Bus Living, Truck Living, Boat Living. You name it, if you live in a home that is capable of moving by itself, or have the desire to, then this is the place for you.
It contains a bunch of 12 volt lighting fixtures, two power converters (120 volts AC to 12 volt DC), The muffler for my generator (which is not hooked up yet), various motor fluids, the "tube of gloom", and a sundry of other items.
Last edited by Rudy on Fri May 20, 2011 2:09 am, edited 1 time in total.
AND NOW, the moment you have been waiting for. The Report.
The day before I left, I had a nice meatloaf dinner that was given to me by my friend, Dottie.
The day I left, I ate a big piece of Quiche that my friend Paige gave to me.
Actually, I discovered that my trip was close to 600 miles.
I left at noon so that I could get through Nashville when it was not rush hour. During those hours, the freeway traffic is not much different than being in Los Angeles.
Of course, when leaving, I had to drive on the narrow road I lived on. That is still a tricky endeavor.
By the time I got to my destination, I had a good idea of where I was placing my bus towards the center of a road.
In getting close to my destination, I had to drive 12 miles on windy narrow roads. I went slowly and safely. I never once went off the right hand side of the road which is a good thing because the shoulder was lower than the road.
I left the small road on which I lived and headed to the truck stop about 12 miles away. I filled up on fuel and got my bus weighed.
I am a little confused about the weighing results that I received. It stated that my front axle was 10000 lbs. (ten thousand?). The back axle was 12000 (twelve thousand?)
Obviously the total was 22000. I think that I may not have been situated on the scales properly.
From the truck stop it was just down the street to the interstate (Hwy 40).
AH NOW! My first highway driving experience. HERE WE GO!
As I approach the entrance ramp, I press the GO pedal all the way down.
With some trepidation I feel unsure of how it will be to drive this bus for several hundred miles.
GO RUDY GO!
The bus takes a bit of time to get up to speed. There is not much traffic.
It was "pedal to the metal" all the way to my destination. Top speed is 67 mph on level land. I did get it to 72 while going down hill.
There were a few uphill grades that got me slowed down quite a bit. (45mph). The transmission never did downshift though. I can imagine going 25mph in third gear up some grades out west. That is a scary thought.
Driving on the highway was comfortable.
As you know, my steering is a little squirly. At top speed, with no tractor trailers close to me, the bus steered very easily with not much play.
When following tractor trailer trucks, the turbulence behind them made it a little difficult to keep a good straight line. Also when they passed me, it was the same.
I had to keep both hands on the steering wheel for the whole trip.
I made a thermos full of Earl Grey tea. The bungee cord that hold my plant was a convenient place to support my old Alladin thermos.
I was so busy concentrating on driving that I just drank the tea out of the thermos instead of filling a cup.
Coffee works for keeping people alert. I can only drink a half cup of coffee and then it wigs me out and upsets my stomach.
Tea keeps me alert and does not upset my stomach.
So, it's pedal to the metal, and I am cruising at 67mph. It is a semi cloudy day and the temperature is in the 70's.
The speedometer needle is going wacko. The GPS gives me my speed indication.
The oil pressure gauge is maxed out at 100psi. The temperature gauge reading varies from 180 to 195 degrees depending on whether I am on flat land or climbing grades.
The ammeter gauge read in the middle. The batteries were plenty charged.
The air gauge remained at 110 psi. The brakes functioned flawlessy. Plenty of braking power.
The fuel gauge never reads over 3/4 of a tank even when the fuel tank is full.
It is quite loud while sitting in the driver's seat when this bus is moving. I had a hard time hearing people who called me on my cell phone.
At 67mph I got 8 miles to the gallon. My Dodge class C camper had a 440 cubic inch gasoline engine with a four barrel carburetor. It weighed 10500lbs and only got 6.5 mpg.
I was surprised at how smooth the bus rode, despite not having air bag suspension. My bus has humongous leaf springs and shocks that are probably as old as the bus.
What really made the ride comfortable was my air ride driver's seat platform. It was GREAT.
The first day, I drove a little more than 250 miles.
The only thing that was sore was my leg from having to keep the GO pedal all the way to the floor.
Coming up next are some pics from where I stayed at Wal-Mart overnight.
Your weights seem a little heavy on the front axle. It is well within the envelope but you wouldn't want any more up front than you do already. You may want to shift some heavier stuff behiind the rear axle.
Your top speed doesn't surprise me but your lack of hill climbing ability with that top speed does. You are either not getting the full travel on your throttle or your engine is downrated considerably. Most of those engines without a turbo were rated between 190 and 210 HP. But it wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility for your engine to be rated at 160-180 HP. If that is the case your top speed and lack of hill climbing would make sense.
The Allison transmission in your bus is not going to shift exactly like what you may be used to in your car, light truck, or your old motorhome. You really don't want to just put the selector in "D" and head out down the road. That can be hard on the engine and transmission. You will want to keep your RPM's in the middle of the power band.
The picture of your dash wasn't clear as to whether or not you have a tach. If you don't you can use speed as a rough guess as to what your tach would be reading.
Your engine has a governed top RPM of around 2600-2750 RPM. You don't want to pull that engine much below 1800 RPM. It can cruise all day long at the top governed speed but as you noted the noise can be a bit overwhelming over time. Lugging it below 1800 RPM can be really hard on everything, harder actually than running against the governor.
Because your engine is in a "V" configuration it won't have much on the bottom end so it won't lug well at all. As a consequence you will want to keep your RPM's at the top end rather than at the bottom end of the RPM range.
Next time you are out on the road and accelerating up an on ramp notice at which speeds (engine RPM and/or road speed) your transmission will automatically shift to the next higher gear. That will be the highest speed you will ever want to be if you should ever downshift. It will also tell you if you should be running around town in 3rd rather than "D".
Most buses with your engine and transmission will shift into the top gear somewhere between 45 MPH and 55 MPH. Since that is the case, if you are on a surface street with a 35 MPH speed limit you really don't want to be in "D" since every time you step on the go pedal it will want to downshift. Excessive shifting is really hard on a transmission.
That also means that if you are out on the highway and your speed drops below the shift point between 3rd and 4th you should manually downshift to get your RPM's back up. Most of the time the automatic downshift will occur at a much lower speed which can really mess up your hill climbing ability. Enough so that instead of climbing a grade in 3rd at 45 MPH you may end up climbing the same grade in 2nd at 30 MPH.
Of course, once you get to the top of the grade you can then manually up shift and continue on down the road.
I also noticed how low to the ground your left rear comparment is. I would be very careful going in and out of driveways. With as much rear overhang you have it will be very easy to hook that compartment on stuff as you go up and down curbs and curb cuts. It will become a real issue whenever you turn right into/onto something and the right side goes up and the left side goes down while the front is going up and the rear is going down.
