Two weeks notice

Closer and closer each day, we are within two weeks now of truckin' on down the road!

we have done lots we now have a work bench on the out side of the bus, and Hardwood flooring as well as running water!

Out with the old, in with the new!
Ya man...
Our first night in the bus!!

Brick by brick

Power power! Yes we have power now with lights and outlets. Last week I took my first stab at home electric and did not get sapped, few! The power system is rigged for power coming from a city grid, YUCK! but not for long its wired so that putting in our solar system will be not that much of a nightmare.

Here is our diner table light that I got at a local hardware store. The lady their just about jumped into the rafters when I told her what we are doing with it.
Our range is all plumbed for the propane that is under the bus, and we are already cooking on it! the fridge is running, but I caught it an threw it back in!

The book shelf, it will soon have led lights under it that should look nice and they draw very few watts.

Our bed with our water tank under it, witch we will be plumbing here some time soon. The tank will have a tank heater and so will the lines, the benefit of us having the water system inside the bus will be so that we can keep it from freezing, an it will be easy to access the lines and pump inside the bus.


More pics to come.

- Zach

D'OH!

Zach pointed out to me that I forgot to add a picture of the fireplace. You can see it in the bottom corner of one of the pictures I posted, but the damn thing is so awesome that it deserves it's own picture.


WE HAVE TAGS! Zach and I drove into Bozeman today to register the bus and got its Montana license plates. Pretty exciting.

Zach has discovered a pile of scrap 2x4's that have that vintage barn look to them. We're using them in the bus and it's looking pretty cool. Also got a wood box built so we don't have to go outside every time we need to add to the fire. It looks really good and already has a handful of logs in it.

The way things are going, we'll only need a little more to get the bus in living condition. The plan is:

-Lay thin wood paneling on the ceiling. This would cover the millions of holes in the original sheet metal as well as screw holes from the shelves that were in it as an activity bus. And it would look freaking schweet.
-Run our wiring for electricity.
-Acquire propane hoses and a propane tank for the kitchen stove and fridge.
-Acquire water hoses, hot water heater, and put it all together.
-Build our bed.
-Insure it.

I think that was all ... that's some pretty basic stuff that (hopefully) won't take long. We've got two months until our lease is up here, which means that the days 'til we move into the bus are limited! Yeah! Aren't sure exactly where we'll be this summer, but we plan to continue our building and blogging!

Kelly and Zach

Progress

Yes, we are still alive. We've been getting flack about not posting, so here's a biggin for ya. (And I'm getting flack right now about "biggin" ... just so you Mainers know, it means "a big one" ... hahahaha). The pictures are in the order they were taken, so they're a little all over the place :)

Zach's incredible kitchen table

Our friend from Maine, Mike, came to visit and we made him
help us put the stove pipe through the roof

Partial framing

Stove and table installed

Kitchen appliances and bench seats (which we stripped down to the frame
and cut to the size we wanted)

Mmmm ... Fat Tire

Lovely custom kitchen with our salvaged RV appliances

Artsy shot :)

Bane of Zach's existence: leaky antifreeze pipe

MUD

MORE MUD

Zach hard at work

That frame we were talking about ...

He only keeps me around 'cause I'm funny

Bus art (airplane courtesy of Mike)

Tracing the sink

Tah-dah!

Homemade composting toilet (aka shit-in-a-bucket)

Already putting the fridge to good use

Chair frame cut in half

We never got a finished picture of our modified frame, but we'll take one and include it in our next posting. It's flush with the table and flows with the couch (which we also forgot to take a picture of). We're making a lot of progress, but still have a lot of work to do! Framing the closet, sewing room, and bedroom will come next.

Until next time,

Kelly, Zach, and Black Dog

Wires

This is what Zach did yesterday ...

Deconstruction and Reconstruction

We've already put in many an hour on our newly beloved bus-o-la. We had to rip out the seats and overhead storage bins, take out the heaters (which involved WAY more anti-freeze than we wanted to deal with), sweep, and rip up the plywood and linoleum. So with a floor of sheet metal, we cleaned the crap out of it and removed any leftover nails, screws, rubber matting, and grime. Fun. But THEN! Today we got our 100 feet of insulation (which is a three layer system of two sheets of "bubble wrap" and a layer of reflective material; commonly used in floors in houses) and our grade C mahogany plywood. We laid down the insulation and Gorilla taped the seams (hey, it works as a weather barrier, too! and what would a house bus be without duct tape?!). Then we cut our plywood with our circular saw and fit them into place (with only a little convincing). It looks GREAT and tomorrows project is to cut out a piece of plywood to fit in the last spot in the front and screw everything down. We now have an insulated floor!

Zach and a Harlow's Bus Sales mechanic ripping out stuff

Dirty

Pile of trash

Our bus was parked in the empty spot on the left

Our first truck stop ... aw

Our parking spot

Doesn't get much better than this!

Bitch work (ripping out the floor)

I need a beer ...

Will it ever be over with?

Insulatin'

Sunroof

First hardware installation

Make-shift workbench

Out of duct tape! Better get more ... LOTS more!

Poor man's caulking

Which way did he go?

Theme of the day

Almost ... there ...

TAH-DAH!

Tomorrow's project

More to come ...

Kelly and Zach


Next: framing!