined into two feeds because I'm using two 30 amp PWM controllers from Bogart Engineering. A PVC LB conduit body was "low profile" enough to stay within the rib thickness. More photos of solar stuff later.
Spray foam: I used Foam It Green kit. I insulated the outer roof skin using everything I had, since it was about 40°F outside.
Spare batt fiberglass, moving blankets, anything. Vis-queen over the top.
Hooked up three electric heaters, about 4500 watts (on three separate circuits) overnight.
Checked roof interior skin temp in the morning, was 108°F. Metal was bone dry. I'd been keeping the two jugs of foam in a small heated bathroom at 75°F.
Brought them out, wrapped a blanket around them, removed the heaters, opened the doors until interior skin temp was 80°F, then sprayed foam. The mix was good, stuff went on well, kicked just fine.
Trimming is NO FUN. Mask, safety glasses INSIDE goggles, still got that **** in my eyes.

[Ross]

Furring strips, 3 inches wide, so ceiling boards could be fastened off the rib centers for thermal break.

Two layers of 1/2 inch cdx, cut across the 48 inch dimension because they bent better that way. Laminated in place with Liquid Nails and Teks screws.

1 inch white "styro" board with silver mylar side facing down bent nicely into place between furring strips. Sealed up with aluminum tape.

Wires for overhead lighting run beside furring strips.

[musigenesis]

Nice job on the insulation and absolutely gorgeous paint job! That might be the best paint job I've ever seen here.

Another tip for the pics: when you just upload the pics, they appear in the "attached thumbnails" section of each post, as above. After uploading the pics, but before submitting the post, you can click the paper clip button again and you will see all the pics you've uploading in a drop-down list. If you click "insert all" in that list, it will add refs to each pic into the body of your submission; you can then write text before or after each pic etc. This puts the pics "inline" in your post instead of all being grouped at the end in that separate section.

[Ross]

Acquired a used hitch, 10,000 lb rated. The seller said it was off a Chevy pickup, $25.00. It was wider than the width of the frame rails, so I got a piece of 1/2 inch plate to mount it with.


Drilling holes in the frame flanges for 3/4 inch grade 8 bolts.



Hitch mounted.

One really lucky break came when I decided I wanted to re-route the exhaust pipe to the other side, because I wanted to mount a grey water tank on the left side behind the axle. Looking at the pipe, it seemed I would be able to use much of the existing pipe by taking it apart and flipping the pieces over.
It turned out that the piping all disassembled easily, and EVERY PIECE flipped over and fit perfectly back together. Even the hangers fit on the other (passenger) side - there were even mounting holes for the hangers on the other side exactly where they were needed.
The bumper flipped over, mounted perfectly upside down, and the exhaust hole was in the correct location as well.

[Ross]

Air horns from WOLO, (reconditioned) Orient Express.
Tried to load a video, but it wouldn't work.
I was able to use the air supply originally meant for the crossing arm and stop sign, which was already being fed from a pressure protection valve, and the original horn relay from the terribly anemic sounding electric horn. I found cable glands and a PVC wire entry shell enclosure on the internet somewhere. It's sealed to the roof with 3M VHB tape.

[Mercuric Mind]

Originally Posted by Ross

His name is Miles, because I didn't want to have to constantly explain why I named my bus conversion "Thelonious".
2005 Freightliner FS-65 Thomas "48 passenger" (built for 22) wheelchair lift bus. Etowah County, Alabama school district origin. Purchased by GovDeals.com auction in August 2017.
Mercedes Benz MBE 906 turbo diesel, Allison 2000 trans, air brakes, 183k miles, ZERO rust.

Could have named it Davis and the Monk.

[Meathead]

Originally Posted by Mercuric Mind

Could have named it Davis and the Monk.

Kind Of Blue

☮️Dave

[Ross]

Got an exterior RV access door online from Lippert. Just the right size for access for filling the propane tank.


Tank installed, with regulator and quick connect fitting installed for the barbecue.


29 gallon tank viewed from below.


The tank is hung from two 2x2x1/4 inch steel angle rails, through-bolted to each floor section bottom flange.


All steel 1/2 inch pipe run under floor, feeds furnace, water heater, and cooktop. Final connections to each appliance are with 3/8 soft copper and flare fittings. Penetrations through the floor are with steel pipe.




The gas shut off for the cooktop and water heater are easily accessed from under the kitchen sink, but the shut off for the furnace was more easily accessed if it was underneath the floor.

[Ross]

Piping held 30 psi for two hours.


The back end of the suburban 16,000 BTU RV furnace had to stick into the wall a bit in order to reduce the depth of the cabinet it was in.


I lined that cavity with sheet metal just for extra safety.


It's hard to tell from the photo what this is, but it's a propane drain from the bottom of the cabinet where the furnace is installed.


Wall can for 1500 watt 120 volt electric heater. Very nice to have when we're camped at a campsite with electricity.


Hole in the wall for the propane 6 gallon water heater. It's on a little platform so that the opening on the outside intersects with the rub rails in a pleasing way.



Water heater installed. It's in the blind corner part of the kitchen cabinet. Two expansion tanks. One is the overall system pressure accumulator, and the other is just the water heater expansion tank. The dedicated water heater expansion tank was necessary because of the check valves needed for the shower hot water recirculation loop that brings hot water to the shower mixing valve at the back of the bus, without wasting any water down the drain.


The least expensive and simplest RV water heater available. Suburban, 6 gallon, standing pilot.

[Ross]

Water heater installation complete. The bezel and the door were painted to match the exterior color. Had to cut the rub rail. I found Thomas rub rail end caps at TAC bus parts.


25x30 shower, base pan and surround from Jazz Sales, a company that mainly supplies stuff for custom horse trailer conversions. The surround was molded from a soft enough plastic that I could cut it to fit the roof curve with tin snips.
Unfortunately, the shipping cost as much as the base and surround, but it was exactly what I needed, so I just bit the bullet.


Air Head "composting" toilet. I like this one better than the Nature's Head because you don't have to open up the poo container to remove and empty the urine jug.



A bit late in this thread, I'll admit, but I just ran across my original floor plan for this bus. What I actually built differs from this drawing in that the shower is all the way at the rear left, and the toilet is forward of that. It worked out better for the placement of the gray water tank under the floor, which was made possible by flipping the exhaust system over to the other side of the bus. As you can see, the wheel wells offered the perfect place to put a couple of his n her closets, neatly dividing the front kitchen/living room area from the rear bedroom/bathroom area.
This bus has 19 ft 2 in of buildable length behind the driver's seat.

[Ross]

I have 2 grey water tanks, 31 gallons each, with 3" outlets. One ahead of the rear axle, one behind. Here's one, testing the fit, upside down, in the hanging bracket for it.


3/4 inch galvanized threaded rod through 2x2x 1/4 inch angle. Diagonal braces keep tanks from swaying and flexing (breaking) the rods. 30 gallons of water is HEAVY. The top rails are through-bolted to each flange of the floor segments. The tanks do not budge. 15,000 miles, nothing has worked loose. Rubber tank grommets are fitted to holes in the top of the tanks for water entry and venting.


The other side.


Wastewater tank mounted in hanger brackets under the floor. Not shown are treated wood spacers that prevent upward movement of tank. Not glamorous work at all, but worth the effort to have systems that hold up and work properly.




Kitchen sink drain, with Hepvo trap. Vent pipe going through the bulkhead to the left, into the closet. The vertical section serves as a wet vent for the forward waste tank.


Vent piping inside closet. Vertical pipe on the left coming up from the rear wastewater tank.

Plumbing vents combine with the fan-assisted vent from the Air Head toilet.


Vent piping goes through the roof to a 360 Siphon Vent.

[Ross]

The "360 Siphon Vent". Only one vent was needed for this system.

[Ross]

All electrical devices in the conversion (with the exception of the microwave) are run on 12 VDC.The main house electric control center is located under half of the couch, directly above the battery bank under the floor. It houses the solar and shore power charging components, switches, fuses, relays, and inverter.

The bottom of the compartment is lined with sheet metal.

The solar power from the six panels on the roof (180 watt, 36 cell each) is split into two feeds, 3 panels each, all parallel to minimise the effects of partial shading. Charging is done by two Bogart Engineering SC-2030 pwm charge controllers. There is a manual switch for the solar feed (red switch center top) and a switch for the battery bank (bottom right).

There are two 350 watt 120 VAC switching power supplies for shore power charging, and a double pole double throw relay that automatically switches the solar panels off and directs the AC power supplies' output to the charge controllers when the bus is plugged in to shore power.

Individual branch circuit fuse block upper left.

At bottom is an AIMS 2000 watt inverter, UL listed.




The system monitor, a Bogart Engineering TM -2030 Trimetric, interfaces with a 50mV/500Amp shunt. Provides battery bank voltage, charge/discharge current, percent battery charge, info, and other modes.


The four 6 volt GC2 flooded lead acid deep cycle batteries fit nicely into the existing storage box under the floor on the
passenger side. Series/parallel connection for 420 Amp hour total capacity. At 50%, that's 2,520 Watt hours useable power.
I've never run the batteries down below 70%.
The microwave is the power hog, drawing close to 100 amps when running. Fortunately, you only run a microwave for a minute or two.




Pulled out on slide tray.


The latch on the tray seemed kinda weenie, so I added a couple of slide bolts.


The Trimetric and the main house electric switch bank is at the front of the bus, right at the stairwell. Can turn everything off as we're leaving. Lights, pump, fan, etc. Remote inverter switch, iPod compatible stereo, and furnace thermostat rounds out the controls.

[ol trunt]

Excellent!

Jack

[Timeline]

Originally Posted by ol trunt

Excellent!

Indeed! Really nice work on your bus!