Eldritch Penumbra
Member
Recently I was hired in at a Ford plant where in I receive good pay, good benefits, etc. etc. and the rest of life is taken care of.
With my new pay raise I went out and bought an $800 1995 Dodge Van with 150,000 miles on it, in great shape, but rusty. I wanted to use it to haul stuff, and to ride to work till I got the transmission on my car repaired.
Meanwhile I began to think of Summer Shutdown and how I could possibly use the van as an RV during vacation, and so I hit Youtube and saw all these nifty videos giving one tips and what not on how to set up solar, battery clusters, and so forth.
While in the middle of researching all of this and ordering materials, my landlord comes knocking on my door to inform me that he wants to re-purpose the house for business and will pay me $600 to be out in 30 days. So with that in mind I figured why not just move into my van full time and see how long I can maintain and what I can learn from the experience.
Currently I have the walls stripped out to install insulation, but I have to move my stuff out of the house and into storage before I go to far.
I've covered the back windows with Foam Insulation that is about 3/4th" thick, and believe I will insulate the rest with thicker foam, then cover it all up with wood. Eventually I would like to add 6 6v Golf Kart batteries as well as a solar panel and self built AC unit. Though I will post elsewhere in the forums for advice in regards to that, which being in Ohio and not in a warmer/less humid state, I am sure I will have plenty of questions, especially considering that I have a cat and a collie who will be along for the experience so I'll need to keep the van cool when I work for sure!
And there is my story in a nut shell. I'm glad I found this site!
With my new pay raise I went out and bought an $800 1995 Dodge Van with 150,000 miles on it, in great shape, but rusty. I wanted to use it to haul stuff, and to ride to work till I got the transmission on my car repaired.
Meanwhile I began to think of Summer Shutdown and how I could possibly use the van as an RV during vacation, and so I hit Youtube and saw all these nifty videos giving one tips and what not on how to set up solar, battery clusters, and so forth.
While in the middle of researching all of this and ordering materials, my landlord comes knocking on my door to inform me that he wants to re-purpose the house for business and will pay me $600 to be out in 30 days. So with that in mind I figured why not just move into my van full time and see how long I can maintain and what I can learn from the experience.
Currently I have the walls stripped out to install insulation, but I have to move my stuff out of the house and into storage before I go to far.
I've covered the back windows with Foam Insulation that is about 3/4th" thick, and believe I will insulate the rest with thicker foam, then cover it all up with wood. Eventually I would like to add 6 6v Golf Kart batteries as well as a solar panel and self built AC unit. Though I will post elsewhere in the forums for advice in regards to that, which being in Ohio and not in a warmer/less humid state, I am sure I will have plenty of questions, especially considering that I have a cat and a collie who will be along for the experience so I'll need to keep the van cool when I work for sure!
And there is my story in a nut shell. I'm glad I found this site!
Hello and Welcome. Which end or side of Ohio are you on? Have you ever seen Jnull0 on you tube? He's in southern Ohio. Interesting story he has, at least I think so.
