1935 Chevy school bus

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Jerry Campbell
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by Jerry Campbell »

That comforter should work great and that access door, beautiful, I'm glad you don't live next door to me, you would make everything I do look bad. :-)
ol trunt
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by ol trunt »

Ha. I'll bet a lot of my neighbors wished I didn't live near them what with all the pounding and grinding I do in my garage.
Thanks all for the compliments. Jack
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by Stealth Camper »

Brilliant.
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stuartcnz
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by stuartcnz »

looking forward to a report on the liners performance.
ol trunt
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by ol trunt »

Hello All. We're back from a week in Yosemite--wish I could stay all summer. There were more campers than I'd expected this early in the season. The camp ground was full nearly every day despite the 60 degree daytime temps and the low 40's nights. I don't know how long it will last, but the Merced river was running fast and full and beautiful with more water than I have seen in 8 or 10 years. Another real treat was that the water falls were spectacular, especially so with the snow still at their tops.

I spent the daylight hours riding my bike while wifey broke out her water colors and created several paintings which she will no doubt transform into greeting cards to augment those she sells at the art center in Yosemite. Evenings were spent in the quiet of the bus reading with the exception of one evening when we watched "Out Of Africa" for the umteenth time. If you missed this movie, pick up a copy on ebay. It is a great story and the photography is excellent.

My wife is afraid to leave the heat on while we sleep (something to do with her childhood in China I needn't go into) so in an effort to keep from freezing to death in the bus with its canvas and plastic top, I devised a liner for the pop up.This was the first try with the down comforter hitched to the pop up. It worked quite well. With only our respiration to heat the bus, thanks to the comforter, the bus remained 10 or 12 degrees warmer than outdoors. On another trip without the comforter when it was 30 degrees outside, it was only 31 degrees inside and we were cold.

Of course no camping trip is complete without a little drama. I had been fooling with the instant hot water heater and over heated the PVC lines which required their replacement. Once I had that fixed I thought I'd try out the shower and run the forced air electric heater in the bathroom. All that worked just fine with the genny supplying the power for the heater. After my trial shower and with the genny still supplying the power, I thought it would be fun to see if it would also power the battery charger--bad move! It says right in the owners manual not to over tax the generator or bad stuff would happen. It did. This was Wednesday before the trip. None of the local suppliers had a replacement Yamaha ef3000iseb generator in stock and the closest one was a 400 mile round trip--which couldn't happen until Friday because the seller was at a trade show until late that day. I had hoped that the generator would be a plug and play exchange, but once I got going I discovered I'd have to change out a bunch of connectors. I spent Saturday and Sunday mickey mousing the thing into the bus for a Monday departure.

I had a plan B and a good thing because on the last day, the new generator refused to start. It didn't want to play nice with with the electric choke from the old genny. The main entry door requires power from the generator start battery to operate and I'd run the genny battery low trying to start it. My plan B consisted of tacking the genny from my tent trailer on the trailer hitch/bike rack on the bus. I used this genny like shore power to charge the battery--worked like a charm. While it would be possible to drive the bus with the door open, (which is what would happen with a dead battery) we ran into torrential rain on the way home bad enough to cause freeway closure shortly after we passed through and we would have been soaked. As an aside, I'd never used the windshield wipers prior to this trip, but they worked just fine and the bus body didn't leak a drop!

I spent a long day today cleaning all the highway goop off the bus--but I'm ready for the next trip! Jack

It's not a report without a couple pics.

Image.

The plan B genny is tucked in between the the bike and the bus bumper.
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We always get to Yosemite after the Dogwood trees have blumed--not this time!
Image[b/]
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stuartcnz
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by stuartcnz »

Sounds like your liner is working well.
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by tango »

Hey Jack --- sounds like you had a great outing and thanks for sharing. And the "drama" is kinda like when stuff goes south at a wedding. Just makes it all the more memorable.
ol trunt
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by ol trunt »

Hello All. I solved the problem of the genny not starting when it is cold out. It seems there was an update on the idle speed controller and as soon as I switched that out all is well. I had planned to repair the old genny by replacing the computer, but when I began studying the parts lists I discovered that for $50 more I could update all the electronics to present standards. That sure beats just replacing a hard to get, back ordered for two months and very expensive original style computer.

In an effort to keep the computer from the new genny happy, I installed a cooling fan (like the ones used in a computer) to help reduce the heat load. I know that part of the heat load is from the frig which occupies the same under counter space as the genny electronics. Further, the frig wakes me up with it's incessant on and off cycles. I've just completed adding a thermocouple control which will turn a frig vent fan on when the under counter temps go above 75?? degrees. I'll have to play with this. Hopefully, all the fans will be beneficial. Jack

Scary business cutting a hole in the side of the bus!
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Frig vent installed.
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Frig vent operating.
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by Dusty »

Very tidy :)
58 Bedford House
ol trunt
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by ol trunt »

Hello All. Thanks for fixing my pass word Stuart!

Doctor science here to report on a brief study of the effect of a couple of computer fans on the operation of the dorm frig in Honeysuckle Rose. Since I couldn't play on the computer today (thank you Windows 10), I decided to monitor the activity of the cooling fans I put in the bus to cool frig cabinet. I had the bus parked in the garage where the temp held at a constant 73 degrees F. I set the frig at 39 degrees F and monitored the temp with a max min thermometer (temp held steady). There are two fans in the system. One runs whenever the frig is plugged in and blows on the frig compressor. The second pushes air out the vent in the side of the bus and operates only when the cabinet temp reaches 73 degrees F. This is what I learned after taking 44 temp readings of on/of with fans and on/off without fans as well as monitoring the temp of the cabinet:

With fans, the frig runs for 5 minutes and then shuts off for 4 minutes while the cabinet temp remains at 73 degrees F. This held true for several hours until I got board and shut the fans off.

Initially, without the fans, the measurements remained the same. After about 1/2 hour, however, the compressor run time began to climb culminating in an 8 minute run time still with the 4 minute off time after two hours. During this period the cabinet temp climbed to 90 degrees F.

It took 48 minutes of combined fan usage to reduce the cabinet temp to 73 degrees F again and to re-establish the 5 min on/4 min off cycle for the frig,

I intentionally set the system up so I could operate the frig with or without fans depending on whether or not I wanted to take advantage of the heat produced by the frig to aid in heating the bus--looks like it'll work :thumbup: . Jack
ol trunt
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by ol trunt »

Oh boy! I've got a camping trip set up for June 13-?? -- what ever it takes! We are going to attempt to follow the old Ridge route in So Ca from Castaic (just north of LA and the start of the famous, at least locally, Grape vine), to Oak Flat camp ground in the Angles National Forrest. It has been 30 years since I visited Oak Flat, but from what I can gather, it hasn't changed much from it's rather primitive self over the years. Hopefully, the fact that it is a first come, first serve campground, won't end up in us getting skunked when we arrive and having to move on!

Here's the best part. We will be traveling in Honeysuckle Rose's Toad, Clarence, and Clarence will be towing his motorcycle tent trailer. We've only camped twice with Clarence and only locally. This trip should be a good test of Clarence's moxy as it includes a couple of 6% grades from sea level to about 4200 ft. I can hardly wait! Crazy is as crazy does! Jack
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by tango »

Hey Jack --- sounds like a great trip lined up. I much prefer the old and out of the way places myself. And where did you find that cool exhaust vent. That is exactly what I have been looking for with no luck so far.
ol trunt
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by ol trunt »

Hey Tango. The vent is a clothes dryer vent I found both at Lowe's and Home depot for about $4. I did a little grinding to get the vent to follow the contours of the bus and then took it apart and painted it with Dupli-color engine paint from Pep Boys (DE 1615 Aluminum) which seems to hold up well and doesn't wipe off like a lot of silver paint does. The paint also stands up to very high temps. Jack
ol trunt
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by ol trunt »

Hello All.

I had nothing planned for the day so I decided to fiddle with the little 2K inverter genny on Clarence's (Toad) motorcycle tent trailer. I added a kill switch which I located inside the tent so it wouldn't be necessary to get out of the tent to shut off the genny.

The genny is pretty quiet, but not the 57 dB the mfg claims I don't think. One of the sounds it makes is muzzled sort of low pitch popping noise from the exhaust. If you put your hand over the exhaust you can feel the pulsing. I removed the cover over the muffler and found that it had only a thin layer of foam on it to deaden sound. I had some left over Dyna-Mat so I slapped that on and replaced the foam. I decided to try making an additional muffler from some electrical fittings I had laying around and then fit it with a short tail pipe to redirect the exhaust away from the living area.

My monkeying around did seem to get rid of the thumping sound and I'd like to think the mat lowered the overall racket though I could only measure a 2 dB reduction. Oh well, it was fun to do. Jack

Just to be on the safe side, I moved the spark arrester to the end of the new tail pipe.
Image[b/].
ol trunt
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Re: 1935 Chevy school bus

Post by ol trunt »

Hello All.

A couple we like to camp with called us at the last minute last Friday to say they had scored a pair of camp sites at a local reservoir/camp ground we have enjoyed on other outings. This time of year it is almost impossible to come up with a site at a local campground--let alone two. Since both of our friends are still working, the deal is that we provide the first night's dinner and they the second. We served honey baked ham, frozen peas, cheese grits (yum) and fresh camp baked apple pie (yum again). The reciprocating dinner was slow smoked "pig ribs", an excellent green salad and camp baked biscuits with honey. I like camping.

It was hot during the day (at least by my current standards which seem to have forgotten the 110 degree days spent plying the hwys in and around Bakersfield, Ca a thousand years ago) with mid daytime temps at 95 degrees. The evenings were a welcome relief with temps in the 50"s.

One of the highlights of the camp out was the appearance of a boat tailed grackle. These silly birds have their tail feathers flat in the vertical plane rather than flat in the horizontal plain like all other self respecting birds! I never was able to see one of them land, but it must be a sight to behold!

One of the "lowlights" of the camp out was the fresh crop of chiggers--blood sucking little bas-----. Damn near ate me alive! No more shorts and flip flops 'til winter!

I'd have posted this earlier, but Wifey and I (and 14 of her artist friends) have been busy setting up a new art gallery in the Ventura Harbor tourist area. By quitting time today, the place looked pretty good and hopefully my duty as "hubby of the artist" will have ended. I can't think of 14 people I like well enough to want to open a gallery with--must be one more of my short comings. Oh well.

Monday 6/13 marks the beginning of our short attempt to follow the path of the original "Ridge Route" in central Ca. We'll be taking Clarence (Honeysuckle Rose's toad) and his motorcycle tent trailer on his first long haul run. I've mapped out the path so we don't have to dare the fwys and all the fast moving traffic. We'll leave at the butt crack of dawn and hope we make the mtn summit (4200') before noon with the attendant high temps. Oh boy, too much fun. Jack

Last weeks camp spot. I tried to block out the S&S with my finger over the lense--ha ha.
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