My experience, Tampa Busses!

[FawnaFox]

Hi, I just recently got my bus officially on the road. I’d like to share my experience with it and how to get a mid-conversion bus on the road. First, you will need to get the bus re-titled as an RV, usually by getting it reweighed after removing seats. You will need a weight affidavit, a body change affidavit and a title change affidavit, along with the bus’s title.

After that you will need to call the Tampa State Farm office, specifically try to get Riley at the Jim Cornwell office, for me because the bus is currently not being driven often, I got a basic policy, it’s costs us around 200 dollars per year for a 1998 Bluebird conventional with exempt mileage, but of course that will vary.

After that take your insurance card and title to the DMV and register the bus! No CDL, no commercial policy!
This is how it worked out for us, I can’t guarantee that it will work for everyone, but for us it did, hope this helps!

 

[Mr P]

Florida?

Good for you!

 

[nikitis]

I got mine weighed at the local dump station and ask for a receipt of the weight. It's a legal document given out by a city official, and can be used if pulled over and the police have to legally accept it. If for whatever reason they don't and you go to court, anything that happens after that moment once the court realizes it's a legal document gets thrown out.

 

[FawnaFox]

Florida?

Good for you!

It was a process, but we did it!

 

[blueskybluebird]

Very similar experience in Florida and with my local State Farm agent. It was a bit of a learning curve for my SF rep but she got it done. When I sent pics they requested, the interior was completely empty. ‘89 Blue bird flat nose.

 

[Timeline]

Your bus paint looks great!

 

[Mr P]

I got mine weighed at the local dump station and ask for a receipt of the weight. It's a legal document given out by a city official, and can be used if pulled over and the police have to legally accept it. If for whatever reason they don't and you go to court, anything that happens after that moment once the court realizes it's a legal document gets thrown out.

Well, a weight at one point in time is not necessarily indicative of a weight at another time. So, I suspect there are "holes" in the above theory.

 

[Kentucky Dreaming]

I got mine weighed at the local dump station and ask for a receipt of the weight. It's a legal document given out by a city official, and can be used if pulled over and the police have to legally accept it. If for whatever reason they don't and you go to court, anything that happens after that moment once the court realizes it's a legal document gets thrown out.

How long after the date of the receipt, and how different is the bus since then? You have some really strange interpretations of laws pertaining to motor vehicles.

 

[s2mikon]

That scale ticket is only valid at the time it was weighed. 10 miles later a LEO can make you re weigh again.

 

[nikitis]

Sure they could make you weight it again, but they likely won't give you a citation right away unless you are vastly off. It's about how you speak to them as well. If the ticket is recent they likely won't make you go re-weigh. Obviously don't be so belligerent towards them. Maybe say you added another 1000 lbs since then, (still be well under what they expect widely), they can see with seats removed etc being stripped, and a recent slip from the city why it would make sense to them. If the LEO is logical likely will go along with it.

Of course there are illogical LEO's and you can't really do anything with them but go to court. Just go get re-weighed and you'll still be under.

Personally, I've not made too much modifications other than the roof raise, but that only adds like 1000 lbs for the way I did mine with longer but less tall panels. Probably <2000 for people using full sized panels. I will get re-weighted again once the poly iso is installed in my rig as I've now added like 7x 10ftx15in panels and like 50lbs of hat channel extensions, and another 50 lbs of rub rails. It probably doesn't even add up to 1000 lbs for them to be honest, but I'll still weight it again to get a new configuration. I was at 13,500 empty before roof raise. I'm likely at 14,250 now roughly post roof raise.

Just weigh often after any major weight change, know where you are at weight wise, and then even if you have to prove it later in court, you'll be fine and get off. Those tickets do hold "weight" in court because they come from a city owned weigh station, but I bet most of the time with that weigh slip they won't even take you there. I've known instances where this has occurred, and they took the slip at face value so it does happen. If your slip is 6+ months old they may make you go re-weight if it looks like you added furniture etc to it.