Workspace needed

[Chicken Little]

Anyone in Fort Lauderdale have room in their back yard or driveway for me to work on my School Bus!!? I'm on a tight tight budget. the bus is sitting at the bus yard where I bought it. I need a place to store it that I can afford and to work on it. I cannot drive off with it till Ive saved enough $$ for the drive out to california. The insurance company requires I remove the seats in order to insure for tag and tittle. HEEELP

searched all over the web including https://www.neighbor.com/rentals/Mia...ge-space-86217

EXPENSSIVE for spaces 20x50 or over

[musigenesis]

FWIW you should be able to remove the seats from a FL bus (which is hopefully un-rusted unless it was imported from elsewhere) without any power tools, so perhaps you can remove them while the bus is still where you bought it.

[Chicken Little]

Originally Posted by musigenesis

FWIW you should be able to remove the seats from a FL bus (which is hopefully un-rusted unless it was imported from elsewhere) without any power tools, so perhaps you can remove them while the bus is still where you bought it.

I'm sorry, WHAT!? you're joking right? Please do tell me how to remove bolts without using a power tool.

[musigenesis]

Originally Posted by Chicken Little

I'm sorry, WHAT!? you're joking right? Please do tell me how to remove bolts without using a power tool.

Easiest way is with a friend, with one of you underneath the bus and the other inside. Person below clamps a vice grips on the nut; person inside loosens the bolt head with an ordinary wrench and a hammer, then uses a ratchet wrench to remove the bolt completely. If you have no friends, buy a bunch of cheap vice grips and clamp them on yourself - the more you have, the fewer trips up and down you'll have to make.

Even if the bolts are a little rusted this will usually work, and in a FL bus they really shouldn't be that bad. You might have a few ornery bolts that need to be cut out with an angle grinder, but your bus lot will probably run you an extension cord if it helps to be rid of you.

[DeMac]

Originally Posted by musigenesis

Easiest way is with a friend, with one of you underneath the bus and the other inside. Person below clamps a vice grips on the nut; person inside loosens the bolt head with an ordinary wrench and a hammer, then uses a ratchet wrench to remove the bolt completely. If you have no friends, buy a bunch of cheap vice grips and clamp them on yourself - the more you have, the fewer trips up and down you'll have to make.

Even if the bolts are a little rusted this will usually work, and in a FL bus they really shouldn't be that bad. You might have a few ornery bolts that need to be cut out with an angle grinder, but your bus lot will probably run you an extension cord if it helps to be rid of you.

Exactly how we removed 28 seats, Musigenisis. Ratchet & vice grips, when I was alone. Wrench & battery ratchet, with a helper. We stripped the cushions before unbolting the frames to make them lighter & recyclable. Persistance.

If fact, we removed every bit of flooring, seats and ceiling using only an impact driver & hand tools. 1,056 screws in the ceiling, 124 seat bolts, 376 plywood screws. All in jars to reuse.

Stripping the seat bottoms ('removed seating') may be enough for the insurance company. Most can be done using no tool, just hands.

[o1marc]

Originally Posted by Chicken Little

I'm sorry, WHAT!? you're joking right? Please do tell me how to remove bolts without using a power tool.

They make these new battery operated ones that work really well.

[Rock-N-Ruth]

Originally Posted by Chicken Little

I'm sorry, WHAT!? you're joking right? Please do tell me how to remove bolts without using a power tool.

I am an old fat guy who hates to lay on the ground. My old fat wife is 3 months older than I am and hates to lay on the ground more than I do. We got the seats out of the bus wit a ratchet wrench with a 12 inch extension and a box end wrench.

She stayed up top and held the box end wrench and I crawled below to ratchet the nuts off. Took about two hours. Lots of good metal, foam and plywood to be salvaged from the seats as well.

As for insurance requiring you to remove seats to drive the bus, try Progressive Commercial lines. Their private use commercial policy is cheap. They will sell you a policy for your non converted bus on the caveat that you notify them when you are living in the bus more than 30 days per year so that they can cancel your policy and send you looking for RV insurance. We have used them for two busses and a box truck. They never required any mods, including seat removal to sell us a policy over the phone in minutes.