I think about 90% of our projects have ended up with Plan B (or C or D). Maybe not really 90%, but in the midst of troubleshooting and coming up with new ideas on the fly, it sure seems like it is that high. At this point, when a project
LED Headlights: Part 1 - Planning & Wiring
I wish we had video or pictures of how poor the light output was from the old incandescent headlights. Unfortunately, we never took any before the wiring was cut to remove the headlights during the painting process (there were no disconnects - only short, crusty old wires). But, believe me,
Lighting Up the Sides of the Bus
While we don’t want to do much night driving, we do want to be as visible as possible when those occasions come up. Since we needed to redo the headlights and their wiring (coming soon), we decided to add LED marker lights and turn signals down the lengths of
Installing New LED Tail Lights
We never really loved the old tail lights that the previous owner had built. However, we hadn’t really thought about redoing the entire rear light setup. Last year, we had even simply switched out the old bulbs in all of those lights for LEDs. That definitely helped some. Unfortunately
She's Home! And So Shiny!
She’s home!!! Our sweet, old bus is finally sitting proudly back in our driveway after five and a half months at the spa (aka body and paint shop). She crossed into Mexico in the middle of June as a sad, peeling, corroded “hot mess”. She crossed back into the
Setting Up our Tow Vehicle (2014 Dodge Durango R/T) - Part Two: Electric and Lights
After installing the baseplate and tow bar setup on our Dodge Durango tow car, we had to figure out the tow lighting. We actually already have the umbilical that connects the wiring from the back of the bus to the front of the car. It was left with the bus
Setting Up our Tow Vehicle (2014 Dodge Durango) - Part One: Intro, Baseplate, & Brakes
While we are still waiting to pick up the bus from the painter, we have been keeping busy. We spent the summer building our solar rack, then we spent several weekends working on projects around the house in preparation for selling it, and this past weekend the time came to
Q&A Storytime
Wow! You guys had great questions last week. We sat down and tried to answer them all. Before we get started, here’s one thing you should know about us - we are both introverts, but if you get us talking about something that we are passionate about, we aren’
Oh, Hi There!
Oh, hi there, Friends!
We have now had the bus for nearly two years (Oct. 22, 2016 was the day we brought her home). Many of you have followed along with us for much of that time. But, we have also had many, many new friends join us in recent
Solar Rack: Part 5 - Fitting a Linear Actuator
When we first started dreaming up the plan to have two layers of solar panels with the lower layer sliding out, we knew that the biggest challenge would be automating the sliding mechanism. There is no way we want to be climbing up on top of the bus all the
Solar Rack: Part 4 - Production, Clamps and Brackets
We finally had our solar rack design planned out and one of four sections built as our prototype. Now, we just had to recreate the prototype three more times. We set up production for each piece and part - measuring, cutting, sanding, drilling, bolting together, welding, sanding again, painting.
All
Solar Rack: Part 3 - Building the Upper Layer
Last week, we got a good start building our solar rack by designing and building the prototype for the lower layer of solar panels (4 of our 8 Sunpower E20 435W panels). This week, we are moving on up to the upper layer of panels (the other 4 panels). Initially,
Solar Rack: Part 2 - Building the Lower Layer
It’s finally time to tackle building a rack to hold our solar panels. The goal is to get all eight of our Sunpower E20 435W panels on our roof, giving us nearly 3500W of solar. We realize that using panels of this size (81.5”x41.5”) is quite