MCI Bus Conversion RV Motorhome

Bus Conversion Page 7

We Go Solar

We are really seeing some progress in our bus conversion project. This winter we spent some time visiting with John from Palmer Energy Systems on his property in Lake City, Florida and took advantage of having a place to work and John’s expertise to get a lot done.

John Palmer is my “go to” guy when it comes to RV electrical systems. He’s forgotten more about the subject than most us will ever hope to know. John was not happy with the original 12 volt wiring I had done for the house lights, water pump, etc. So under his tutelage I completely rewired the house 12 volt system, using shielded 12 gauge stranded wire. I also relocated the 12 volt circuit breaker box to the front bay where our house batteries and inverter are installed

We had been debating adding a couple of solar panels to help power our battery bank while we are dry camping, and while in Lake City John Palmer installed two 100 watt panels from AM Solar, along with an HPV-22 solar charge controller. While this will not eliminate the need to run our generator when we are boondocking, it will reduce the amount of time we need to do so. It’s nice on sunny days to look at the charge controller and see that we are quietly making electricity from the sun! Of course, solar is predicated on the weather, but under optimal conditions, our two panels should reduce our generator usage about 25 percent.

Our Heart Freedom 458 inverter has never worked right, using too much power while not giving our battery bank a full charge. While we were in Lake City John replaced several Hearts for folks who were having the same problems, installing the new Magnum Energy 2000 watt inverters in their place. We got in line and had John swap out our old inverter for a Magnum Energy as well, and the difference is like night and day! Our batteries charge up faster, charge completely, and maintain their charge much longer when dry camping.

My buddy and fellow bus nut Terry Simpson came up with an omni-directional Wineguard TV antenna, so while John was up on the roof installing the solar panels, he mounted the antenna at the same time. We have a Dish 500 satellite TV system, but there are times when we want to be able to watch the local news wherever we are staying.

One simple afternoon project has really made life easier, and I wish I had done this very early on in our conversion project. I added two weatherproof outdoor-style 120 volt electrical receptacles in the lower bays of the bus, one on the curb side in the front bay and another on the driver’s side in the rear bay, where our holding tanks and campground hookup connections are located The receptacles are wired into our inverter circuit, so now we can run power tools or whatever other electrical equipment we need to simply by opening a bay door and plugging in. What a convenience, compared to having to run a heavy-duty extension cord in through the door or an open window!

One very big improvement was putting most of the final covering on our ceiling. Early on in the conversion process we put three layers of different kinds of insulation in the ceiling. In Lake City we covered the bedroom ceiling with ¼ inch hardwood plywood in preparation for installing the finished ceiling. What a job it was bending that plywood to fit the curve of the bus ceiling and holding it in place long enough to secure it to the bus ribs with self-drilling screws! Several friends helped out, and by the time we were finished we were all exhausted! The next step was to add one more layer of ¼ inch extruded foam insulation to form a barrier to insulate the screw heads used in the plywood from transferring cold and condensation inside. Now it was time for the final ceiling treatments.

In the bedroom we used strips of tongue and groove knotty pine, which we finished with three coats of Olympic clear satin polyurethane sealer, which gave the wood a warm, rich look that we just love. In the living room and kitchen area we used the same final barrier foam insulation layer, and then tongue and groove knotty pine strips on both sides, starting just above the windows and following the curve of the roof up 25 inches on either side. We will cover the rest of the ceiling with padded white vinyl, except for a boxed in channel down the centerline of the bus that measures eight inches wide. This wooden channel serves as a wiring chase and holds all of our 12 volt wiring, as well as coaxial cable to the bedroom television and the cable for our backup monitor. It also serves as a base for mounting our ceiling lights. This same channel will be incorporated into the bedroom ceiling.

The walls in the bedroom were covered below the windows with a nice village birch wainscot paneling. We used the same paneling for the areas above the wainscoting that we used in the hallway and bathroom. The result is very pleasing to our eyes. We will use the same wainscoting in the front of the bus for the living room/kitchen area.

The next big project was to build cabinets across the back of the bus over the bed. This was one that intimidated us going in, but we are very pleased with the final results. I have to give credit for the finished work to Miss Terry, whom everybody knows is the beauty and the brains in our household. She completely built the cabinets while I stayed in the background encouraging her on. She used ¾ inch oak hardwood plywood and built shirt closets on both sides of the bed that measure 13 inches wide (inside dimension) by 48 inches deep.

The bottom of the closets have nightstands on either side with a single deep drawer 12 inches wide by 34 inches front to back, and a small cubbyhole below. Spanning the back of the bus between the shirt closets is a five foot span containing a pair of double door cupboards top and bottom, with an open bookshelf below and a small storage compartment below that. All of this extra storage is really going to be a big plus for us as fulltimers. Unlike the house we left behind, our home on wheels is limited in places to stow everything we carry with us.

Terry faced the plywood with 1x2 inch oak boards, giving the cabinets a nice professional look. The end result is as nice as anything I have seen in a production motorhome, and much sturdier. She built the cabinet doors out of the same oak plywood, using oak trim to face the door edges. We are so pleased with the results in the bedroom that Terry has decided her next project will be to build in new custom kitchen cabinets. We hope to have those done by our next update.

As you can see, it has been a busy time for us, but we continue to enjoy our project, and every task we complete brings our home on wheels closer to completion. It is very rewarding to see all of the planning and dreaming we have done throughout the course of the bus conversion coming together even better than we had hoped for.

Our traveling schedule and other writing and speaking projects have kept us so busy that it has been a long time since I have updated our readers on our progress on the bus conversion project. We have accomplished a lot since the last update. In fact, the bus is about 90% finished! Our friend John Palmer at Palmer Energy Systems in Lake City, Florida was kind enough to allow us to spend several months working on the bus at his place the last two winters, giving us the opportunity to complete some major projects.

With the bedroom cabinets finished, the next step was to take on the kitchen. We were not impressed with most of the prefab cabinets we saw at places like Home Depot and Lowes and decided to custom build our own. We tore out the temporary plywood kitchen cabinets we had built as a stopgap measure, and Terry used ¾ inch oak plywood to build new cabinets that suit her desires for a functional kitchen where she can practice her culinary arts.

Off the shelf oak molding was used on the cabinet edges, and the counter top is formica, and she edged the counter with an oak lip that really sets it off. Wanting to get the very most out of the space available, Terry made the cabinets extra deep at 28 inches. The shelves are all mounted on heavy duty rollers and pull out for easy access. The kitchen cabinets include extra deep drawers and a pull out pantry. The finished product is beautiful, functional, and gets a lot of rave reviews from everybody who sees them.

On the other side of our stove, Terry built an oak cabinet that holds our water heater, and microwave oven. Soon after we moved into the bus we acquired an Olympian Wave 6 catalytic heater, and it worked so well that from that day onward we never used our noisy, fuel wasting Suburban RV furnace. While building the new kitchen, we pulled the furnace out, and in its place Terry now has a deep drawer for pots and pans.

Anyone who knows us and knows anything about our bus project already knows that Miss Terry is the handyman in the family. She takes on the toughest job and astounds everyone with the results. Keep in mind that we have converted the bus while we live and travel in it fulltime. Now consider that when Terry built the cabinets we were dry camping with no electricity, using only our inverter and battery bank to power the saws and tools she used!

With that project out of the way, we next took on the ceiling. We have included several layers of insulation in the ceiling, and covered that with ¼ inch oak plywood. Bending the plywood and screwing it in place took several people and was a lot of hard work, but we rounded up some volunteers and got the job done in a couple of hours.

We put down a layer of extruded Styrofoam fanfold insulation over the plywood, so that we have no screws that touch the outside frame of the bus coming through to the inside, thus preventing condensation and cold or heat transfer, then added another layer of the oak plywood for even more insulation and strength. Next we nailed pine tongue and groove strips up about a third of the way on both sides.

We glued upholsterer’s padding over the plywood in the two center sections, and then stretched white vinyl over both sections the length of the kitchen/living room. We left the wood center channel, which contains our 12 volt wiring chase and ceiling lights, natural for the time being. With the ceiling finished in the kitchen and living room, we enclosed the front cab ceiling in insulation and plywood, covered it with the same padding and foam, and Terry built a handsome oak shelf over the top of the windshield, setting it off with pre-made oak ladder rail molding. We are very pleased with the results, and now the bus has a finished look we enjoy very much.

Terry finished off the lower half of the hallway and bedroom walls with wainscot bead board paneling, and trimmed it with oak molding. She also built a sturdy oak shelf in the bathroom to hold our toiletries. She used the same oak ladder rail molding she did with the shelf over the windshield to finish it off and hold everything in place while traveling.

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