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Sorry about posting this on such notice, but it looks like Home Depot is selling their 100w Grape Solar panels for $100 each today. Ship to store or to home shipping is free, so it's a pretty good deal...

I make my living attending auctions and IMO they are the very best place to find a deal on a van. The trick is to go to the right kind of auctions!  My suggestion is to find government and municipal vehicles where they  are auctioned off direct.  Not secondary sales where they have already been...

I don't want to get into the politics of it, but I'm one of many that will end up paying more and getting less because of Obamacare. I'm a male in my mid 30's, single, no children and no previous health issues. Because of my age and clean health history my monthly health insurance premiums...

Thanks for the replies! After speaking with 5 different agents I've come to conclusion of what I need to do. I'd prefer not to post the details here, but lets just say there are a few immovable stumbling blocks to insuring a self build van as an RV. Fortunately, I think I can walk around...

First issue is I don't believe Dodge used a "Straight 6" in that time frame. Ford vans had a inline 6 in the 4.9 which was an amazing motor (One of the best gas truck engines ever IMO). If that van is a 6 cylinder it's a 3.9 liter V6 which is basically a 318 V8 minus the front 2 cylinders. The...

I'm starting a new van conversion soon, but this time instead of using my paid off 10+ year old Ford I'm considering a brand new van. With that said, I'm going to have a significant amount of money invested in this and want to make sure I dot all my I's insurance wise. Has anyone had any...

Keep an eye on Craigslist for the Montague folding bikes. They make a couple different models, but they all have the same basic folding design and it's rock solid! I have a Montague Paratrooper and really like it! At one time they a had a promotional deal with GM's Hummer division so some...

Yeah, the plastic bags are a must. I found a easy way of securing the bag is to use a loop of that stretchy bungee cord. Basically I open the bucket, put a 13 gallon trash bag inside and overlap it down over the sides of the bucket by a couple inches. Put the loop of bungee around the outside...

The first issue I can think of would be loss of stealth (People can see and hear the fan much more easily on the sides of the vehicle than on the top). A more serious issue may be the design of the fan itself. The fans are fairly water tight when mounted on a roof, but the overlapping design of...

The Gamma lids are actually a 2 piece lid, similar to those that are on those large 5 gallon food buckets, but I think they're a little different. The outer seal portion snaps into place along the edges of the outer ring of the bucket. That one is hard to remove, but it pretty much stays on...

I have the small 5.5 liter Saratoga Jacks cooker and it's ok, but if I had to do it again I would go with one of the more expensive small Japanese models. The Saratoga cookers are insulated with foam which works, but there are thermal cookers out there that are vacuum insulated like a Thermos...

Longinthetooth, Just a word of advice. If you're going to be stealth parking you may not want to be so specific as to where you will be (City, specific location, etc). These are public forums and anyone can read them including some people that may not have the best intentions. There's a RV...

If you plan on living in the van I would recommend setting up everything to run on a 2nd auxiliary deep cycle battery. Also swapping out your existing lights with LEDs and perhaps changing out the tube TV to a small LED tv that runs on 12v (Under $100). The changes to LED will drastically cut...

One thing you might want to check into is insurance. If the box truck is over a certain carrying capacity it may have to be registered, inspected and insured as a commercial vehicle which can get expensive in some states. Personally, I would be very leery about spending 11k on a 20+ year old...

Take the seats out, pull out carpet, powerwash carpet, dry in sun and reinstall (Carpet then seats) That's exactly what I did to my last Aerostar and it turned out great. Just make sure and thoroughly dry the carpet and backing before your reinstall it.

For a small area like a van or RV I would think a complete replacement would make more sense. You can often find carpet remnants and small lots of flooring at a huge discount and installation is fairly easy.

If you're just looking for something short term check out Fort DeSoto campground. It's a county park on the point West of the Skyway Bridge and a definite can't miss if you are in the area! They don't offer long term rentals or discounts, so it can get expensive quickly, but it's worth it for...

No beer? No girls? And you can't take a crap? No thanks!:huh::D

You'll really appreciate the added a space a full sized van provides, and even more so with a high top. I'd suggest estimating the mileage you plan on putting on the van and see what the fuel savings/costs might be. My guess is that savings from the mini van won't be enough to outweigh the...

The 5.4 is a good engine and there are a lot of E-Series out there with 400-500k miles and counting. It did have one major issue around that time and that was the spark plugs and the threads for the plugs on the heads. The spark plugs would seize up in the heads and when it was time to change...