Different Wisdom

Discussions about all things to do with buses, trucks, and the homes made within them.

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Lostranger
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Lostranger »

Jack, we burn a variety of hardwoods: oak, cherry, locust, dogwood, sourwood, sassafras and others. This part of NC is a hardwood rain forest. Tree growth is phenomenal. We live on ten acres that is about 1/3 wooded plus several long hedge rows. I've been storing wood from saplings and limbs I've trimmed for almost two years. The beauty of a small stove is that it burns what most consider scraps. I need to do a lot more trimming and also cut a few mature trees which are in the way. I have years of fuel for no more than the cost of saw fuel and my time.

The sealer is something in a caulk tube I found at the hardware store. I think it's called Asphalt and Roof sealer. Seems to work fine.

The mount will be easier to show than explain. It's mostly 2" channel. I'll build an ell shaped frame to cover the fuel tank. That's the large black box under the stove. Our couch will cover the rest of the tank. Once that frame is in place, I'll bolt two rectangles of channel to it and bolt the stove to the top of the rectangles. The stove may move six or eight inches toward the door in the final arrangement. I have a roof frame member directly over the ideal location for the stove, but a couple elbows in the pipe won't hurt.
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Dusty »

Lostranger wrote:The stove will still smoke some if I open the door before the box warms up, but it's not bad, and it's manageable
I found that flue temp was a determining factor for the fire to smoke or not when the door is opened . The hotter the flue , the better the draw.
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Dusty »

Lostranger wrote: I have a roof frame member directly over the ideal location for the stove, but a couple elbows in the pipe won't hurt.
Elbow add great character to the fire :) but they do gather the soot , so your flue cleaning brush will need to be suitable . Either that or be prepared to throw a small chook down the chimney occasionally :D
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Lostranger
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Lostranger »

Dusty wrote: be prepared to throw a small chook down the chimney occasionally :D
[/quote]
Dusty, I'm just proud that I know what a chook is. It's not a term that shows up in US English. I am tempted to stay with a straight flue and a shorter couch for the reason you mention.

Jim
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Lostranger
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Lostranger »

After two days of use, I pronounce the chimney a success. Draws great and looks good. Most importantly, with the stove wide open, I can put my hand on the flange of the thimble I built to pierce the roof, and it barely feels warm. I should have mentioned before that, after I put the purchased, insulated pipe inside the homemade thimble, I stuffed the remaining 1/4" gap with some insulation my friend Jason gave me. He called it a name I can't remember and said they use it when building forges. It appears to be some sort of fiberglass. I pulled small chunks off the batt and stuffed them between the two pipes with a thin lath.

Still not as warm in the bus as we'd like, but I remind myself that only a fraction of the surface area is insulated. I'll soon be researching sources for enough 12g aluminum sheet to reskin the window area, hopefully as soon as spring comes. Then I'll hit everything inside with spray foam.

What we have now is a HUGE improvement over the propane heaters.

Best to all,

Jim
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Dusty »

As an interum measure , get some bubble wrap and tape it over the glass, tape all the way around the edges. it will still let light in but is a good , tho ugly , insulator.
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Lostranger
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Lostranger »

Dusty wrote:get some bubble wrap and tape it over the glass

Great idea, Dusty. i'm on that this week.

Stove is doing great. I'm getting better at using it. Easily got four hour burn this morning while we were gone to church and lunch. Supposed to be 26 F. here tonight with wind. I have a bunch of seasoned locust and cherry laid in. We can handle it now.

Jim

P.S. I'm pretty sure we'll keep the straight pipe and build a shorter couch. I already have several sections of chimney cleaning rod. Just discovered that McMaster Carr sells round chimney brushes in both sizes I need. With a straight pipe, I can go up the ladder, remove the rain cap, then ream both sizes of pipe from above.

P.P.S. Jack, the sealer is Ace brand, Black Top and Roof.
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Stealth Camper »

I have been using this stuff for a few years in the trailer. The windows and vent hood over the stove are very leaky. This closes enough of the leaks so the heater can make it liveable. Was down to 3 degrees F last night here in central Oklahoma.

http://www.walmart.com/search/search-ng ... _tt=window
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Lostranger »

Okay, okay. I'm guilty of not updating in forever, and I apologize. Still not much new on the bus, but I owe it to everyone who has inspired me with their work to at least say something and post a few photos.

Took from October to April to get four new 8D AGM batteries. Here are the six group 27s before I removed them:

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Once they were out I was looking at bare floor and wall space. With a hard winter still firmly in mind, I took care of a bit of insulation work before installing the new batteries:

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Some may recall that I'm furring with strips of 5/4 x 6 treated decking. The full inch thickness matches perfectly to an inch of polyiso board insulation. The "back" wall of the battery compartment is the original bulkhead where steps led up to the rear seating area over the transmission and final drive. I used 1-1/2" polyiso on the bulkhead wall. Floor and outside wall of bus got 1". On the floor of the utility area (batteries, fresh tank, waste tank), I will not use additional flooring. Just furring and insulation. No need for floor here, and it would only reduce the height of my tanks. Furring in this area will be on 16" centers. That temporary support wall of 2x4 lumber will be replaced with two steel units welded from 1" square tubing. One between batteries and fresh, the other between fresh and waste.

On the subject of final drive, our bus has an exceptionally small ring and pinion in order to facilitate the "low floor" concept. To make the final gearing, the rear hubs have reduction gears.

Here are the new batteries in place:

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For some reason, I don't have a photo of the $200 worth of new 2/0 copper cable I bought for the installation. I'll try to pull the floor sometime soon and take that shot. I discovered recently that our local Kubota tractor dealer has tools and supplies to make battery cables. Their copper cable is all fine strand, and their crimp-on ends are highest quality. I know the folks well, and they let me make up what I want and then joked about not charging me labor. The joke is that they don't charge for labor even when they make cables, but I do a neater job of trimming insulation and lining up ends than they do. Their 2/0 cable is $8.25/foot, and that does not seem unreasonable in today's market.

We've been using the new battery bank for two months, and it is more than satisfactory. I realized a couple weeks ago that I do not nervously check the volt meter several times a day the way I did with the old battery pack. We're not yet running even a small AC or refrigerator, but we do anything else we want and never worry. Our four, 255w Samsung panels are plenty this time of year, in spite of the fact that our bus is in shade for at least half the day.

I've also been working on getting the generator mounted in the old air handler space above the engine. I picked it up with a borrowed tractor about three weeks ago and broke the old exhaust manifold. Since I wanted to refurb it before installation, I took it down a bit further and cleaned it up for paint. Here it is in original livery:

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The photo above shows the high performance coil I installed last year. It's yellow. At the same time, I upgraded to a type of electronic ignition that did not require pulling the flywheel. It still uses points, but only to trigger the electronic unit. The two upgrades to the ignition made it start like a dream, and it ran so much better that I had to adjust the governor a good bit to get it down to 120 volts.

Here is the generator in it's new Detroit Diesel garb:

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In this upgrade, I replaced the original air breather and crankcase breather. Both involved some modification. The crankcase breather took several trips to the plumbing supply store before I got the right combination. It looks simple here, but you don't see the hours it took me to get to this point. The proper combination proved to be 1/4" black iron pipe fittings with the hex end of a 3/8 x 1/4 bushing as a nut inside the cover:

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The breather was off the shelf at one of the big auto parts chains.

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The main breather fit required a different approach. It was made for a 2bbl auto carburetor and was much too large at the throat. I cut a circle from 3/8" aluminum plate with a hole saw:

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Turned it to OD on my Shopsmith with wood turning chisels:

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Then cut out the center with a smaller hole saw:

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The resulting bushing worked well:

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The breather stud was off center just enough to secure my new breather after I drilled an additional hole in the support:

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I have the bent pipes to make the new exhaust manifold — that's right, I've done everything EXCEPT what I started to do — and I hope to get that done tomorrow. Then I can install the genny into the bus.

One of the reasons I've not gotten much done on the bus is that we decided over the winter to radically expand our organic market garden. This little jewel has proven invaluable as well as inexpensive:

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Here's a shot or two of the 300 tomato plants which are on the verge of paying their own way:

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We have another 100 tomato plants ready to set, and tomatoes are only part of the organic fruits and veggies we're growing. Here's the new roadside stand I'm building so we can find all that growing stuff new homes:

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I've also done a fair amount of instrument building and performing this year. All told, I've just not had much time to work on the bus. Hope to do better soon.

In the meanwhile, all of you be well and do good work.

All the best from our little corner of North Carolina

Jim
Last edited by Lostranger on Mon Jun 16, 2014 8:35 pm, edited 2 times in total.
ol trunt
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by ol trunt »

Hey Jim, thanks for the newsy update. It looks like your "garden"is big enough to qualify as a farm and I'm sure your neighbors will pick the shelves clean once you open your road side stand!

I've said before that if I were to convert a real bus it would be one like yours. One of the features I like about it is its low stance--and now I know how they did it. I'll bet those reduction gears are a mechanical sight to behold. I recall that as a kid I discovered that my V W bus had similar gears at the wheels but I don't know if they were just to lift for road clearance or if they also changed the ratio.

Anyway, good to hear from you. Jack
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Lostranger
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Lostranger »

Jack, the Split Window VW busses had to have additional gearing just to pull themselves around with only 36 hp. The reduction gears did, of course, also increase ground clearance. Volks used that setup through 1967. The '68 models had swing axle rear suspension without reduction gears, and beginning in '69, they used true IRS with two joints on each axle. The outboard reduction gears never reappeared.

The reduction gears in my bus hubs are planetary, and I think their use was part of the engineering genius of this series. Gillig uses them in about everything these days. The more I live with my low floor, the more I love it.

Sorry you didn't get to take your bus to Yosemite, but I'll bet you'll find plenty of future opportunity. You should drive it to NC this fall. As you know, plenty to see in the Appalachian South. Don't come during October, however, because we're planning to spend most of that month on the road playing music and vacationing on Ocracoke.

As always, I have big plans for doing stuff to the bus. Hopefully, I'll have more to show in the near future. Might even get the generator mounted this week.

Jim
Last edited by Lostranger on Tue Jun 17, 2014 2:11 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Lostranger »

One more thing about VW busses with outboard reduction gears. In those models only, the ring gear was on the opposite side of the pinion inside the transaxle. That's because the reduction gears caused reversed wheel rotation. Since VW designed their transaxle to be able to reverse the ring gear, it makes a fairly easy job of using rear engine VW transaxles in mid engine cars. Just take it apart and mount the ring gear on the other side of the pinion. American car makers would have designed an entirely different transaxle. The old Germans were too smart for that.
Last edited by Lostranger on Tue Jun 17, 2014 2:12 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Stealth Camper »

Great looking everything....

How about a little write up on the hoophouse - looks like PVC pipe? Do you use T's on the horizontal tubing to stick the hoops in? How about clips to hold the plastic in place?? Pictures would be nice, too.

That's the kind of garden I am gonna try to make - huge! ....good luck with the veggie stand!!
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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Lostranger »

Hey Stealth,

The hoop house has been a process. This version is full joints of 1" PVC tubing. Each end sits on the exposed end of a 30" length of 1/2" rebar driven 20" into the ground. The house is 12' x 20', and the hoops are on 4' centers. I'll see if I can provide some photos.

The first version used 3/4" PVC and two rows of purlins glued in with cross joints:

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I found the design on a youtube channel called Monkeysee. DON'T BUILD ONE! We were out of town for five days in early March. While we were gone, this part of the world got an ice storm. The glued-in purlins provided pockets to hold ice and water. Not a good system. Ice piled up on one end of the house, and this is what we found when we got home:

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(If you're interested, you can barely see the front of our bus near the center of this photo. It's way up the hill, about 600 feet from the hoop house.)

Of course, the plastic was still on when we found the damage, but I must not have photographed that. Several of the glued purlin joints broke loose, and a couple punctured that expensive sheet of new greenhouse plastic.

I was desperate for a place to start seedlings, so I dragged the 3/4" frame aside and bought a bundle of 1" schedule 40 in 20' lengths. I left the rebar stakes in the ground, leveled the end hoops side to side, then sighted along the outside to get the middle hoops lined up with the ends.

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On this house, I secured the ends of the PVC pipes to 2"x8"x20' pressure treated boards with two hole, 1" pipe straps. (The end of the pipe with the coupling bell required 1-1/2" straps.) That gave me a place to secure the lower edges of the plastic. Working on the outside, we rolled about 16" of plastic in 1x2 strips, and then screwed the strips to the 2x8s.

I built the end walls from 2x4 treated lumber after the hoops were up. I drilled 3/4" holes spaced 12' apart in a 2x4 slightly longer than 12', and laid it over the pairs of end stakes before adding the hoops. Then I built the end wall frames between those 2x4s and the arc of the hoop.

I used a single ridge-top purlin and secured it to the hoops with crossed zip ties, but I can't find a photo.

I'm not happy with using treated furring strips to secure the plastic to the end walls, but it was quick. When this plastic has to be replaced, we'll buy wiggle wire channel from some place like Farmtek.

I bought a roll of greenhouse repair tape from Lee Valley Tools. That took care of the holes made when the first frame collapsed. Built my benches from 2x4 lumber and stapled 2x4 welded wire fencing to the tops. I made the benches 40" wide since I'm using standard 10" x 20" nursery flats. That allows two flats to sit end to end across the bench:

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The hoop house has been a busy place this spring, and it's likely to stay that way year round. We have lots more seedlings started, and in late July, we'll start brassicas for fall crops.

With all that said, the PVC frame is only a stopgap. I'm told that PVC reacts with polyethylene, and that the plastic sheet will not last its full four years because of that. After I built this house, I learned that Johnny's Selected Seeds — johnnyseeds.com — sells a simple tube bender for turning 1-3/8" steel pipe (chain link top rail) into greenhouse hoops. Before cold weather, we plan to build a 100' "high tunnel" to get an even earlier start on next year's crops. Johnny's site links some videos and an online manual. When the plastic on our current house has to be replaced, I will also replace the hoops with steel.

I do not plan to do the ends of my long high tunnel in the style shown in the Johnny's Seeds manual. I like the wooden framed end walls I'm using now, but I will hold the tunnel plastic down with crisscrossed ropes so that the sides can be raised for ventilation.

Hope this is some help. Having a small greenhouse has been just as much fun and utility as I always thought it would be. I built this house on a part of the property which has access to mains electricity. Next winter, the small house will be wired for heat mats, and it will have automatic mist watering to use after frost danger.

Jim

P.S. Here's one more shot of our heirloom tomatoes and Samantha, our summer intern, hard at work. We're lucky to have her. She's living in our house truck. This shot is more than 2 weeks old, and the tomatoes are much further along. Both beds are now trellised.

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Re: Different Wisdom

Post by Stealth Camper »

Nice!! Thanks for that. I always like to see what people are doing with buses and gardens! I have seen small hoops - 2 or 3 feet tall - made with polyethylene pipe (black plastic) and it is said to not hurt the poly sheet like PVC does. I think it would be too flexible for a taller house.

My tomato is 'stuck' - I think the potting soil I used is not 'working'. Am SO ready to get into a bigger garden actually at ground level....

Intern?? For the market garden business? How does that work? Someone from an ag school nearby? (We have a great ag college close to us that might be a good source for 'trained' help...)


I just found this place referenced in a magazine SWMBO** has and started looking around the site this evening. Kind of interesting - the garden part I think I kind of understand, but the marketing part is kind of new to us.

www.growingformarket.com



**SWMBO - just thought while writing...may not have used this before. Normally use it in another life - She Who Must Be Obeyed - my wife.
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