Just Call Me Bobert

[Dbacks2k4]

Finally starting to get some better weather. I haven't hardly been at the shop in months.

I did come out last week and do a full mechanical inspection of the bus. Overall looking good, but a new possible issue with the front passenger side brakes. A lot of grease in the area after last summer's pressure washing/engine degreasing, so will need to investigate that. The front main engine deal is still leaking, but it's still small enough to punt that repair down the road a bit.

The inspection was a good opportunity to make a new Youtube video - which so far has the worst analytics of any video I've ever made, haha. Goes to show why there's so much "we broke down" "please help us" drama on the popular channels - along with lots of crying.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=k_uo5QZQaNc

We had some bad tornadoes hit close to home Friday night, but thankfully the one went between my shop and my house with no damage to either. The Coralville strip took the direct hit, not to mention other areas around the state.

Today I took out the latest batch of tools and equipment I've been collecting out to the shop and got some organizing done. I'd bought a cheap drill press from harbor freight that took an hour to assemble. It's definitely a cheap piece of crap, but it'll get the job done for what I need to do.

My new Maxxair fans are in and the old ones listed on eBay. I was an idiot when I bought them... Not paying attention I didn't notice the difference in the model number and wound up ordering the 4 speed variant that is exhaust only and not the more expensive model that ventilates in both directions. Doh! Which reminds me, I completely forgot to measure the emergency hatch opening today to order the sheet metal to close them back up...

I also had bought a used air compressor off fb marketplace that I wound up having to replace the drain, regulator, release valve, and gauges on. Even after all that it was still significantly cheaper than new so I'm happy with it, despite it taking all afternoon. As such I didn't get to the undercoating which was today's goal. I had pressure washed the underside last fall but wanted to use the air gun to give it a final blast today before undercoating, hence the long air compressor distraction today.... Yep, adhd at its finest haha.

Interior demo is still on holding pending the ac units. I'm keeping them for sure, but have determined they need to come out for the build and that keeping them connected and building around them just isn't an option. After hours and hours of research I'm about to pull the trigger on the proper ac tools - vaccum pump, recovery pump, recovery tank, scale, hoses and gauges - to remove them myself. I was hoping to talk my mechanic friend into doing it for me but that's not looking likely unfortunately (he can't get access to the equipment as we'd hoped and his day job is keeping him hopping anyway).

If this site's resident a/c expert reads this and you're interested, I'd love to pay a "consulting fee" to spend 45 minutes on Zoom to review my gear and plan as an added precaution! My mechanic friend has assured me I can handle it and given me some pointers but an extra set of eyes never hurts. Plus I'm still confused on how I tell if I've extracted any pag oil (the cheap Evac equipment I'm looking at doesn't separate) and more importantly how to tell if there's enough in the system? Back to youtube university tonight I think....

In other news I may have an opportunity to upgrade to a larger shop this summer which I'm working on. I really don't want to move again, but my current shop is very small. I knew that going in and for the price difference was OK with that. Well see if this new deal winds up being affordable or not.

 

[Dbacks2k4]

Well, sometimes things don't go according to plan!

This summer has been an absolute whirlwind. I did get the bus home for a couple days in early April.

I started applying the rubberized undercoating. I very quickly realized I had underestimated how much it would take by a factor of about 10... and ordered more just to find out they were back-order for a month. The section I did get done looks pretty good though I think.

The next couple days I continued doing some gutting.

The AC evaporators are mostly disassembled and I did finally pull the trigger on ordering the equipment necessary to evacuate the system properly.

I did manage to get the last few windows out even with the AC evaps still up and got all the channeling for the lines loosened up. I also got the rear heater disconnected - it will eventually get relocated. I still don't understand the setup on this bus. Every other bus I've had the heater lines come in through the firewall and go to the drivers seat heater, then down the drivers side of the bus interior along the floor to the back to the heaters. This bus for whatever reason, the lines run interior like usual, but then just past the rear wheel well go down under the bus and across the cross-members before coming back into the bus on the passenger side where the heater is. Makes no sense to me at all.

I also started loosening screws for the side panels hoping to just take them off rather than cut them off. Best laid plans ha ha. Turns out the interior walls are folded steel under the window frame and then again folded up where they're riveted to the outside steel and the rub rails.

And that's as far as I got this summer, those 3 days in April. Shortly thereafter we took on a massive project at work and I spent the remainder of April and half of May in Kansas City working. Family committments kept me busy most of June and in early July I made the decision to sell my house and move back to the Davenport/Quad Cities area from Iowa City to be closer to family. Unfortunately my house needs a fair amount of work and a few updates in order to list... so every waking minute (and every spare dollar) have been doing house projects and the bus has sat in my shop neglected.

About a week ago I did get the bus moved to Davenport. I made a deal with my former business partner on the party buses to use some of his space to work on my bus once I get moved. Right now its sitting over there loaded up with boxes of parts. I still need to move the rest of my shop, work benches, etc.

We've had some fun with insurance lately too. Since I sold my share of the business to him on contract, I'm still listed as an owner with the insurance carrier on the party buses. During this year's renewal they decided to run a DMV search on the business as well as both of our names personally and they threw a fit when they found a bus titled in my own name and not listed on their commerical policy. It's been a 2 week fight of sending documents, proof of "personal use" insurance, photos, etc but my broker thinks they've finally agreed that my bus isn't being used for commerical hauling of passengers and will agree to "drop it" from the commerical policy which they wanted to charge us (well, my business partner) $350/month to insure. What a pain.

Last night I did get the order placed for the solar panels. I've had most of the electrical components (Signature Solar) for a while. I found (what I hope is a deal) on some Longi 350W used panels from SanTan Solar for about 29c/watt. Now just gotta figure out the racking system... I like the IronRidge XR1000 that Chuck Cassady on YouTube recommends but seems kinda pricey.

 

[Dbacks2k4]

Well, here we are almost at end of October. My house went on the market 9/1 which is when I was able to move into my new place. I've spent the roughly last 6 weeks getting moved and settled into new place, working overtime at my day job, and driving back to the old house to mow lawn and vaccum carpets between showings.

Yesterday and today I was able to spend some time at the new shop getting shelves and workbenches set up. The floor had a giant crack under where I wanted the workbenches, including one hole about 6" square all the way through the concrete and into what I can only describe as a mini-sinkhole below. It took two 60lb bags of quickrete to fill all the voids. I really dislike concrete work, but alas, now I don't have to worry about dropping parts or tools into the abyss haha.

The move was hard on some of my shelves and workbenches and a few 2x4s split on me. They weren't exactly quality builds to begin with, haha. The workbench uppers have to be completely rebuilt from ground up for the new space. They were add-ons between the original party bus shop where I had more space than I knew what to do with and the last storage-unit-turned-workshop where I had to start building vertically in order to be able to walk around. It's slowly coming along. It'll definitely be a nicer space than where I was before for sure. Price is right too, haha. No rent, just a few hours a month of helping out with party buses.

I've got roughly 30x50 ft in the building that's mine (for reference the storage unit shop was 14x50). The other 30x50 is my business partner's. We've got a 14 foot overhead door with electric opener to get buses in and out. Only downside is he's got the side closest to door so if I need to get my bus out I've got to move whatever bus he has in there first. Better that than the other way around, my bus doesn't need to move very often haha.

There's plenty of power for lights and tools. No more having to remember to unplug my dorm fridge and cordless tool battery chargers before turning on the air compressor. The property has unlimited well water onsite, just not in our building. So I've got a small utility sink that I can use with a foot pump from a couple 5 gallon jugs. Perfect for washing hands or parts. I can take the bus outside to the spigot for pressure washing whenever I want.

I'm building out a peninsula shaped work area of 16x32. One side (left in photo) has those tall narrow shelves at 16 feet across. To the right and parallel to the bus itself is 32 feet of shelves and workbench. The first 8 foot is a 2' deep heavy duty double storage shelf. Then 24 foot of workbench, extended from my previous 16 foot workbench. Dead center is now a recessed miter saw platform that I'm absolutely loving. Im currently building up the uppers with small shelves and pegboard.

The third side (behind me in photo) will be a pair of 7x7 Rubbermade knock-off storage sheds I brought from my old house. They were starting to fall apart and split due to unlevel ground and cheap factory construction and piss poor design. They'll be perfect here where I can replace the stupid factory plastic tabs they were held together with and basically build a 2x4 frame and just attach the plastic panels on the sides and roof. The metal roof in the building itself has a tendency to leak, so those old sheds are the perfect place to store items bought for the bus like my batteries and the stove. Behind each side of the peninsula I'm putting in R19 fiberglass batt insulation.

The whole workspace butte right up against the long side of the bus. I'm building a removable, insulated ceiling at an 8 foot height to cover the whole workspace. I'll drop a canvas along the fourth side next to the bus, leaving just an opening to the bus door and to get out of shop. This should allow me to heat the space with just my two propane shop heaters when working out there.

I had attempted to insulate my last shop best I could. But, between the "insulation ceiling" being 16' in the air, no insulation on any of the walls or the roll-up door, and the thermal bridging of the cold steel of the bus it just didn't work. Hopefully this new design with significantly less cubic feet and the bus being outside the heated zone will make winter work possible.

It seems I've spent more time the last year moving and setting up shops than actually working on my bus. But hopefully all this work now will allow me to do bus work this winter.

 

[Dbacks2k4]

I haven't given up on the bus build project, but it's definitely on hold. Last summer I moved across state and over the winter bought a 1970s house that needed a total renovation done which I'm in process of yet, which is taking up all my time and funds The portable internet setup I built for this bus a while back is happily providing me pretty decent wifi at the new house while I'm out there working though.

Meanwhile the bus sits in my storage spot collecting bird droppings...