Finally finished our homebuilt RV!

[Ally]

Really amazing! Congrats on your future travels.


Sent from my iPad using Early Retirement Forum

 

[eytonxav]

You need to go into the custom RV business; very impressive.

 

[Car-Guy]

Car-Guy, yes, this is a tilt cab. I have found you don't really need to access the engine that often (most fluids can be checked with the cab un-tilted). In order to tilt the cab you need to either raise the main camper pod on the jacks a few inches (about 8) using the plug in jack stands, or slide it back on the flatbed (if the garage pod is not there) or remove both pods. A trade off for trying to get the maximum living space in the shortest length vehicle possible while maintaining headroom for a very tall person yet keeping the height of the whole rig reasonable.

Interesting... Sounds like reasonable trade-offs to me.

Enjoy and be safe.

 

[Koolau]

Looks amazing. You obviously built it with your own needs in mind. Smart! Do let us know how it all works on the road (speed, mileage, ride quality, maneuverability, etc.) Have fun and congrats on your ER.

 

[Fermion]

A little update. We have taken a couple of trips now in our homebuilt RV truck camper. It drives great and is getting around 10mpg which is better than I thought considering we are usually tipping the scales at 16,000 pounds or better.

Recently we unloaded the pods in our backyard and took the truck in for full service. While we had the pods off, we decided to remove all of the old flatbed wood and we only added back three new pieces of apitong hardwood. We calculate we have saved over 600 pounds doing this and the pods are still fully supported and do not shift or slide. Slight downside that now the flatbed has openings but it is still pretty usable as a flatbed for hauling things. We could always toss some temporary 4x8 sheets of ply across it if we needed a solid bed for something. My wife has already calculated 600 more pounds of stuff we can take on our journeys .

Last week we took the truck camper to Mount St Helens. This is a great time of year to go as there are near zero crowds. We stayed at the Lower Falls campground on Lewis river and road our motorcycles on a beautiful route right up to the crater. Coming back from Helens we decided spur of the moment to detour over to Long Beach, WA for a couple of nights on the beach. We rode the motorcycles some 20 miles right on the beach (this is legal!) then washed them off very well . Yay for ER to let you take those roads less traveled...it makes all the difference.

 

[Bigdawg]

OK. Now I am jealous. Awesome job on the project and have an great FIRE. Looks like you are doing just fine.

 

[Car-Guy]

You should be proud. I know how satisfying it can be to accomplish something like that. Great pictures too!

 

[HFWR]

All those years of playing with Tinker Toys and Legos finally paid off!

 

[MBAustin]

Most excellent!

 

[InTheSticks]

Very Nice. I have an RV, but I didn't build it. I can't wait until I retire to use it more.

 

[Major Tom]

I am really impressed that you built this. Great job!

 

[cooch96]

Tremendous!

 

[bld999]

Those WR's are a nice mount for what you did there. Is that some wacky custom home made to look like a lighthouse?

 

[Fermion]

Rodi's post in the other thread about home downsizing reminded me of this thread. I figure I will post a few pictures as we set out on our adventure.

We closed on the house today and now just need to sell our 2008 Toyota Tundra 4x4. I am thinking of taking it to the Toyota dealer where we bought it and seeing how much they will give us. It only has 48k miles. Maybe take Uber back to our RV since I have never tried that service. Alternatively we could load the motorcycles in the truck and ride them back...or try to park the RV in Kirkland...

Here are some pics of the RV setup as it is currently. The garage pod now has a 3 axis milling machine in it but to use it you really need to take out the motorcycles and bicycles. I had to leave the lasers behind in storage, just not enough room for a 10kW laser (I tried SO HARD to figure out how to take that one). Oh well, guess I won't be making nanobots on the road.

 

[stepford]

I'm curious about that CNC mill. It looks like it has a large work envelope, but is somewhat lightly built. Can you cut metal on it or does machining time effectively limit it to softer plastics. We had a similarly light CNC machine at (former!) work. Accurate as heck, but its limitations on hard materials often caused my colleagues to call upon the Bridgeport in my home.

 

[Fermion]

I'm curious about that CNC mill. It looks like it has a large work envelope, but is somewhat lightly built. Can you cut metal on it or does machining time effectively limit it to softer plastics. We had a similarly light CNC machine at (former!) work. Accurate as heck, but its limitations on hard materials often caused my colleagues to call upon the Bridgeport in my home.

Yes, it has a pretty large work area but as you say, it is lightly built (hey, this is an RV!). It has a calculated stiffness of around 25,000 pounds/inch which is toward the lower end for cutting aluminum.

My Shizuoka B-3V cnc mill that we used to make a lot of the RV parts during construction could cut anything, including stainless steel, but it was over 7000 pounds.

But this garage pod mill does use NSK ground ballscrews and dual linear square rails. With the 300 watt brushless servo motors it can rapid at over 2000IPM.

 

[dixonge]

so if it's raining, you don't go anywhere unless you unhook everything?

 

[stepford]

I'm not sure which impresses me more, the 7000 pound machine tool you had in your garage (and what a garage it must have been) or the fact that you bought a separate CNC mill just to travel with.

 

[NW-Bound]

The hardest part with becoming a hobo on wheels is to find a way to accommodate one's hobby(ies). For a man/woman without hobby is a dull Jack/Jill. And not all hobbies are amenable to a vagabond's life.

 

[Retch The Grate]

Very cool, and I'm also impressed that you are traveling with your own mill.

 

[Fermion]

House is sold, money in the bank, and we are free camping on BLM land in eastern Washington state this Memorial Day weekend. Really just relaxing although I unloaded the garage pod to reorganize a bit and maybe go for a motorcycle ride. It is sunny and 70 degrees and just finished up 2nd coffee.

 

[Ronstar]

House is sold, money in the bank, and we are free camping on BLM land in eastern Washington state this Memorial Day weekend. Really just relaxing although I unloaded the garage pod to reorganize a bit and maybe go for a motorcycle ride. It is sunny and 70 degrees and just finished up 2nd coffee.

Congrats! You have the perfect life - especially with a garage pod, mill, etc.

 

[Sunset]

House is sold, money in the bank, and we are free camping on BLM land in eastern Washington state this Memorial Day weekend. Really just relaxing although I unloaded the garage pod to reorganize a bit and maybe go for a motorcycle ride. It is sunny and 70 degrees and just finished up 2nd coffee.

That looks wonderful.
Recently as I was driving on a few thousand mile trip looking at the various trucks and rv's , I did wonder back to your message on the side of the door about not for hire. Some weird legal necessity I suppose?

when are you going to take orders ?

 

[GravitySucks]

Looks like an awesome rig you've put together! Enjoy the journey.

 

[Fermion]

Found a really nice spot in Idaho to unwind. I have not paddled my kayak in a few years and am sore now. Really pretty area though, and free to camp.

Only downside was no internet. I survived (barely).