1963 Flxible Starliner Vintage High-Tech Bus Conversion Tour - The Creative Cruiser

five Demeter is already commented am ah [Laughter] hello i am cherie and we'll be starting soon we are going to give you a tour of this amazing bus conversion and introduce you to our friends Ben and Karen who have been nomads a month longer than Chris yes Ben has been doing this forever and he picked up this great little hitchhiker one day we actually chaperoned their first date but we will give you a tour of this amazing conversion and tell you a little bit of its story this is probably I think I may be biased but I think they are too you'd agree right I've seen a lot of bus conversions and this is the yes this this is the bus conversion of bus conversions eight-year project right oh my god it's gorgeous oh so many is in transit to Antarctica how cool oh my gosh this is like just a work of art in every possible fashion this is this is as pretty as the bus gets look at that shark fin on the back Kurtis is Funi and where do you see the inside if you take it outside just cool we just decided to do this on the spur of the moment so we just get all the ducks in a row here yes they invite us by to see this on our way up to picking up hiki and we're like can we stream a tour and hey we've actually done some really cool videos of these guys before we boiled water with Ben it's actually to hit on your we have an amazing number of also get an introduction to these guys in our rambling series if you remember those old where we used to interview other nomads hey this is Ben and Karen and Ben was actually the first other full-time RVing nomad still working on the road that we met so before that Chris and I had been on the road for two years and you had been on the road for about two years yeah and we'd only other man retirees vacationers things like that to meet someone else who was working on the road in our age group was really cool then we ended up Rindy feeling all across the country at the time he was in a 1997 Liberty converted pray boat or Prevost as some people call and what you used to enjoy getting our little tiny Oliver next to his grave oh we were in a 17-foot travel trailer I was traveling together with a cat he was solo in a rock star benda has had the bus for one month longer that he's had me actually [Laughter] so when Ben was shopping for he got inspired by flexible and so he started was doing a lot of research on vintage buses and when we were ready for something larger we kind of were inspired by his research and that's what led us to buying a vintage bus he's finally living in a vintage bus now yeah this is piece of art it is so detailing all the effort he is put into this over the years I know what Ben give you a tour all right well let's do the quick car story CC to minis to Manila to Ben was heart heart was set on a red bus uh you know yeah and I was actually gonna get a red vintage station wagon to pull behind it 1957 Buick I'll butcher the name camporee yellow or something I have a mini girl though so the mini stayed yeah when we first got our bus we were parked next to those guys and and we're like hey your mini matches our bus it's already set for flat towing well we can fix this problem yeah so anyway I used to be our mini so anyway boss as far as tour goes on the outside up there those on both sides are awnings the awning will come out to about the width of fun oh if you can see it or not but this concrete pad that we have may be parked next doot so it can shade the entire area then there are three lights on the outside on the side of the bus and there's a light that runs the entire length of the awning so therefore this outside area can be nicely lit regardless of what time of day it is there's a little camera there's one of these on three sides of the bus you can see 180 degrees this way and this way so I can see somebody standing at the front of the bus as long as they're not centered it goes from that little camera it's got a old-school handle like a school bus to close the door if I want to close those guys out in on the - this little girl keeps us company when we're driving you got to interface that into your Alexa voice control system what's it gonna do I don't know here's the rest in the front we have two sofas so it kind of his inverse arrangement and they come up to three different positions this position is for sitting normal style on a sofa and then if you want to instead lay on it sideways this can be a little skinny so this can slide out to meet this black area at the bottom and then the two can also slide all the way together so they touch in the backs behind the sofas would slide down to fill in the gap for that at the bottom here on this side since Karen's a yogi is custom yoga mat storage and since we're both photographers on the opposite side there is custom tripod storage so we've got two tripods and a monopod in there and if I were to lift the cushions we could also fit just shy of a case of wine also within there we've got the kitchen the kitchen special because it gets much bigger if you want it to I can reach down and undo a little catch and then pull this out and both in so the kitchen can come out so that you can get a c-shaped kitchen yeah and I don't know that you can see it from that angle but this side is an appliance garage so you have blenders and mixers and things they remain plugged in and you just grab them and set them up here on top to use it and when you're done you just put it right back where you found it and then you can slide that in if you want to get it out of the way the other side is more of a pantry have you know dry goods and oils and stuff no question what kind of wood is that oh man I always get two woods mixed up in my head I can first tell you the wood on the ceiling is a vertical grain Douglas fir this is either a McCory or sub Pele for some reason those two are in the same bin in my head but one thing that's a ridiculous detail about the bus is we bought a tree and all of the dark wood is all from a single tree therefore all the grain and all the dark wood matches and if we ever want to replace anything it will not match can the woman the grain won't be the same that's kind of absurd do you have the rest of the tree anywhere we used to know us the kitchen the sink goes all the way over to here but you don't lose the drawer that's underneath at all this is full right and that's so you can put stuff in here and it can drain into the sink and can have various accessories put into it here's a cutting board for like chicken I can flip it over and use it for other things or I can go down here and if I want to do vegetables or just have a nicer chopping that fits in as well and other accessories so the whole thing is set up nicely this you can put it any angle you want and it stays put and then you can just turn it on and use it can you swing it out the window and use it as an outdoor shower yeah two burner induction here's our little paper towel holders here and if you open this you can tilt the paper towel and behind it is where you store the rest of the rolls that come in the pack see our little spices on this side is our workstations so what some people would use is their dining place but we use our workspace and there we have to IMAX they're back to back one is actually hanging off of the other it's amazing and these stay in place when we drive because they're bolted to this and this is bolted to the table then the table has a steel plate which stabilizes it here is my workstation and since I do a lot of photography this is a printer that can print 13 by 19 inches it folds into the aisle out when I want to print and when I'm done with it I just roll it back in I don't even have to get out of my booth you have my need paper for it I just reach my hand up here there's the paper and there's all sorts of custom storage everywhere right here in this area there's a PC laptop if I were to open this up right here there's paper right there there's extra ink over here it's a panel that opens if I wave my hand oh nice cool tools storage there underneath it's a little bit of a mess right now but on the wall under there the big black box is a subwoofer so that we can watch movies and have good sound because we have the sub and if you look towards the front of the bus where Karen standing she'll be Diana and point out where the TV is we need to get on the computer do so the voice controls are not active just yet well I'm not on Wi-Fi on my phone so but if I were to get over here comes press the button for the blinds to cheating let's go tonight down they go instant movie time now the front doesn't quite have automatic yet no we have to manually cover the front it's one of the very few manual things let's get some more light in here a TV is amazing and you can hardly even tell it's there when it's up [Music] and if you look on my computer screen left side you can see on the each side there's a speaker and below that Center channels there and if you look up it's just a little crack that tells you there's something hiding behind Chris our speakers up here which are the rear channel speakers and then over here on my screen no how will you be able to see it but either on my phone or my computer I could use the normal remotes or here I can turn my amplifier on I can turn my blu-ray on play put the TV up or down and do all that kind of stuff and I can do that also if I use this to do the shades as well if you keep going back here's a fridge this one's just a kind of door fridge and then we have two drawers this is a freezer and this is another fridge so you just pull them out get to whatever you want and they have little latches here to make sure that they can't move them we're driving those securely hold them this side his-and-hers camera bags go in there a little extra storage just for random stuff in here it's like our energy monitoring setup big trauma not pulling too much power right now and down here is a vacuum cleaner that stays on its little charging base yeah this is a blu-ray of receiver and then there's an Alexa up there what's the weather today she'll talk to you in a minute and there's also an Apple TV keep coming yeah let's see I'll get out of your way so you can fast okay I'm gonna close off the front of the bus and now here we got a shower or you do get your phone right now I will I'm actually gonna put the shade up that's in here I'm gonna go to tonight's TV flush the toilet with the app to UM now there's button right there on this side there is the shower and it's got a folding door which we secure when we're driving a huge rubber band comes around and grabs both here little knob ER and there's a doodad there right here okay I'll step into the shower just there outside the shower would be your towel and it sits on a hood ornament from an old Chevy there's three of those from the bus that's anything the other one is right above the toilet where the second towel is sorry looks got a great view yes it does and sign up and if you go further back you can open both of these doors I'll get out of the way you open that door you get your full-length mirror and here's Karen's dressing area here's my own so you can access both to get clothing after you come out of the shower custom cabinets are gorgeous and if this door which I'm not gonna open it was closed you'd have a whole private area throughout here when you take a shower laundry bins in the area under the bed and then I'll let Chris get back their background this is a little nook with a queen-size bed nice and that's it we caught the creative Cruiser there's one other detail which I don't know if you notice when we're walking through which is up on the ceiling and that is there is a custom wood thing that runs the whole length of the bus for the most part and this hides two rooftop air conditioning units and two vent fans and some electronics and it also makes it so the air conditioning is ducted so it's you know distributed throughout the bus but it hides it also you don't usually see those plastic crates that would usually be in an RV so I think that's most of the Shelf the engine bay I'm not gonna open it necessarily because I have to find the little beautiful - and you don't have a vintage engine right no I have a monitor engine story its Cummins is C with an allison 6-speed Automatic we got it on of an RV that had been in a front end collision but the engine was in the rear and so it was unaffected and so we got all that on the outside of us there's a whole bunch of customization this stainless wouldn't usually be on the outside older models are the same bus would have that but we found some vintage stainless and put it on these weren't here but I put them on from the front these weren't here there was a different style this wouldn't usually be here it would be on an older model Chris can keep up and what else on the outside can you change the destination sign I can't is it rotators it it's I have to put the TV down and then there's a little manual crank too and it has about a dozen same nice water on a reel so that we can electronically pull it in you manually pull it out it's in there there's also water filtration in here and then dump valves no need to open this unless you feel like using it you can do it on the computer your phone and remote anything that deploys like while you're being pursued down it could be done but it is actually it you'd have to go out of your way and then we don't have storage under the bus that's all water tanks and things our water tanks are massive this has got 256 gallons of fresh water and so we can go for a long amount of time our storage is actually in this area on both sides of the bus it's also where there's a bunch of electronics like our inverters in there I have to actually look it up I can tell you that few minutes here but all I remember off the top of my head is the fresh but probably by the time we're done walking around it oh it's making me log in and see if it happens to be this one so I know incorrect password' unfortunately I can't inflict so engines in here Cummins is C you can see another camera here so we can see out the back and I can also see all the way down to our tow bar so when we hook up the car I can tell if one side is collapsing or not you know if both sides have engaged in the back this wasn't originally here these weren't originally here these are special ones that have three turn signals stop sign and running lights all in one in their glass vintage ones on this roof there are I think there's 500 watt panels up there there's 540 amp hours at 24 volt which is how many watt hours he's doing math in his head right now so if you're used to a 12-volt system then you'd have to double that and then you'd also have to go higher if you use two normal batteries because you wouldn't be able to use or full capacity I don't disco ball in the introduced there well it's still back there it's just not currently hanging let's see we're on curved sides so let's extend Oh you ever just press the button on his app and you have an identical wanting on the other side right we can also dump from either side of the bus we have to be on the driver's side to fill with water though nice and then if he gets windy out or they are these Gerrard awnings yeah they're Gerard's and they have motion sensors so if this ends up doing something like this because the wind let's start going in nice we also have leveling jacks that are hydraulic so you can market for jacks for Jacksons are big foot hydraulic jacks so when we park if we're not on a level surface that'll get us level and we can also raise up the bus and I think I've had it where the back tires had been off the ground so if you really needed to change the tire I might be able to got a torsion bar suspension which is relatively smooth when you're driving and it's a 1963 flexible Starliner I do have a history it was originally a bus for a New Mexico school high school and it would be the band and the football team I think would take it out to various events I have the full history of it on my website that's related to the bus which is creative cruiser dot-com and so I know the every owner that's had the bus since it was new which is kind of fun and it was kind of fun how I learned acts I just happened to run into a picture of the bus on somebody's website and it said that he used to own it it looked like mine but it wasn't sure so I contacted him and he gave me I think the serial number or something so we could confirm it was the same bus and so he told me the early history and the person I bought it from told me the later history and the two connected together so I knew full history hooked it's kind of fun and then this was repowered in Texas at a place called Trackmaster fabricators and the interior was made in Oregon at a place called Paradise coach in Eugene Oregon and it was painted in drain Oregon I can't remember Troy's name at his place but or not Troy Mike Wilson and that's pretty much it it's our full-time home yeah so we been on the road for a couple months now and we did make it all the way from Eugene Oregon to here near Tampa Florida and we'll be here until April Fool's Day and then we'll start exploring the country again in it it feels more like driving a minivan as far as getting around traffic and things although it does not currently have power steering's so that when you slow down to you know 3 miles an hour or something it becomes harder to steer and therefore pulling into a tight RV park or making a u-turn is not as fun as it could be so otherwise it's not bad 34 feet see there's 34 to 36 is what I was gonna say 34 it's 96 inches wide whereas most RVs are 102 I think so we're a little bit skinnier it has more ground clearance than our old ones and it's not as tall if I had the password in my one little thing like my note-taking app just happened to ask for the password which almost never does then I'd know how tall it is I'm thinking 10 and a half feet but I could be wrong any other questions pop up in the I got a picture everyone I can do this the old-fashioned way this is what the bus look like when been purchased it yes here we go and it had a knotty pine RV interior in it but it its largest closet was less wide than my body some of you would say that that's doesn't mean that it's small no it just means it was like a coat closet so also the bathroom in the kitchen were massive in size compared to everything else last bus so that's the bus I've been lived in you had up on the screen inside the our Oliver and your old bus next to each other right [Music] [Music] Oh Cherie knocking I was gonna look up the pink capacity okay yes okay I might have it here in a moment I love that actually I'm gonna get a close-up view of that double lapped is a double IMAX setup okay here you go No here we are these are an opposite ends but in reality this is a 360-degree panorama so in reality we were parked right next to each other you know I just happen there's the stitch it that's 2010 that is I get out of this view 2019 April yeah I also have this one of you guys in a lodge yeah it's so much fun and I was going to look up don't you spit combo fill my screen right now cuz there's personal information it would appear nothing there [Music] do all I meant okay you wanted to know about you don't need to show in here to their lab other ok fresh tank is 256 gallons great tank is a hundred and ninety eight and black tank is a hundred and twenty nine father's are huge yes and you can run your air conditioner and everything completely off of your inverter system yes we have two 5000 watt inverters we also have a to see if I'd be right I think it's 240 amp 24 volts alternator on the engine which would also make it so I can generally run that kind of stuff while driving so actually you know we are Victor on inverter I've got turned on to that because then it researched Victor on way back when when he started researching his bus project now we've had ours for six and a half years and did the lithium well you bought your inverters couple years ago they just kind of sat in the boxes for a while where they sat installed on a wall there are other things in the bus that's different on the outside of the bus you will find no handles locks or similar things for any of the doors and that's because there are a hidden little electronic locks that don't use a standard key i'd have to grab my key over here the key for the bus looks like this and this is something where I hold it up to a particular spot on the bus and then it will open the door for me yeah whatever door I'm trying to go for and each one of these has a serial number so if I give one of these to somebody at a bus shop for them to work on my bus I can tell them exactly how many times they open the door and I can lock the door on them remotely that kind of stuff as well can do things with remotes little remote we have one of these this one's actually going to go in the car our Mini Cooper and the top button will unlock the front door the middle button will turn the lights on inside the bottom one will turn the lights off and all that so just like your garage door opener you might have in your car will have one for a bus I just need to get some velcro to install that when you've got your magic light switches which are potentially changed around yeah they're all here right now he has to use a computer to turn a light on but in the reason for that is because I haven't finished programming these these are light switches where each one of these little side areas or buttons in the screen in the middle I can program so just like when I press that it lights up more I could press one of these and it would send me to a submenu on here like for air conditioning and then this could be the UP button and the down button for temperature that's have a thing I've programmed the interface as far as what the icons look like but I haven't gotten around to programming the actual functionality where they actually do anything so that makes it a little bit frustrating they have to use my phone or the computer to do some of the tasks in the bus we got a phone call and Ben was on the side of the road need broken his Windows laptop and it was the only way he could turn on his lights and stuff and the Sun was setting so I had to help him figure how to get his Mac to connect yeah here's the laptop this is the only PC I have right but the screen is smashed and when that happened he couldn't turn the lights on we're still in progress with a few things we're optimizing things but hopefully between now and April we hit the road again the majority of those projects will be wrapped up this is the most amazing bus conversion period anywhere hey let's train say goodbye thank you for joining us impromptu you livestream and thank you guys for joining in hope you enjoyed it we are on our way to pick up Zephyr our vintage bus and do you need to get our buses parked next to each other buses and minis converged yeah so so yes they all have to be in one place that's got to happen oh yeah okay all right guys we're gonna get back to hanging out with these guys see y'all later

Channel: Technomadia

Views: 955,372

Keywords: 1963, flxible, flxble starliner, creative cruiser, bus conversion, ben wilmore, vintage bus, flexible bus, ben willmore, karen willmore, starliner, bus from RV, rv movie, robin williams

Id: mfz-7xKSaow

Length: 34min 31sec (2071 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 22 2018