Penny - 5 speed house

[5speedhouse]

Hi Skoolie, We have been lurking and planning for a while and now it is time to share our project with you.

We are Melissa and Derek and we bought a bus! More specifically… Penny, a 1986 International S1800, All Canadian School Bus! She has a 9.0L Diesel V8, air brakes, a 5 speed manual transmission and with only 116k miles she's just a baby! The frame is SOLID, however there are a few areas around the rear wheel wells and windows we were concerned about. ( more on that later)

Here are some pictures from when we met and bought Penny.








Oh also here's a picture of her service records, from 1986- 2013.





Penny started life as a brand new bus and serviced the Oxford Academy Band for 20 years. She was sold to Angelique, a driver in the district. She loved “Big Red” and tuned her up and fitted her with 6 FRESH TIRES! After several years, Angelique traded Big Red to Devin for a newer shorter bus. Devin listed her on ebay and we had to go see her. We are located in Rochester NY, and Penny was only a few hours away. We met and fell in love!

Melissa is a senior Industrial Design student and Penny is her senior design project! I will let Melissa talk about her project more but basically a lot of the project will focus on multi-functional furniture and spaces as well as green and off grid living.

Floor plans and Sketches!!!












Currently our plan for Penny involves a 14”-18” roof raise, spray foam insulation, rear garage/workshop space, maybe a ductless mini-split, we’ll also fabricate under-bus storage bays. We are going to incorporate a shower, composting toilet, and kitchen area, murphy style bed, rooftop deck and solar panels. We will be set up for solar, generator, and shore power. We plan on using propane for stove, fridge, and tankless hotwater heater.

Enough blabbing here are some pictures of Penny.

whoops having some trouble with files today stay tuned for a picture dump or check out our instagram for a few more photos! https://www.instagram.com/5speedhouse/

She came with most of the seats removed already so we made quick work of removing the interior skins and insulation to investigate what our rust situation looked like.





The chair rail is a little rotted where it attaches to the floor. We will remove these rotted pieces and repair them while adding HD angle iron attached to the floor and ribs.

Thats all for now its quite cold out and we have a good bit of rust controll ahaeda of us! Stay tuned! Dont for get to look at our instagram and website! thanks!

Penny – the 5-speed house


https://www.instagram.com/5speedhouse/

[Rusty]

Welcome ! Nice score - 9.0L 550 IH w/ 5-speed. Looks like a great platform.

Looking forward to watching your build.

[Rochey6957]

Hi guys! Melissa and I have been hard at work on Penny!

Melissa has been hard at work design and working through our floor plan and modular furniture. We will try yo have an update tonight or tomorrow with the design stuff.

I have been working on stopping the rest of the ceiling panels out and treating the rust on the floor. I just finished treating the Interior with the green ospho and wow does that stuff kick butt! At this point I'm about ready to cut out the really bad portions of cancer around the wheel wells. I'm borrowing a HF 90amp flux core unit with out shielding gas hook up and I am not a huge fan. I'm looking into purchasing a better unit with shielding gas and fully adjustable wire speed and electrical output. If I get another unit I'd want to be able to use it on the roof raise. What are you guys using in terms of equipment and are you satisfied with it?

Thanks all.

Going to put some photos and videos up tonight but for now enjoy this photo after ospho.

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[Robin97396]

Looks like you're well on your way. Good work.

[5speedhouse]

Ok so I got the hang of the gopro studio and heres a little video of penny getting a bath! I hope you enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5Qd...ature=youtu.be

Here is some pictures of the rust before and after ospho.

[Rochey6957]

Not too much work done on penny over the past few days. However, I did make a pretty big purchase for this project. I bought us a nice Hobart 140 MIG welder. After playing around and making a cart out of the old bus seats, I am quite happy with this little machine. The only thing that I'm not in love with is the multi position output switch. I would prefer an infinte control knob like on similar Lincoln and miller machines but for the $200+ price difference I can live with predetermined output amperages.

This week I'll be cutting out all the rot and preping all patches to weld in.

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[EastCoastCB]

nice setup!
I like my lil hobart 140 a lot.

[Rochey6957]

Yeah man after seeing you do your raise with it, I was pretty much convinced haha

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[Tango]

Great choice on the Hobart. They are made by Miller and may be the best mig welder value anywhere. You get a few more bells & whistles on a Miller (I have two of them), but for the money, Hobart is one helluva deal.

Weld ON!

[RobHouTx]

I see your grinder from Harbor Fright. I have not had a bad experience with them yet. You can't beat the price. I hope Penny serves you well. Thanks for letting us follow your journey.

[Rochey6957]

Yeah the harbor grinder is OK. We fried our first one in about 2 hours of use. I think it was just a bad unit. I ended up purchasing the extended warranty on it because I know its going to take a lot of abuse.

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[EastCoastCB]

Originally Posted by Rochey6957

Yeah the harbor grinder is OK. We fried our first one in about 2 hours of use. I think it was just a bad unit. I ended up purchasing the extended warranty on it because I know its going to take a lot of abuse.

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I dropped my old trusy cheap Hitachi while on my roof recently after the raise.
She ground rivets etc on at least 4 or 5 buses. RIP Hitachi!

[ol trunt]

Good choice on the Hobart and good luck with the hf grinder. If it makes through the first 15 minutes it'll probably go for a year. I've learned to sell off my used hf tools after about 6 mo use while they are still sort of working and I buy replacements on sale days two at a time. That keeps me from having to run out in mid project to buy another tool. While I am bitching, NONE of the hf drills with the keyless chucks are worth a damn. You can't tighten their chuck jaws enough to overcome their non parallel jaws which results in the destruction of the drill bit shank to say nothing of the wobble of the drill bit.

End of rant. Jack

[Rochey6957]

Haha jezz turnt if your buying 2-3 harbor tools at a time, might as well be a more expensive tool! I have never used a HF drill and dont plan on it. I've got a makita and ryobi cordless drills and impact that work quite well. I might need to pick up an old craftsman corded drill though for rivet work down the line.

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[cadillackid]

my HF impact gun has been a TROOPER!!.. I turn the air WAY up to like 140 at times.. it blows oil out the back when I do that but has never broken.. and Ive worked that thing HARD..
-Christopher

[Rochey6957]

Melissa is a mechanic at a local Hyundai dealership and uses the HF impact. I think it lasted about 2 years and then failed. I believe she got the most expensive one the second time. I find if a HF tool makes it through the first couple uses, it will usually last long enough that it was money well spent.

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[EastCoastCB]

Originally Posted by Rochey6957

Haha jezz turnt if your buying 2-3 harbor tools at a time, might as well be a more expensive tool! I have never used a HF drill and dont plan on it. I've got a makita and ryobi cordless drills and impact that work quite well. I might need to pick up an old craftsman corded drill though for rivet work down the line.

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I buy air tools and stuff that I plan on abusing/destroying at HF.
If I want a good tool that will last, I look elsewhere.
Makita would be my choice for a drill as well. Love my cheap Ryobi, too.

[5speedhouse]

Hi everyone, quick Pre weekend update.

On Monday Penny made her way over to RIT's campus for Melissa's senior design show. All of her design are viewable on 5speedhouse.com under the design tab.
All of her professors and passer-bys were very impressed and we had a lot of fun talking to folks.

Prior to the show I was able to repair 95% of the bus floor. After all the welding I applied rustoleum paint.

Last night, I started some bondoing work, and removed the driver heater core. We also sorted out an electrical gremlin with our accessory selonid that stopped all of the accessories from work.

On the subject of the heater core.... Can I pressure wash all the dust out of this? Obviously I need to take some care not to damage the fins.....

Here's an image dump!



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[Robin97396]

Yes you can spray that heater core off with low pressure water. Not a pressure washer or car wash sprayer. An old toothbrush might help.

[5speedhouse]

OK I'll try the garden hose first...

Any other suggestion for cleaning them?

Any other suggestions/ tips/ tricks with these heaters? I plan on keeping them for on road heat. But they need to be serviced and cleaned. They dont make great heat, they vomit dirt and dust, and sound like absolute hell when they run.

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