Please be my best friend.

hammyt wrote:

How much you pay for it?

Way less than I feel I should have, which is why I own it.  Got a guess?

Loving that giant chrome front bumper.  I worked for a company that provided the steel for those back in the day...  Completely off track story, but steel for chrome bumpers (and chrome steel wheels) had to be flat polished prior to stamping and chrome plating to get the proper surface quality.  A little company down in Flat Rock MI would do that job.  Their head technical guy and I worked together for a while at that steel company, and one fine April day he invited me to their corporate seats for Tigers opening day.  Turns out that this goofy little company that flat polished steel blanks for car bumpers had season tickets RIGHT BEHIND THE TIGER DUGOUT.  We sat between Dennis Archer, the mayor of Detroit at the time, and Van Earl Wright, who was the lead sports guy for the NBC affiliate in town.  That's how manufacturers rolled in Detroit, at least prior to the recession...

So what I'm hearing is you plan to cut a ramp through the back so you can park your Fit inside it while driving around in the bus... 

itsnotmeitsyou wrote:

So what I'm hearing is you plan to cut a ramp through the back so you can park your Fit inside it while driving around in the bus... 

Bingo!  Wait, no.  I need to see if the Fit will fit on the wheelchair lift.

sohlman wrote:

Lol what are your plans for it? Camper, party bus, Uber, etc
so many possibilities!

Camper, relatively simple for now.  The miles are up there, it's got the 7.3 but I know it won't last forever so I don't want to sink too much into it.  Plans for each side, starting from the front:
Passenger - Leave 2 seats for wife and/or kids, dinette, small simple kitchen, gear garage where the rear doors are to house bikes, paddleboards, kayaks, etc.
Driver - Leave 2 seats, gaucho bed for wife and I, triple decker bunk beds for kids and dogs, tiny little commode in the back.

If I get lucky and/or creative with it I think I can make this thing damn cheap and pretty comfy.

Biggest current headache is a battery drain, that's priority number 1.  Hoping to get a manual out of Goshen before they shut their doors at years end.

hyperboarder wrote:

Way less than I feel I should have, which is why I own it.  Got a guess?

A grand?  Seriously, I have no idea.

I mean provided you get a couple years out of her without any major repairs that's a solid deal.  Interested to see the progress throughout the project. 

iamchris wrote:

Jesus. I was going to guess $4k and I thought that was pretty low.

You find that puppy on SlickDeals?

Ha. No.

Local auction site gets a lot of the retired fleet vehicles, sometimes good deals, others not so much.  There was a similar one 6 weeks back, 1.5 ton chassis, a bit shorter, less miles but worse condition, went for 3x what I paid.  I honestly didn't expect to win, but here we are.

Dynamat would cost more than the bus .  Got any recommendations for cheap and effective bike retention inside?  Everything from my road bike to my fattie.

Something like this will work. I used them in my truck. Mount it to a length of 2x2, them bolt the board to the bed or a piece of plywood. I used t-nuts on the plywood, so that I could remove it quickly.

https://www.amazon.com/RockyMounts-013- … A491462011

SaabaruAero wrote:

Something like this will work. I used them in my truck. Mount it to a length of 2x2, them bolt the board to the bed or a piece of plywood. I used t-nuts on the plywood, so that I could remove it quickly.

https://www.amazon.com/RockyMounts-013- … A491462011

Definitely bolt it down. My very first new vehicle was a small truck. I used these as described in the bed, but DIDN'T bolt them in place. On some quicker than typical stops, and usually with two bikes bolted in place, the 2x4 would tip forward and the bikes would move commensurately- bar ends into the back window. Never did any shattering, luckily, but that certainly would have overshadowed my unwillingness to put holes in my precious.

hyperboarder wrote:

Shitty phone pic of the layout my wife made.  Squares represent 6".



I think her couch (which will fold out to our bed) is about 2.5' too wide, cutting that down means we can fit twin bunk beds and a queen mattress for us.  Simplified table setup too, 2 of the existing seat setups with a pop up table between them.  Otherwise I think it's pretty close to a final plan.

Queen beds are 60"x80". Based on that drawing, you only have about 66" from the drivers side to the chairs / table on the left of the image. Unless I counted wrong, the current rendering shows a 90" wide couch; you can only cut 10" in width (15" if you go with a full, but at 75" are still too long to rotate 90 degrees unless you trim those cabinets waaaay down; full XL, which you'll need for your lankiness, is 54" x 80" so that isn't any better than a queen).