Cheap No Build Van Conversion Camper: Van Life Tour and Setup - Ford Econoline E150 E250

as a first adventure i started planning a six-week trip up to alaska and the yukon with that i had to start looking for a vehicle now my requirements for this van were pretty darn simple but in my research i found people who spend thousands of hours and thousands of dollars in creating their van without even going on a trip first now i think the danger in this is that you can end up over building how do you know what you really need until you actually go and do a trip now the problem with overbuilding is that you're carrying around a lot of that you really don't need and you're going to be penalized on every kilometer that you drive as far as fuel economy so my thought was that i'm going to do the simplest version of my requirements that i possibly can for a first trip and then see what i want to add after even though my design might look very simple when you see it it actually took a lot of time and thought to get it down to this level so as a base i wanted something that would be simple light require a minimal destruction to the body of the vehicle and be as inexpensive as i could possibly make it as far as functionality i wanted something that would require minimal setup and tear down on a daily basis i also wanted something that would be discreet so that i could camp wherever i had to even in a residential area if necessary and i wanted something that had a full-size bed that didn't require opening closing every day and lastly i wanted somewhere where i could store my bike inside the van that was out of the way rather than putting it on the outside of a van on a bike rack where i'd have to worry about it being stolen and it would be in the way as far as opening and closing the back doors okay so as a platform to build upon i chose the ford econoline cargo van now this e150 even though it's the base model the most lightweight it still has more than enough capacity to function as an rv or camper van now i've seen some people recommend the more heavy duty models but this one will carry 3 194 pounds of passengers and cargo now if you think you need more hauling capacity than that you probably don't what you need is to get rid of some of your the van comes with a 4.6 liter v8 it has air conditioning mine has cruise control and it also has a stereo that i installed and i'll show you that later it has two barn door style doors on the side with windows in them and it also has the same in the rear oh and although the van looks plain white ford has assured me that it's not it's actually oxford white okay so it's raining out here a little bit so how about we go inside and take a look okay welcome to a tour of the inside of the mansion in this video i'm not going to go a lot into why i did things the way i have those decisions will be explained in future videos i put a lot of research into it and that's probably a lot of detail that you don't want to see in this particular video i've also tried to remove a lot of stuff that i would normally have in here just so you can get a better view of the whole design a lot of times there'd be coats and clothes hanging on the sides and that would just sort of get in the way and detract from uh from seeing the vans okay so first of all the walls there is no insulation or anything behind this wood paneling this has given me over six feet of width to comfortably sleep uh widthwise in the van the paneling is 1 8 inch solid mahogany imported from the philippines and attached to the wall well come closer attached with half inch self tapping screws now this wood is also known as luon and it's extremely cheap you can see that the corners are rounded and custom cut for a precision fit i've left the roof completely untouched as anything i put up there would consume precious head room and anything beyond white brings the the the feeling of the the head room and the height down lower so by keeping it white that makes the van seem like it has a higher roof when you're in here moving around doing your thing so it's perfect the way it is and plus it's got these uh various little um holes in here where you can hang headlamps and lights as far as the bed goes this is a full-size twin that sleeps too comfortably the mattress is custom made it's 54 inch by 73 and a half inch and the foam is three inches thick now normally the manufacturers would uh recommend a four inch thick mattress because it makes them lots of money and it's really good for extremely heavy people but i went with three inch i've got two inches of 2036 foam topped by a one inch convoluted waffle foam that's great for that massaging feeling while you sleep and there's no bottoming out of course normally while on a trip i'd have a comforter on here but i wanted you to see this beautiful cortez fabric mattress cover that came with it as well it's just really great that while you're sleeping you know that this cortez mattress cover is down below underneath keeping everything together and solid and when you actually lay down on it it's really super super comfortable [Applause] now the thickness of the mattress and the actual height of the bed was one of the bigger decisions in the building this van because i wanted to have enough room for storage bins underneath the bed while still providing enough headroom so that i could sit up comfortably without banging my head so with that i built the bed at 15 inches height now above the wood paneling down the length of both walls i've installed these hooks which are great for hanging backpacks and my toiletries bag and also clothing along the sides i can also go over here and this side is great for hanging wet clothes because it's directly over the sunken plastic side entrance well uh of the van so everything just drips onto that and doesn't do any damage to the floor beside the door is a great place for the water when i cook outside it's super convenient the sunken entryway makes filling pots and bottles super easy and one of the best things is that any drips just flow down onto the plastic step and outside of the van beside the water i have spots for three 53-liter bins and in the middle of the bins i do have a separator that can be removed to make room for bigger items now these bins hold my most commonly accessed items like all my kitchen stuff my pots and pans my current stock of food and my clothes and on the far side against the wall there's a little cubby hole where i keep my stove and my camp chair i've also designed it so that where the flooring ends it creates a lip that keeps the bins into place for the floor i use this forest fusion clicked together vinyl floor planking it's durable doesn't get damaged by water like wood it's super easy to install and great for dance parties and this floor is completely free floating i've not attached it to the base of the van and the reason for that is because this floor needs room to expand and contract and if you were to secure it to the bottom you could get buckling and separation when the floor goes through the seasons here in canada where it varies between 30 and plus 30. during my alaska trip i drove on some pretty rough roads the mccarthy road and the dempster and i found even with the floor floating it never really moved because it's quite heavy and solid as assembled all i noticed was that on the roughest roads after 100 kilometers of driving it had maybe shifted about half an inch so i found a fairly simple solution what i did was i took one minute and i pushed it back into place now over here against the wall behind the driver's seat you can see it's a great place to store my cooler this cooler is extremely well insulated and holds ice for five days so it's hardly an inconvenience to have to stop for ice every once in a while this cooler has 49 liters of space so it holds a ton of food and drinks now the only thing i've not liked about coolers in the past has been that once ice does melt a little bit you get a little bit of water on the bottom and then you'll have produce mixing with fresh meat and it's just not healthy so i've gone and designed a really interesting setup inside of here to keep that from happening i'll show you that in a future episode and i'll also explain why i didn't get a propane fridge in back of the cooler is a great place to store my folding table which i use outside to set my stove on when i'm cooking now over here you can see my two chocolate satin drapes which separate the cockpit from the living area these were extremely important in alaska where you have 24-hour light and through practice and optimization i've gotten the switch over from night to day to less than a second watch this day night day night sealing off every crack of light was really important to getting a good sleep so i also on the side here where there is a gap i have velcro so i can butt the drapes right up against the wall and seal off every last bit of light they're suspended from the roof using a simple spring-loaded curtain rod in the sides of the doors i keep my dustpan and awkward items like my hiking poles okay welcome to the garage i wanted a way to store my bike inside the van but yet being out of the way and requiring as little disassembly to the bike as possible and as you can see the bike is fully assembled the only thing i have to do is loosen the handlebars to turn them sideways to get the bike in even though i could have used less to get the bike in i went with the massive 11 and a half inches of depth for the garage getting the bike in and out is extremely easy as you can see i just turn it sideways and pull it out to get it in is simply the reverse i just roll the wheel up and it's in it's like magic now i normally have a blue tarp in back of the bike and on the bottom to keep the dirt out from the bedroom as you can see i've got a lot of storage space underneath the bed here in the back as well with enough room for three of the 53 liter bins now because the bike is in the way of these bins i typically put things that i don't need on a daily basis or will need only once so this is all of my reserve food my backpacking equipment like my tent this sort of stuff that i access only once a day or very rarely and you can also see here i have my window coverings which are also in the side windows they're ultra classy on the inside with this wooden bamboo look and they come out very easily and on the outside they are silver so they reflect the heat and keep things cool during the day they're actually beach mats that i got from the dollar store for a few dollars and cut down to size they can be attached ultra quick and these flexible clips i'm not even sure what they're called but they're used in picture frames in the back to hold the photo in but they work great for this purpose and i also have in the corner here stove fuel and tools and other things like that you

Channel: Sweller Van Dweller's Your Van Life Toolbox

Views: 68,189

Keywords: simple van build, simple van camper conversion, simple van tour, simple van life tour, simple van life setup, easy van build, easy van conversion, easy van camper conversion, easy van tour, easy van life tour, easy van life setup, no build van conversion, no build van life, no build camper, modular van, van tour, van life, tight budget living, inexpensive van conversion, tight budget van life, low budget van life, van life on a budget, best cheap van for van life, e150

Id: Cx3RHFXXeqk

Length: 13min 10sec (790 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 23 2022