The In Between TC-2000 Handybus

[Trooper2]

Got some work done on the bus this past weekend.

Installed all the tables



Welded together all the fresh and grey water tank brackets



Working on mounting the tanks

[Trooper2]

I finished up the exhaust and intake on the Plannar 44D heater, mounted the thermostat and fired it up.

Warms the bus up in no time, it is surprisingly quiet. After reading the reviews I expected it to be louder than a typical RV gas furnace. It is not.

I cut the hole for the propane tank door / rack. It lands perfectly in-between two of the structural floor / body side supports . Stay tuned for pictures of the assembly. For now you get a blank hole.

[Tejon7]

Man, you are killing it! Your progress is impressive, as is the apparent quality of your work. Thanks for sharing - I'm really enjoying the updates and all the pics.

[Trooper2]

Originally Posted by Tejon7

Man, you are killing it! Your progress is impressive, as is the apparent quality of your work. Thanks for sharing - I'm really enjoying the updates and all the pics.

Thanks!, I am sort of facing winter getting worse and my wife needing a warm up area / indoor space for her school. If I were to caulk the roof, and install the new wiper linkages she could use it as is.

My worry is once she starts using it I will stop working on it..... and it will be 80% done forever. My day job is going to get really busy soon and will limit my time to weekends and not afternoon / evenings like I have now.

[Trooper2]

Life got in the way this past week. The only progress was finishing up the propane cylinder storage area



Getting it primed



And installed



Much of the steel for the rack was cut out of the old handicap lift that came with the bus.

I have fabricated a door that matches the one for battery compartment to the left. I am waiting for the locking latch to come in then I will install it.

The two hole bracket in the middle is for my auto changeover regulator. Tank enclosure holds two 20lb tanks

[Rwnielsen]

Very professional looking. Nice touch on the molding ends too

[Trooper2]

Originally Posted by Rwnielsen

Very professional looking. Nice touch on the molding ends too

Thanks! really trying to class the old girl up. Thinking some pinstripes after I paint it .

[Trooper2]

Old vehicles are funny things. The bus yard my bus sat in unused for 17 years borrowed a few parts from it , wiper linkage, wiper door latch, pivot assemblies, few other things, I am sure they intended to return them.

On to the wipers, I bought the missing parts plus new wiper shafts, put the whole thing together BAM I had sweet working wipers, wiper doors with latches and not wire holding them shut. I was so proud to have a bus that looks put together!

So today was a big day for the yet unnamed bus. After all the tune up work, interior work, inspect this , replace that I had very few items left on the must fix before road testing. I got them all done today and went for a road test.

Bus drove better than when I bought it, I have a feeling it was the 17 year old fuel I replaced with new, and the filters etc.

Then I hit a pot hole, then the wipers came on …. then they stopped, then they came on , then they stayed on... If it was raining it would not have looked so silly. Banged on the wiper switch and that cured it ( it kept trying to wash the windshield) until I hit another bump and back on it came. Pulled over and disconnected the switch / control unit and headed home.

In its maintenance history from 1995-2005 ( the point it was parked in the bus yard) it never had a wiper switch installed in it. Failing after all those years of use, plus sitting shouldn't be a surprise.

Turns out that particular switch isn't all that easy to find, but eBay had a NOS one for 30 bucks! Score!!!! The unavailable one sells for 98, the one that is available for the out of stock one is like 195.00 ouch.

For those of you new to old vehicles, expect stuff to break, don't get frustrated, just think if I fix it right , I won't have to worry about it going forward.

Wiper switch, headlight switch, turn signal switch.... which one of you will get me next !

[Trooper2]

My goal was to try and keep the sink / tankless/ outside shower as close as possible to each other. It cuts out wasting water while waiting for it to warm up.

The cabinet under my cooktop was a good spot to mount the tankless, I am already running gas to it anyway, It is next to the sink and shower so the run for hot water will be really short.

I didn't take too many progress pics but here is the installation so far.



I used 4" B-Vent for the venting, and a typical ceiling/ wall thimble for where it went through the countertop.




For the outside I found this stainless 4" vent termination online.





Worst part was making the transition from the odd 4-1/4" flu on the heater. I used an adjustable section of B vent and re-made the inside liner to be 4-1/4" at the bottom .

Next task , connect the gas and water lines.

[Trooper2]

Holidays took up more of my time than I had originally planned. It was nice to get away from work, not work on the bus or the house, or the jeep, nope I did work on that. So other than the jeep, It was nice to spend time with family.

Bus progress -

Finished up installing the gas line from the regulator to the cook top and tankless.



Installed the back up camera


Finished up the minor punch list items on the outside that needed to be done.
All new clearance lights, headlights, taillights, fixed wiper wash function.



I also sealed the roof seams with seam sealer and have no more roof leaks !

[Trooper2]

Now that all my lights work, brakes look good, wipers work, and have a working seatbelt ! It's time to shake it out and find out what other issues it has.

I really can't complain with how it drives, keeps up with traffic just fine, being short wheelbase it is super maneuverable.

The air ride seat never worked, after poking at it I found it had a cracked hose so a stop at home depot for a 1/4" shark-bite union had us driving home in style.

YRC freight called my Alison 2500PTS is ready to pick up at the terminal !

[Trooper2]

The length bus is pretty sweet for getting around town, but the wheelbase does not leave much room for an awning that mounts in the middle.

I was able to get a really good price on a 13' x8' awning that had been returned to the seller for some reason or another. It had all it's parts in their original packaging so all was good on that that.

I had the option of mounting it in front of the the main door, or just behind the front wheels with the back mount landing on the wheelchair lift door. I wanted to keep that door operational as it allows storage of things like chairs, BBQ and other things to be accessed from outside the bus.

So we mounted it in front of the front door. It provides relief from the rain at the cost of useable space under the awning.

I used 1/4 -20 riv-nuts and stainless bolts for mounting it . Upper mounts are all in areas that have ribs/ double sheet metal or heavy steel ( front upper) Lowers are in single sheet metal.

The biggest two aggravations were the retaining channel perfectly aligned with a sheet metal doubler / channel that was 1/8" behind the outer skin. This required the outer skin to be piloted larger than the stainless self tapper, and the inner to be piloted due to thickness and the self tappers not working well.

The second challenge was installing the awning vinyl when it was 40 degrees outside. I could have waited but we have some camping tips planned soon and wanted the awning available.

The awning will need to come back off when I paint the bus this summer, but for now it will keep us dry.

[Trooper2]

Just a few ideas we threw around after dinner.
3 -color


2-tone #1



2-tone #2

[Trooper2]

I haven't posted much on the build lately, I am done with the major parts of the project and on the shake out phase to see what problems come up.

I don't want this build thread to go dormant as some do when life gets busy so here are the updates for the last month-


Exterior- No leaks! between sealing the windows in the fall, and sealing the roof seams on a warm day in December we have cured the roof leaks!

Water system- I installed two pumps on the system, one for cold and one that is dedicated to supply water from the tank to my tankless water heater. When designing the system I debated installing a dedicated suction line from the tank to each pump. My concern was one pump effecting the others suction, and I was right on that. If one pump is running and the other fires up I end up with cavitation in the second pump.

Solution will be to install a second suction line to the other bung in the tank.

Interior- We did all the shop drawings for window coverings, bought 20 yards of thermal mylar film lined fabric (amazon), and 20 yards of drapery fabric on closeout at the local JoAnne fabric store. Window coverings will be held on with magnets sewn into fabric.

Window Screens- I was able to find one of the self closing magnetic door screens that fit my front door perfectly. I purchased cloth window screen material and magnets to make a magnetic screen for the rear door. The drivers slider will get a standard sliding window screen. I am still working on bus side window screen plan, might just be magnetic.

Engine Cover- My bus is a FE ( Front Engine) with the 12v Cummins engine. The original sound / heat insulation was rodent damaged when I purchased the bus. I bought some dynomat type product that needs to be installed. After about an hour of driving it at 2000 RPM's the sound level gets a little old.

Engine- The more I drive it the better it runs. If you have followed along you know the bus had 17 year old fuel in it. I drained the tank, replaced all the filters and lines put in fresh fuel and some conditioner hoping to get the pump and injectors nice and clean. This has paid off big time, no smoke from the engine regardless of load, plenty of power to keep up with traffic.

[Rivetboy]

Originally Posted by dzl_

I totally get what you mean/are saying, but this made me laugh


Its a sought after size bus. I look forward to seeing what you do with it. I go back and forth between wanting a ~5 Window cutaway or conventional, or an 8/9 window flat nose, but the latter is hard to come by.

Here is my 28 foot TC 2000 Rebuilt everything including the 5.9 mechanical, new trans, brakes, shocks, dashboard, wiring. LED exterior lighting, trans cooler with thermo fan and thermostic valve and six tires. Finally painted it white. Starting on the interior now but I wanted it 110% reliable before the interior was begun. It has taken 4 years to get to this point.

[Rivetboy]

Anyhow , I forgot to say how inspiring your work is! Liked your propane solution. Planning to use the passenger side wheel to wheel for propane storage and a Honda 2200 generator. My wife liked your stove installation also. Very neat.
Thank you for the inspiration.

Cheers

[Trooper2]

Originally Posted by Rivetboy

Anyhow , I forgot to say how inspiring your work is! Liked your propane solution. Planning to use the passenger side wheel to wheel for propane storage and a Honda 2200 generator. My wife liked your stove installation also. Very neat.
Thank you for the inspiration.

Cheers

Thanks for the compliments !

I am pretty jealous of your drivetrain and paint job.

I have all the service records for my bus the engine has about 89K since a Cummins reman was installed. The trans has about 100k on it, but is a 545 and will be replaced. I am keeping an eye out for deals on a 12v reman at the various auction sites.

Speaking of transmissions, I purchased a Allison PTS2500 with 48k on it to install. Just waiting on my turn for a wiring harness and TCM , I should have that sometime in may based on his backlog.

[Rivetboy]

[QUOTE=Trooper2;464138]Thanks for the compliments !


And my wife wants to know why our bus doesn't look all shiny inside like your's.
She was talking about the stove again today.

I have posted this pic before but it was a tremendous amount of work. And that crummy 545 is my 0 time crummy 545 ....

Would like a lock up trans but do not want to ever pull that diesel again.
Plus furniture is so much easier.

So, what kind of door for your propane tanks?

[samfilm]

Great thread; thank you for sharing. This is basically the exact bus that I would like to buy and convert into a camper. I've been following some auctions and waiting to see what comes up.

[Trooper2]

[QUOTE=Rivetboy;464161]

Originally Posted by Trooper2

Thanks for the compliments !


And my wife wants to know why our bus doesn't look all shiny inside like your's.
She was talking about the stove again today.

I have posted this pic before but it was a tremendous amount of work. And that crummy 545 is my 0 time crummy 545 ....

Would like a lock up trans but do not want to ever pull that diesel again.
Plus furniture is so much easier.

So, what kind of door for your propane tanks?

For the door I used a piece of 12ga steel and a piano hinge similar to the other doors on the bus. For a latch I purchased a weld in paintable latch on amazon. It looks decent and is lockable. I plug welded the piano hinge to the door, then drilled the other side of the hinge and through bolted it to the body.

That engine and trans looks great, 545 or not it gives you piece of mind to have a 0 time drivetrain.