Hi Fred, I was there also, bus less, but there, wish we had the time to Sync up , maybe at the next one.
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Hi Fred, I was there also, bus less, but there, wish we had the time to Sync up , maybe at the next one.
I hear ya regarding the work to be done, At least you got your Bus there, I was in a car HaHa. I still have a bunch of things to do before I am road worthy including Air Bags, Shocks, Valves etc etc. plus a DMV visit once they open up again to get my Vin inspection and plates. Hoping for the Maiden Voyage this summer.
Just now getting around to documenting the TV lift that I used in my bus.
I purchased it off of Amazon at the following link:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon....AC_SL1500_.jpg
I first used this with my 75 inch TV (hey go big or go home...).
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...reds/led75.jpg
However even I had to admit that it was too big in the bus, plus it weighted a lot and I was going to have to add a significant amount of bracing.
I had been wandering around Costco and noticed that there was a 55 inch OLED TV at a decent price and when you look at the screen portion it is only about 1/4 inch thick on top. The bottom is thicker as that's where electronics are. But hey it's a much lighter unit and you don't need two people to mount it or move it around.
Here's a side view of the TV.
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...eds/oled55.jpg
And a image of the screen:
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...ledpicture.jpg
The above picture doesn't display the clarity that I get from this LG OLED TV, it also has an AI mode for the video and audio that does real well upscaling the video's that you get over a cellular data connection.
The lift is totally silent and had no problem with the the 75 inch TV which as I mentioned took two guys to move.
It's current position is based on centering the 75 inch TV, so I will be moving it to the left and closer to the wall. I will also adjust the mount so it will have a travel position when dropped down to the floor to rest on padding. Also in the dropped position it doesn't obstruct the windows.
I will also be creating a drop down desk in front of it, so it will be totally hidden unless in the raised position.
Well done going Big, That looks awesome. I have to get a couple TV's for my bus in the next couple of months.
Here’s preliminary view of the plumbing for my recirculating shower, the bus originally came with a grey water shower dump valve.
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...terOrginal.jpg
The way it was originally designed is that the pumping connection at the top routes the grey water into the downward pipe, when the valve is closed the water backs up and then goes through the water trap and into my grey/black water tank.
In my case I replaced the manual valve with a sediment filter and electrically driven valve that is normally closed.
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...alveFilter.jpg
The rest of the system consists of:
1. Dual backflow check valve
2. Electrically driven auto closing three-way valve (normal shower when not activated)
3. Heat exchanger for hot water (kind of hidden in this picture)
4. RV style water pump
5. Dual filters
6. UV sterilizer
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...howerStuff.jpg
Plumbing is done, now onto the electrical portion. Initially I will just use a five gallon bucket as the recirculation tank that you see in the second picture. Will custom build something else later.
The valve above the initial sediment filter gives access to fresh water to prime the recirculating system.
I think a recirculating shower is a hard sell.
I take showers twice a year weather I need one or not.
Listen buddy my Pete is still so ruff I won't be seen in large venues yet. I am not knocking u actually quite interested in your experiences. Just saying.
Build some condensation generators. Ever see um?
https://Air2watersolutions.com
Model a45 or the a150 on a good day can make 40 gallons. On a bad day it would still pull enough to keep things fluid.
If I had one of these in my trailer id use it to support a washing machine when im out on the road for my work clothes. In typical fl humidity it would be very productive and bet enough to provide an adiquate supply. An almost endless supply of water would be a dream? Is this a fantasy?
I've seen very clever homade ones too. Out in the desert probably u would be reduced to the homemade ones that require no power and produce very little product. But that's an assumption.
Another Example of "I can't tell if Joe is joking or not".
Interesting, however not sure it is practical for an RV as even the smallest one would consume 17KWH of power a day which would require drastically upsizing the solar array.
I have 3KW of solar panels that are flat mounted (covering fairly much all of my 40ft roof) and peak power seems to be 10am to 2pm at 1800 watts which basically gets me actually topped off by the end of day given my other uses cycling a 8KWH battery pack storage.
I would like to see the links that you have for the home made ones. So far on my first trip to Quartzsite I haven't had the need to run the AC, which could be a water source.
U tube Fred.
Ok just starting my next major project which is finishing a dash upgrade that a previous, previous owner started on and quit as soon as they had enough gauges to make it drivable.
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...artingDash.jpg
As you can see in the above picture, only the gauges circled in orange are working and the idiot lights in green which are extremely hard to see.
This is something I have planned on doing for sometime and after experiencing the rats nest of wires that the PO left behind I was considering just making the jump to an electronic dash. Which will save a lot of time on my part.
After meeting Scott from the YouTube channel "This Old Bus" at the BCI rally; who is doing a similar conversion. I finally got kicked into high gear on this and now have a number of items on my bench to start testing/developing a replacement electronic dash solution for my bus.
I have a non-electronic 8V71TA engine in my bus, so the challenge is to get sensors wired up to some form of hub in the engine compartment that then sends out CANBUS messages to be displayed by the electronic dash.
The advantage of a CANBUS solution is that you will only need two wires for a signal data bus through out the vehicle.
If I had DDEC based engine. I would need is a protocol converter of some sort. But since I don't I will not expend any effort on that path.
Still going to maintain the current analog gauges that I now have as a backup.
My current wish list for instrumentation is:
1. Coolant temperature Left and Right banks TA8V71 engine
2. Turbine inlet temperature Left and Right. (Bus has the sensors, but with the half @$# instrument panel upgrade they were omitted.)
3. Engine oil temperature
4. Engine oil pressure
5. Transmission temperature
6. Turbo boost pressure
7. Low coolant level
8. Engine RPM
9. Speedometer
10. Brake system air pressure
11. Idiots lights and other indicators (including low coolant level)
12. Fuel pressure
In my research on the electronic dash replacement.
I stumbled across a YouTube video on a narrow boat where they take excess solar power after the batteries are fully charged and dump the energy into the hot water heater.
They were using a manually controlled variac to soak up the excess solar power and were basically setting a value of 500 watts.
You know those kind of idea's that percolate in your brain and wake up at 1AM?
This is one of them!!!
In my DIY hydronic system I make use a couple RV hot water heaters as my heat storage.
When I am on shore power they cycle between 180 and 120 degrees due to the large hysteria between the high and low points on the temperature switch.
The hotter the hydronic storage temperature the shorter the time period that the toe kick heaters need to be running to heat the bus.
So my idea is going to be to kill two birds with one stone by monitoring the tank temperature (which I am already doing for logging) and turn off the power input just before it reaches maximum temperature so that the temperature switch never triggers.
Plus I can also use it as solar power dump controller to maximize my solar power usage and more and likely have more hot water availability when off grid.
If the automation fails in the off mode, no big deal. If it fails on; then the normal built in switch takes over.
The electronic dash project is still soaking up a quite a bit of my time of my tinkering time.
My last post was on solar load dumps.
The heat wave that has been plaguing the western US has finally creped into the Seattle area. So it has gotten hot for us also.
Hey when I am not using the bus there is excess solar production that is going to waste.
My battery pack voltage range is 18 volts to 24 volts with my Tesla house batteries. So I threw into node-red a simple automation flow to:
1. Battery voltage greater than 23V, interior temperature > outside temperature + 10. Turn on the air conditioning.
2. Exterior temperature less then 70 degrees and interior temperature less then exterior turn off air conditioning.
3. Battery voltage less than 22.25 turn off air conditioning.
So with this automation in place I can escape/retreat to the bus/man cave to tinker or watch videos on the big screen OLED TV at any point in time and not walk into a heat soaked bus.
Ok the whole country heard that we had 110 degree weather here in the pacific northwest this last Monday; with the heat dome that was stuck over us.
Needless to say that it was a challenge with the bus also!!!
It turns out that when the cooling fan on my inverter comes on; it exhausts air out the bottom of the inverter, which then got sucked back in as it ross; so not much net cooling. Got to say I didn't think ahead about this when I installed the inverter..
So anyway the inverter tripped offline, resulting in no bloody air conditioning!!!
Had I been living in the bus, I would have been headed fast to somewhere I could plug it in to shore power and run the generator in the meantime.
It turns out there is a vent to the outside in the same area of the floor, so I created a duct to force the hot air outside.
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...terAirDuct.jpg
To our relief the temperature dropped by 30 degrees on the next day.
PS. My roommates mom who lives in Phoenix AZ, called and asked if she wanted to come for a visit and cool down...
Bus nut's with older buses talk a lot about repowering our buses, this is about repowering my HP Laptop LOL!!!
While I was on my recent trip; I found myself powering up the inverter to then charge up the laptop and other devices. Which I thought was kind of a silly power tax to pay. The biggest goal is avoiding a 80-100 watt overhead to power a 40-75 watt load.
In case you haven't noticed practically everything USB related is in a state of transition to the USB C standard and a lot of devices are switching to USB-C PD (power delivery).
While I could and probably will buy a new laptop at some point in time that accepts USB-C power input directly.
It turns out that are adapter cords out there for some older laptops. Two such cords that I have tested with my HP laptop are:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
An adapter cord works because most laptops accept 19V as their charge voltage.
With the above adapter cords, I recently tested this unit on the 12V input in my bus:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
This device is also 24V compatible, so I expect no problem running it off of my house battery bank.
Note not all USB-C chargers are created equal!!! There are two basic specifications out there:
- [li]PD 1.0 which supports 5V, 12V and 20V devices[/li]
[li]PD 2.0/3.0 which supports 5V, 9V, 14V and 20V devices.[/li]
However not all devices support all voltages!!! I make extensive use of the following for my home automation system.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
And it only supports up to 12V out, even when the input power is 24V. So be sure to read the fine print before you buy a USB-C PD power supply!!!
I recommend using a regulated DC to DC to converter when powering electronics. TRC is a source for quality products. https://www.trcelectronics.com/
This is probably a question for Joe and given the ancient not sure anyone can answer it.
I want to convert at least a couple of my bay doors from rubber hinges to pantograph where they swing out and up vertical to the ground.
Anyone heard of this being done or kits to do it?
Thanks
Ok this is my second shake down trip in the Covid era...
Doing the snowbird migration south from Seattle to warmer climate in AZ.
Cousin in Wyoming sent me notification of -14 in Wyoming a few days ago...
Anyway the Phoenix AZ area has been swamped with covid refugees from the east coast and Canada now that they can cross the border.
To the point that it is impossible to find a RV parking space. I only got a spot outside of Quartzsite in the Phoenix area because i stayed with them last year and they knew me and I was allowed to dry camp in a dusty lot next door to the actual RV park with no services.
Anyway there are a number of thing that I want address on my bus/motorhome for the long term.
Recently I have had problems with the diesel boiler for my DIY hydronic system which I will document more on my build thread and the only backup to shore power is the diesel generator which had major problems in my case. In this dry camping lot I hear lots of generators....
Anyway the typical response for this year is don't call anyone on the phone as they won't call you back. Show up at their counter and talk to them face to face even if you have drive 90 minutes...
So anyway there is so many clothes that I can throw atop of the bed when it hits 38 degrees during the night.
While my solar/Tesla Battery pack configuration it can do a lot of things, it can't heat the cabin in the dead of the night, only shore power in a RV park or the diesel boiler can do that!!!
OK how does this get back to my bad day?
Practically anybody that you talk to in the phoenix area this year has the following rejections:
1. Your rig is older then 10 years
2. You are living in a motorhome and I don't do that...
3. I might be able to get to you in a couple of months from now (like April).
4. You are nor an over the road trucker, etc...
Anyway I found a nice place northwest of Phoenix that is willing to do what ever you request (as long as it's not in the cabin) with the hour meter running. You pay for how every long it takes.
How bloody refreshing!!!
Anyway their work location is a bit difficult to access and with the promise that I could dry camp in their storage lot I had a bit of euphoria and managed to screw up and side swipe a fire hydrant!!!
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...ds/badday1.jpg
I do admit that I was a bit over the moon as someone is willing to work with all the different things that I need (so many rejections) and I am not as wary as I normally am and in my stupid defense I had re-adjusted the mirrors on that side the previous day...
Any way it turns out that there is two types of fire hydrants. Cold weather and not!!! So dry verse wet, run over a cold weather hydrant and you simply break it off at ground level as the valve that turns it on is below the frost line...
Warm weather and you get the fountain!!! Needless to say I didn't apply that much force, just re-clocked it so that the big outlet doesn't face the street.
https://www.crystalpoint.com/cpdownl...ds/badday2.jpg
So now I am in the market for a complete bay door and the following panel on my 1980 Prevost and hey one big awh $#!%!!
I have talked to Prevost and they don't have any parts in their system for my bus.
Doesn't anyone know of junk yard that has a bus being parted out around my vintage?
Thanks
Fred,
I have been following along on your progress. I'm very impressed with all that you have done. This is a project that very few would have taken on. As a trucker my son and I always buy older used equipment and rebuild as we go along making $ with them. It takes a certain kind of person to resurrect something from extinction. I would be interested if you could share your background since you seem to have a mechanical inclination for all types of repairs. I always find it interesting to see a little bit of the man behind the machine.
Sorry to hear that Fred, have you tried these guys?
https://ibp.parts/collections/parts-...market-prevost
Well thank you!!!
Your basic high school dropout (bored JD), did a bit of time in the army; four initially and then three more in a fit of insanity. I was in the artillery as a cannoneer and wandering across the firing point helped a guy make a generator run better and wound up in the fire direction center which is equivalent to driving the baggage cart at the airport and then working in the control tower. When I first arrived everything was manual with charts, protractors and graphical firing tables (special purpose slide rules). We then got a digital computer with a rotating memory drum, which got me into computers (repair and programming) and done related stuff ever since.
Kind of a focus self taught guy who beats his head against the wall until it comes out the other side or the problem is solved.
Not yet, I did review their web site and they don't list anything older than an XL bus. But hey it doesn't hurt to call.....
Prevost is reporting that they have no parts in their system that could be used to repair my bus.
Prevost in LA says bring the bus by and they have a local vendor that might be able to make the new skins. Which is not too far out of the way as I head home from AZ to Seattle.
Fred, there is a Bus Junkyard I remember reading about on one of these Forums, I think it was in Kentucky? I will see if I can find the place.
Maybe this one?
https://rvexteriorbodypanels.visoner...in/welcome.pl?
Fred,
Thanks for your bio. I think a lot of us here are the same way when it comes to banging our heads on the wall until we figure something out.
Give this place a call. https://evolutioncustomcoach.com/ ask for John,
I normally would not recommend this guy for repair work as I had a bad experience with him for a generator repair but he has been around a long time and does really nice conversion work. He is very resourceful and may be able to point you in the right direction for those bay doors. He has a small bone yard behind his shop that may have a surprise.
Mansfield Texas may be too far, but I just talked to David with Coach Specialists. He is familiar with the panels and has sourced or had them made in the past. If you would like to talk with him, his number is 817-842-1144. I have no experience with them but they were recommended by a local metal fabricator.
I broke down and posted on Facebook which something I avoid like the plague. (Funny how that statement doesn't seem to apply today...)
Anyway I heard back from:
Steve Kolb
IBP Industries
2055 Sprint Blvd
Apopka, Fl 32703
407-880-9700 Local
800-468-5287 Toll Free
407-880-2026 Fax
www.ibpindustries.com
https://ibp.parts
Turns out that they produced the skin panels under sub-contract to Prevost and had all the engineering drawings. Which they sent me for my bus which has one measurement that is different than is on my bus. I need to verify that that portion is behind the fender before ordering the part.
I was aware of them but didn't initially contact them as their website didn't list my bus.
Congrats Fred, It's nice when we get solutions.