Meet our new bus... Mr. Beefy!

[AlphaHare]

I was anticipating a similar want for my skylight windows. I'm going to try making a simple glued sandwich laminate of reflectix / 1"XPS / fabric that snugly fits the window frame. I'll wrap the sides with tape if required. I've got 10 windows with exactly the same dimensions so I'll just rout them with a pattern.

 

[TheHubbardBus]

I was anticipating a similar want for my skylight windows. I'm going to try making a simple glued sandwich laminate of reflectix / 1"XPS / fabric that snugly fits the window frame. I'll wrap the sides with tape if required. I've got 10 windows with exactly the same dimensions so I'll just rout them with a pattern.

@AlphaHare, Is there a reason you wouldn't consider one of the polyiso foam board products that already have a reflective layer on one side?

 

[nikitis]

Polyiso would work imo for Windows. Might be lighter too. XPS works too and more costly, but I don't see any added benefits to using XPS over polyiso for covering windows.

 

[TheHubbardBus]

The window quilts are on the back-burner at the moment waiting on thinsulate batting to arrive (FYI, Seattle Fabrics was the only place I could find any, and as this is my 2nd order, I can attest they're GTG).

In the meantime, I got the bus A/C evap / blower unit hung, and the enclosure built for it (for the most part).

I designed the enclosure so that (1) it could be removed without removing the A/C unit, (2) the A/C unit could be removed without removing the enclosure, and (3) the enclosure, while not the primary means of support for the A/C, could serve as a supplement/safety/second-chance support if the main supports were to fail (highly doubtful, but I'm real paranoid about this since it's right over where the passenger seat will be).

I still need to add both vents out (obviousy) and return-air vents toward the rear. Everything made of wood is waiting on cooler temps to sand/prep/coat. It will look much nicer soon.

 

[nikitis]

The window quilts are on the back-burner at the moment waiting on thinsulate batting to arrive (FYI, Seattle Fabrics was the only place I could find any, and as this is my 2nd order, I can attest they're GTG).

I ran into a skoolie traveling at Jack-N-The-Box today, I walked over to talk to him. He had a cummins Blue Bird flat nose front engine bus. He did not do the roof raise, kept the windows, but tinted them all himself.

I asked him about it and he said it was worth it 100%. Gave them privacy, and cooled down the bus a ton. He hadn't heard of this site so I told him about it. May see a new member here soon.

 

[AlphaHare]

@AlphaHare, Is there a reason you wouldn't consider one of the polyiso foam board products that already have a reflective layer on one side?

None other than I'm not there yet. I'll have a lot of small XPS foam parts left over...

 

[TheHubbardBus]

Window quilts are back on the menu, boys!

After lots of trial and error, we realized quilting all the components together as one unit resulted in a highly-inflexible product (due to the mass-loaded vinyl). So we ended up having to make separate 'quilts' for the front & back, which will be combined with the MLV in the center when we sew the borders onto the edges. So that meant sewing 36 quilts!!! (12 side windows, 4 rear windows, roof skylight/hatch, & drivers window... all 'times 2').

Each side took us about an hour to sew, so 36 hours there, plus much more time measuring and cutting everything to very precise dimensions. Working with the reflective fabric was a bear... fabric glue didn't stick to it, fabric markers didn't show on it, pins couldn't be used because the holes wouldn't 'heal', and I literally had to sew in the dark, as overhead light ended up blinding me lol.

For batting, we used 210g thinsulate for the front sections (flowers), and 105g thinsulate for the rear (reflective). With all components combined (included the MLV), each completed quilt will weigh ~ 3-3.5 pounds. That ended up being way too much for our magnet idea, so we're pivoting to using 'Durable-DOT' snaps instead. More on this later.

Hopefully we can get them done and up before they become a permanent dog bed.

 

[nikitis]

My wife picked up a sewing job, and she has this old 503a Singer machine from 1956 which is a tank of a sewing machine and one of the few with a direct cog driven machines ever made. They only made them for 3 years. Singer went from belt for decades to cog for 3 years, then plastic discs after that that break the teeth over time as a wear item.

Point is, Her machine needed servicing and I had to recently take a crash course in sewing machine mechanics, reverse engineer her machine, got her machine rolling smoothly. Seeing your quilts just bought back the recent PTSD of that experience, but also gives me the idea that I can now have her sew similar curtains for our bus since we're keeping the windows.

I think the Snaps are a great idea and should go that route. Magnets don't always hold up all the time.

 

[TheHubbardBus]

I used a 1970s Japanese-made Sears/Kenmore machine I bought used 10 years+ ago. It goes through the MLV (and pretty much anything else) like butter. Never sewed before but much respect to anyone that does this for a living! Thankfully my wife gave me a good start w/ learning. And even more thankfully, she'll be doing the borders!

And much respect for figuring out a sewing machine! The engineering that went into these things is really amazing. All I've done is clean / lube ours. I rue the day I may have to actually figure out how it works.

Stay tuned on the snaps... we're doing a couple cool things I'll post about soon which I'm pretty excited about (assuming it works as planned).

 

[syntaxterror]

The window quilts are on the back-burner at the moment waiting on thinsulate batting to arrive (FYI, Seattle Fabrics was the only place I could find any, and as this is my 2nd order, I can attest they're GTG).

In the meantime, I got the bus A/C evap / blower unit hung, and the enclosure built for it (for the most part).

I designed the enclosure so that (1) it could be removed without removing the A/C unit, (2) the A/C unit could be removed without removing the enclosure, and (3) the enclosure, while not the primary means of support for the A/C, could serve as a supplement/safety/second-chance support if the main supports were to fail (highly doubtful, but I'm real paranoid about this since it's right over where the passenger seat will be).

I still need to add both vents out (obviousy) and return-air vents toward the rear. Everything made of wood is waiting on cooler temps to sand/prep/coat. It will look much nicer soon.

That looks beautiful.

 

[AlphaHare]

Triggered - Thread Tangent Warning

Exactly because of the engineering I went through a phase of rebuilding and repairing sewing machines for fun. I had and used as many as twenty at one point, including a few industrial machines like a walking-foot Juki 563. My oldest (1896) was a Singer 29 'Patcher' which I took down to bare metal and fully restored.

Anything made in Japan from the war to the early 60's is awesome, especially the quality of their chrome and 50's styling. I have several Brother machines from this era. My favorite working machine is a Singer 201, direct gear drive.

Cog belts were available in many Pfaff German machines - I had a 40's era Pfaff 130 ("made in occupied Germany") with a corded belt with metal clinched cogs, but the newer ones used timing belts.

FWIW - a straight stitch machine will do about 95% of anything you want to do. Zig-Zag is nice once in a while, but IMO the pattern cog machines are mostly gimmicky patterns for napkins - no practical purpose. Get a Singer model 15 (or any Japanese clone of the 15) and you can do almost anything (within reason). It will outlast you and your children.

 

[nikitis]

My 503A is direct gear drive as well. Will punch through any thickness of cloth you can fit under the foot. Our plastic Vietnamese sewing machine breaks all the time cause the plastic gears can't hold up.

 

[TheHubbardBus]

I kind of expected a bit less enthusiasm from the male contingent here regarding sewing! So before we all sit down and have a cry-fest watching 'Fried Green Tomatoes'...

I finally got our passenger seat in!!!!! Air-ride, & passenger pivot!

I was really dreading this job, as both the seat base itself as well as the seatbelt tethers / floor-mounted retractor are directly above the fuel tank. So far everything I've had to put through the floor and back with a nut up underneath (battery cage, inverter cage, trap-door mounts) has been a nightmare to reach. Amazingly, this ended up being the easiest of the bunch rather than the hardest, because the fuel-fill door gave me easy access to the nuts closest to the passenger side, while the rest could be accessed from underneath squeezing by the driveline.

The seat base was made from the original, which was a 2-piece design. For this seat I used the top of that, after cutting off the sides that otherwise would have provided a 3" lift. Then I welded on nuts underneath, and relieved the floor underneath to clear said nuts. Before doing so, however, I had to cut the floor out where the seat base would sit, and replace the insulation 'sandwich' where the bolts securing the seat base through the floor would go with solid wood, so I could tighten them in earnest without fear of the rubber I used for sound-dampening to compress (learned this lesson the hard way with the 'drawbridge').

4 x 7/16-20 UNF grade 8 bolts secure the seat base through the floor, backed up with fender washers and nylok grade-8 nuts + red loctite. The seatbelt tethers and floor-mounted retractor bracket (the bracket being homemade) are the same, except I skipped the loctite as I'll have to remove & reinstall these when the flooring goes in. The seat itself is secured to the base with 5 x 7/16-14 UNC grade 8 bolts (added 1 extra to make up for the reduced strength compared to UNF). If you look close there are 3 extra galvanized bolt heads there... lag bolts that go through the wood in the floor, but not out the bottom. I'm sure they add some strength, but the real reason they're there (along with some high-strength PU adhesive) is to fill a few holes that I thought would miss the ribs under the bus, but ended up going right into the center of them instead

The biggest challenge was the upper seatbelt mount. It would have been far less challenging had I accounted for all this during the demo stage, but now with the bus painted, the windows in, and everything else, I had to figure out a way to secure through the frame as it sat. I ended up drilling a 7/16" hole through to the outside of the bus through the hat channel, and pushing another 7/16" bolt in from the outside. Onto this I threaded on a nut as a spacer (after relieving the window frames) followed by a coupling nut, into which the seatbelt mount screws into directly. The wooden window divider/components were drilled to accomodate.

This moment literally marks the first time my wife has ridden in the bus for further than around the block, and on a surface other than a plywood floor. And that sucks - I admit - but a whole lot of other things logistically absolutely had to come first. If we didn't already have another name for our bus, I'd consider 'Delayed Gratification' to be a contender. I ended up finishing it up at 12 noon, on her birthday. Then we went for our first long drive together

 

[AlphaHare]

I kind of expected a bit less enthusiasm from the male contingent here regarding sewing! So before we all sit down and have a cry-fest watching 'Fried Green Tomatoes'...

LMFAO

Seat looks awesome!

One comment - I'd suggest you shorten up (remove) the standoff to make the upper seat belt retainer flush with the column. That point is going to take much of the impact load for the passenger, and the overhung load (i.e. extension/leverage from the wall) is the weak link. I'd have the seat belt bracket flush with the wall so the bolt is only loaded in shear. The bolts in the base will hold the seat, the bolts for the seat belts will restrain the passenger (which is also why the tethers are there).

 

[TheHubbardBus]

@AlphaHare, I truly appreciate the input. I intuitively knew this was potentially problematic, but at this point my choices are limited. For many reasons, I really want/need to be able to maintain that stand-off if at all possible. If you don't mind, I'm gonna shoot you a PM in a day or 3 requesting a bit of guidance.

In the mean-time, here are the quilts all bonded together by my lovely wife, with the prototype border done on one. Into this border will go the snaps.

Also pictured are the frame templates I made to fit them. Each template matches the interior dimensions of the window frame it goes over on the inside, and the extent the border must extend to on the outside. You probably can't see them in the pic, but at the points where the snaps should go, I've drilled tiny 5/64" holes (with a drill press so they're perfectly straight). The idea here is to align the interior of the template with the interior of each window frame, mark/pilot-drill all the snap stud locations through the pilot holes, and then use the same template to mark corresponding locations in the quilt border for the snaps themselves. This way they should (knock on wood!) align perfectly, and (at least for the side windows) make it so any quilt will fit over any window.

I'm toying with the idea of making screens for the windows down the road that would work exactly the same, so I'll store these templates away somewhere safe.