Camper Bus Re-wire And Ac Upgrade: Little Family Project

yep that's not a piece of equipment what's this thing doing in my shop [Music] all right for you guys that don't know this is uh Jenna's camper bus her and the kids have been uh tooling around and camping in most of the summer we bought this thing out of Nashville Tennessee from a guy that had mostly renovated it took it up to officer Hoover or dot bear woodworking he kind of customized it a little bit to uh fit doing the kids needs had the paint job done put the awning in he's got all kinds of videos on his channel of all the work he did I'll try to uh link him down below so you guys can kind of see the uh transformation of the bus and when we bought it to what it is now this thing is working awesome and Hoover has did a great job on this thing but we got one little uh issue we got to work on is the electrical system this video is going to be operation rewire so let me try to um explain this to you here a little bit so inside the bus we got an on-demand electric hot water heater drill is about 20 amps it's a it's a big boy we got an air conditioner currently it's drawing about 10 amps we're going to replace it with a rooftop unit on uh with a heat pump in it that'll hopefully work a little bit better but it's going to draw about 12 amps uh we got a refrigerator drilling three amps we got a battery charger for an inverter drawing about an amp and then we got some miscellaneous things so if you add all that stuff up uh probably about 30 plus amps 35 36 amps and uh currently our power supply is uh 120 amp 110 plug right here that's all we got so we're going to upgrade that to 50 amp so we got plenty of amperage to do what we need to if we get to a campsite where we only got a 30 amp plug which is more common we could just isolate a few things out like the hot water heater and Etc so we're going to Upper amperage to 50 and then we currently have no circuit protection inside that basically goes inside to a junction box and feeds everything so we're going to put a sub panel in that way we can put a circuit in for the hot water heater put a circuit in for the air conditioner put a circuit in for refrigerator and then we'll have a circuit for some miscellaneous plugs and stuff so where do we start this is supposed to be a family project do you see any of the family out here no it's just me and a bus let's run up some help and uh get started why are you making bus content who why are you making buses because I gotta pay for your air conditioner somehow yeah but why it's supposed to go on my channel is going to pay for new air conditioner carry on all right step one remove bed like I found two family members where's the third one she's got a 4-H project that needs but we got a we got a bus project that needs to be finished okay focus here people focus focus focus focus you know what's really cool about the bus is you can magnetic that camera wherever you want up in here well watch guys step one remove bed well I'm waiting for you to help me get it through I think you're gonna have to fold it up and go that way I know that's why don't stand over there Gunner and push it up like a pretzel shoes I don't think he's gonna be able to make it thank you okay here well we got the bed out we didn't get any of it on video can you believe that yeah we're perfectly smooth didn't it maybe it's a good thing we need to have it on video yeah yeah underneath the bed here's electrical central here this is where the battery charger is at a couple batteries for the inverter and the junction box is right down there so we're gonna get some of this stuff cleaned out of here so we get in there to work and uh get a plan all right so I got a torn to this thing far enough kind of got an idea of what's going on so Hoover did a really nice job of setting up an inverter a charger and a couple batteries back here and what that allows us to do is basically plug in the fridge and keep it cold but we're going down the road from uh site to site so that's pretty good pretty sound first thing we need to do is set up our new breaker box or our load Center and uh I'm thinking the best thing to maybe do is put that like right in here somewhere should give us easy access in easy access out for all of our circuits our supply is going to be coming from right here should keep it off this door far enough where it's somewhat protected but very easy to access to flip the switch system got a few boards cut gonna get them in here so we got something to attach it to uh we still got access to get the batteries out if we need to at some point they can kind of slide out and around that way which is probably the way they'd go anyway so I don't think that's going to hurt us whole lot so let's get these screwed together get this up here and then we'll kind of sort out um what circuits need to go where foreign there it is guys that should work great be nice and handy to get all of our wires in and out of and convenient to get to to access and everything so kind of have to think this thing a little bit through on what I want to put on which circuit and how we're going to route each one I go in there I don't think it's going to be too bad it's going to take some fishing out the buses complete we'll get her done unfortunately this evening that's going to be it trying to work on this a little bit each night get it done for the weekend so hopefully we'll be back on it tomorrow so stay tuning all right good afternoon guys we are back on our bus project and uh first thing on the list tonight is we got the plug this is going to be our new Inlet plug this goes on the back of the bus got uh sectional wire here I may or may not have robbed off another dryer cord I have it check this out I got a pretty much idiot proof red white green black so let's get this in wired in we'll slide it in the bus and uh and get the other end wired in all right got this plug on man I really like this plug it is a nice plug the only thing is those little screws in there that hold the white part in the black part had to taper them a little bit they didn't want to uh start but before we put this in the bus I know about where it's going to hit that electrical panel I've got it scored right there I'm thinking it's going to be easier to strip those wires out here outside of the bus come on baby you're doing so good I need to grab a different one yeah oh yes I got off my uh cut there anyway so I'm going to strip it back to right here I figured it's gonna be a lot easier to do this outside the bus than inside the bus and then we'll get her attached to the back and wired up in the panel all right let's see if we can get this in there see if I can do this one-handed while I'm holding the camera through there right through here come on I'm missing a wire where's the white one there it is all right foreign [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] foreign there we go plug is mounted this is what I was talking about cutting it too short I almost didn't get it where that black part comes in but uh let's get uh let's get this thing wired up I'll be trying to explain this the best I can so the black wire is going to go to this lug right here then makes this breaker this breaker and this breaker hot so that's basically 110 to three Breakers we got 220 coming in 50 amps the red one's going to go down here it makes the opposite Ones hot so if you wanted 220 basically you had to pull off this one and this one together the green wire we'll come over here into the neutral bar and if you look at this one right here it's a little bit different that screw actually go all the way through and grounds out the box and the white wire will come all the way up and around and go down to the neutral lug down there so let me get those attached and I'll show you what that looks like and then we'll start running our circuits in there all right guys looking good looking good we got our one hot wire down here on that lug one hot wire up here on that lug ground is into the neutral bar we've got our screw in ground the Box got our neutral down there on the lug I've already got my first two circuit wires right in here this circuit here actually goes up and feeds the microwave and a few counter plugs so that'll be a 15 amp and this one here actually feeds this plug-in right here which is the refrigerator plug why you ask is the refrigerator plug right there let me get this wired up real quick and I will explain questions check that out guys there it is first two circuits are officially wires like I said this one here is going to be a 15 amp goes up feeds the microwave and a couple of uh plugs on the counter this one here is going to feed the refrigerator which is this plug right here so whether this works this plug right here goes up and feeds uh a charging port in the refrigerator whenever you're going down the road you can plug this over into the inverter right like so and it'll keep the refrigerator going while the bus is not plugged into power and once you get plugged into Power basically you can just switch that over to right here just kind of a cheap little transfer switch this right here actually charges or Powers the trickle charger which keeps the two batteries charged the power the inverter so if it's plugged into Power that's charging if it's not plugged into Power it's doing nothing this one here you just switch switch back and forth so that system has seemed to work pretty good I think that's about as far as we're going to be able to get tonight I need to get one of the little motions here with me we got a fish tape uh two wires up towards the front of the bus one for the hot water heater circuit and one for the new AC circuit so hopefully tomorrow I'll have a little bit of help and we might try to tackle mounting that new AC unit that's the that's going to be the big the big project yet so anyways good progress see you guys tomorrow land behind the scenes we got one heck of an excavator welcome to the bus rewire project who's the family project so we figured might as well get you involved yeah who knows I might be living in it you can at least move it out of the shop like if you live in it outside no I kind of like it in the shop but we don't need the air conditioner because the Shop's air conditioning by default we got right now right now beside today so uh Aaron's got wrapped into helping us so you guys seen the free previous part of the video I got the first two circuits in uh we're under the air conditioner yep so like first thing we need to do is I guess I should show you guys what we're going to do basically we're going to take there's one Skylight here right here which used to be an emergency hatch and we're going to rework it into a rooftop air conditioner we've already got our fish tape fished up the wall there but I think first things first we need to run our wire from there to the back yeah so I guess since our fish tape's going that way we're gonna have to start here and go that way here we go I like that you like that so I do it all right let's do it you ready I'm ready how's it going this is my middle name right here oh look at that that's sharp hey look what I got yes all right now Where Do We Go From Here we gotta get through that cabinet yeah I think that's a win that's a big win all right man 100 scenes this will turn into a fiasco we tried to go straight down right here and we do have a Fish Wire down through there we cannot get the wire pulled through so now we're gonna go across and try to go down right there and hopefully get us accessed into the inside yeah you ready you want to try to just push it through you want to try um fish statement I can push it through it's going to be on the outside of the insulation okay and you're going to go down right here yeah right there let's see what you got got it why don't you listen to me that was way easier than what we did last time yeah all right hold on let me go around the other side now that was way easier yeah I'll try to tell you that was our better route oh all right hold on all right thank you look at this that's a perfect little hole for you I feel like I'm more of a plumber right now oh man let's get in here and see where you're at oh man I don't think that's really all that necessary so wherever you say you can't fit in a tight spot I know you're full of it for the record that we didn't video out last crawl space we were in I was in a lot tighter spot than you were a little man the oxygen levels were low I had to crawl out because you talk too much no I I was getting light ahead of that crawl out plus you need me on the outside anyways I don't think so all right I just want everybody to see his little tight hole you're in so you're about the size of when you're crammed up you're about the size of that AC unit see your short size comes in handy too I don't think you've been quite as well as what you used to no I don't all right did we make it we made it Hallelujah right here and we got enough wire looks like yep good freaking deal all right now we gotta figure out how this thing mounts user divide HVAC technician not on houses but on school buses oh that's good because I've been looking for a professional uh we got this straight off the boat from China yeah it's a styrofoam aluminum and hopes and dreams I believe somewhere in there hopefully a little bit of cool air yeah but for the record it did not come in pieces like that well well that piece come in pieces it's not supposed to be pieces yeah yeah the images didn't shipping all right basically we need to cut a 14 by 14 and a half hole up there and then this turns into one great big sandwich uh this piece basically goes to that piece and then it just gets all sandwiched together the piece goes outside yeah that speech goes inside yeah all right we're gonna get her a little man left over here and we'll I was wondering why it was so dark in here you got a whole lot of lights off are they all for blocked I'm thinking of the Rocks yeah look at that all right 14 and a half before day in half I'm not sure I'm not sure if we're running much but uh holiness heck yeah I am it'll be fine if it's wrong I mean it's just Janice somebody's gonna get wet when I'm sleeping yeah all right that's it I'm gonna fall through this thing trying to cut it you imagine twice three times thank you all right all right now we need to go down and frame that hole out yeah all right to the underside hey by the way good job I know Jenna won't tell you but I will pretty nice I'm gonna hold one yeah I can get her out here if we want if you want her to uh I think we're better off without her oh yeah she don't watch my videos so she won't know that did the holes uh off by two inches get out here hey I gotta tell them but well I guess I did tell them you're not centered in the bus uh I got latitude right here I prefer us to leave this up here so yeah we're running a little low on battery power all right man behind the scenes we got one piece already in there kind of got a notched out where it holds that up so keep our roof good so we got one in chamfered to make sure we miss those wires over there I don't know if I can do this why get some good action shots of me working tight fit um you're supposed to be watching that water I am back here it'd be nice if you had some air conditioning this bus oh boy you better smash good news crisis on Earth yeah you just said you put that notch in there yeah there you go play that old gutter yeah what you do all right so there's those and then we should go right here like this right yep and then that should be our 14 and a half you know we can screw this all together but the way this system works this air conditioner is a big sandwich and uh we put that piece of plywood down here sandwich it all up and we put some screws in out here and that'll hold it ain't going nowhere because these are tied into that bow that'll be tied into that roof yeah and we can actually run screws up into the strut there the strut yep all right let's get that last one in and then we're gonna grab our plywood you probably will screw that one in for me I'll make it easy yeah you gotta show the fancy piece we made look at that you can tell what all we went through to make that happen I'm holding my hand it was not pretty trip I lost saw box came open on the truck started raining all this raining but look how pretty it is now I know it so in theory let's put that up into a test room so that is gonna go like that well that's gonna look good [Music] so that'll all get squeezed up tight like so yeah uh yeah I'm liking it so basically when you put the air conditioning unit on top yep and then we can squeeze all that up in there yeah oh yeah we'll go you know what we could do move these magnets over here that we're in the way well is it gonna hurt is it going to hurt anything to go ahead and put just a couple screws in there to hold that up that way we're not fighting it with everything else yeah we go ahead and put screws in yeah let's do that foreign okay right I love it I believe screws gotta do is hold it until we get the unit on top yep is it time for Up Up and Away it is right you ain't gonna have enough uh up up it's gonna be close it's fun now let's do it you go up catch how about uh how about over this uh air conditioner unit if anybody's wondering all right see what you got look at this how the installment the factory with a two-ton crane oh foreign nice even bead a level of concentration look at it okay I wish we could have welded this speed well it's kind of like liquid welding is that such thing yeah well there is plastic welding after time lapse is the speed you're going and it is for you have to go a lot quicker it's Virginia so I'm trying to make sure I do it right well if at least it's not my head that gets wet sorry Macy all right ah so I would have lowered this down so far like I told them all right bring it down coming down coming down good yep come on oh yeah uh needs to go towards the raise it up just a little bit I need to go towards the back a little bit a little more all right hold up I know it's got dark guys I don't know if you can see but this little metal bracket catches our framing it goes all the way up through catches that unit on top kind of squeezes everything together possibly to make sure you don't over tighten these I think it's like five foot pounds foreign all right I got the washer on the wrong side of this let me switch it real quick and it'll be good all right man behind the scenes about to go backwards to go forward second time's charm the commenters were a little late I'm telling me I forgot my piece of duct work and once I realized I forgot my duct work I realized I had this on backwards but I wasn't down here it's on right now so only thing we got left now is uh the bottom cover right all right put it need this out of there right yep this goes out now I know you spin this around this way oh this looks up to this yep that one's gonna be real nice is I wonder if I should zip tie down for this so I don't think that's what that's for oh yeah so it don't flop around in there because whenever you pull it up it'll pull it up in there yeah all right you ready yep got your holes no something you did I should be right on it I can't come towards me you can't as far your way as I can go I'm hitting that I'm in the groove there there's a Groove in the center that you gotta be there you go there like I think you got it yeah I was gonna say probably had yep the only thing I like about this is It's backwards let me just Powers uh this should have been turned around so the writing ain't upside down well I should have returned the bus over you'll be in good shape all right a lot of this let's see it work you got plugged in 220 I don't have my cord for my boss if I can shove the ends of the wires and I can extension cords real quick oh yeah ah I went behind the scenes now we got a cold AC yes we got one thing left to wire and it is the hot water heater the hot water we gotta run dedicated circuit there I don't know if there's much exciting to film on now we basically got to get from there to this switch right here because it's on a on off switch everything's all right there everything's already there let us uh let us get it run and then we'll uh we'll show you what we got all right man behind the scenes I think everything on the front half has done so should we show them what we did you want me to show them what I did yeah I'm off the clock yeah I see that so all right so we had to isolate out the hot water heater circuit the hot water heater is on a switch because you don't need it sitting there we don't use the hot water heater a whole lot so you don't want to sit there and randomly draw an amps and I don't need to so I had to isolate out the hot water heater from this circuit to put it on its own circuit and I still wanted to keep the switch so got these two wires or them two plugs into the old feeder wire into a nice little junction box right here and then we run a new feeder wire to come up for the hot water heater and if you guys look right up there there's the heater and it's got its own dedicated plug-in up there so that is that so with all that being said I think everything in the front half of the bus is done the only thing I got left to do is uh get those circuit train into the breaker panel yep and then I need to get uh it's about 15 about 40 amp plug in the shop get it plugged in see what it goes yeah you got choo choo train coming to visit us that's gonna be a wrap for tonight I like one more evening and we're gonna have this thing all right guys back on the bus and we are getting close we're gonna get this thing done one way or another so these are the last two circuits we ran in this one here is the air conditioner this one here is the hot water heater we're gonna switch over put these on uh what do I go 20 amp circuits we'll pull one off one leg one off the other leg just to kind of keep everything even out but let's get these wired in and then uh we'll uh plug this thing in the wall and see if everything works foreign guys I think we I think we're dead I think we're down to the most important part seeing if this uh see if this thing works you got our breaker box all tidied up got our four circuits in there for now I went ahead and picked up two extra circuit breakers I just zip tied them up there for now so with 50 amps we should be able to add two more circuits if we decide excuse me if they saw we want something like an outside plug or uh something of the future Jim I couldn't dream anything up and I wasn't going to add anything to the list excuse me we already had enough going on so uh yeah I guess uh Step One is we got us a new 50 amp power cord should be a good old-fashioned twist and lock into there got the ring on to kind of keep everything plugged up tight so that much amperage you want to make sure every all your connections stay good and tight so nothing comes loose and uh we're gonna take the other end go plug it into the uh welder plug here in the shop see what happens all right so prayer no sparks [Music] that is a tight plug right there folks that's good well I hear the air conditioner kicked on Jenna took this back down is she painting it looks pretty good touch running see if we got a light in the refrigerator oh yeah baby that's looking good hot water heater on nope but if we flip the switch look at that look at that I can't actually try it because we're out of water in the bus I'd like to fill a little bit of water in there and see what happens but ah there we go operation rewire is about complete so we're gonna get this thing cleaned up let's take it up to the actual campsite and get it set up and uh see what everybody thinks well here she is guys back out in the wild up here at our little family compound let's go inside and see if everything's everything's working I guess so well what's the verdict do we have cold AC yes yes can we have hot water bomb yes to both the refrigerator work yeah yeah everybody comfortable everything seems to be working just fine all right good news that means I can leave you guys go back home to my nice comfy bed no you like camping you like camping now you're just not gonna admit it to nobody all right everything's fixed I'm done I'm going home [Laughter] [Music] and you got a bed I'd like to go back to work sure they're bad do I just need to put like some like stay safe I would help a little bit so all right so we got done we gotta goes you guys gotta tell them bye they gotta go um don't they like the video give it a big thumbs up we want to make sure you don't miss out on what's coming up next I need to consider subscribing if I have it tell them I don't know you guys subscribe

Channel: Dirt Perfect

Views: 59,587

Keywords: school bus conversion, skoolie conversion, do it yourself, andrew camarata, construction, diesel creek, heavydsparks, larson farms, letsdig18, letsdig18 volvo, matt's off road recovery, millennial farmer, mustie1, out door with the morgens, stanly, welker farms, rewiring, electrical, how to, upgrade, how to electrical, diy electrical, full rewire, camper bus, bus conversion, skoolie, bus conversion build, 50 amp, rv electrical, 50 amp rv outlet, rv electrical system, camping

Id: 7nK4hvel9hI

Length: 38min 18sec (2298 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 25 2023