LOW COST | DIY Camper Van Conversion Solo Woman

my husband passed away five years ago and half of his ashes are sprinkled over there in the woods so this is a very special i think it's here now very special sight to me hello this is patrick with new jersey's outdoor adventures youtube channel here at elaire state park in new jersey and i met up with sandy and sandy has a really cool budget-friendly diy van conversion that she's going to give us a tour of today so join us hi i'm sandy and i've been camping for about 50 years i grew up in new jersey i lived in new jersey for about 35 years of my life and then i never went camping until i was 20. so i've been camping for 50 years tomorrow's my birthday i'll be 72. so over the years i've had tons of different rigs and tons of different vans and cars and different things i've tried to fix up and different things for camping but um i decided at this point that i wanted to try uh doing a full-size van because i actually had a minivan before this and i found out that i had to spend most of the time on my knees and crawling around and when you're my age and you have back and hip problems that just does not work so i went up into this um van and i love it i absolutely love this fan it's fantastic it's a chevy express 2500 i had a little bit of a challenge looking around for a van because i only had a certain amount of money to spend and vans are hard to come by sometimes and so i finally found this van and it was actually in a lot um run by i live out lancaster county now pennsylvania so it was run by mennonites and super super nice people and they had a whole fleet of these types of vans uh that used to be owned by the military uh so i it's a 2012 and it only had about 18 000 miles on it a perfect condition and i bought it specifically because of the running boards because it's very hard to this is a very high step if you have to come in off the ground and so and then i also have another step down there because of my back and hip issues so that works out great for me so i made the um all of the windows are covered with reflectix it's material on the inside and on the outside i painted a black and i did it with spray glue i don't recommend that you do that in your kitchen that was a mistake i have the first aid kit hanging right here at the door because i had an incident at home where i nicked a vein and i didn't have even anything at home to help me so i have things in there now that if i were to be bleeding or someone else was bleeding i could help them and i wanted it right out in the open where i would be able to know where it was at all times my son put that shelf on for me which i didn't know what i was going to put in there at the time but it's got my [Music] fire stop which is very important i had a volkswagen van that caught fire and burned to the ground when we were camping once and so it's really important to have a fire extinguisher or something my son put this on by just putting two screws right through it right into the whatever you would call that so the floor was um i just actually didn't lay anything down there's carpet under here but i have a dog i usually camp with so i didn't want any accidents to happen so i just put the linoleum down right on top of it and it's easy to clean and i put the strip on right here because again i don't want to have to trip or anything up in the front i have to on the windshield i have they're just like the sun shades that you would put in your car for the heat but they suction on and then i made reflectix to the for the two front windows because when you're i also have a curtain i could pull but when you close that it closes everything in so with without it it's nice and open you feel like you have more room which is important to me i had a 12 volt refrigerator i tried them i had a couple of different ones and they just didn't work out so for the time being i went back to having my old cooler and um and ice and i make my own block ice at home because block ice lasts a lot longer than ice cubes especially when it's hot i have bungees hanging different places i have this is my husband used to make hiking sticks so this was his stick i have my umbrella here my broom and my solar panels i have a jackery 500 back over there um i have a lamp that's plugged into it right now and i have a 12 i put in the max air fan and i had it not connected to the battery of the car i have a wire a six foot wire that they left me so i can put the jackery anywhere in here and put it into the 12 volt and it runs it and i found out i went to florida recently so i found out that without having that fan it was brutal so i put these chunks i just put them here before i left the house to come here just because i don't know i had some books i wanted to bring and just some extra things and an extra blanket and that kind of thing so i put these here they're just stacked there and i bungee everything so it doesn't go flying all over and that i use that this is my um my kneeling pad so when i come in here if i have to kneel to get under the bed or something i use this the bed is um it's just a metal frame which is the sec um it was a double bed and so this is half of it and then this is a six foot trifold memory foam mattress very very comfortable and i got the tri-fold because i'm able to carry it around myself without having to have anyone help me under the bed i have just storage i have you know this is one whole big trunk and i found a very cool way to cook without making a mess i bring this steamer pot with me which has a big basket and i line it with aluminum foil and i'll bring like chili that i made or even frozen foods from you know the store put them in there steam it put the top on and steam it until they get hot i eat it right out of the aluminum foil and then i wrap it up and i don't have any dishes no mess in the pot it's wonderful i just ordered another palm and stove i had an old coleman stove the old big heavy one and i was leaving the campsite last two weeks ago when i was camping and um i lit it was a torrentially raining i was trying to get things in and the thing opened and just whacked me in my leg oh my god it was awful so i decided i'm getting a different stove but in the meantime i can show you what's in the back it's just that one single burner one that sits on the propane can this is my port-a-potty enough said and then i have one trunk i just turned this way just to put like my mirror and different things in and my little meditation dog i have and um i have a lantern back here as well and then i have a usb fan over here that stays here all the time and you can drive with it and everything it's you know fine so if you notice i have things stuffed on the side of the bed and this is the solar panel that goes to the jackery um i keep it in the plastic bag that it came in just so it doesn't get all messed up and this is it when it's open and on the back it has kickstand so you can angle it toward the sun you know if you need to and that hooks right up into the jackery and charges it so the jackery can be charged by solar panel electric in the house or in the cigarette lighter this here is a back rest that i bought and like last night i was using it to watch youtube channels and it just comes up it has a bunch of different you know uh positions that you can put it in and um yeah and then i put pillows you know in front of it it worked great and then um during the day my um reflectix and the the front window shades and the reflectix they go here so everything you know everything has a place otherwise you become overwhelmed these are my buddhist flags um i used to be heavily into meditation i kind of have put it aside for a while why i don't know but anyway i love these so these are my meditation players and i started a um sticker board over there and patrick just gave me a sticker to put on and this is the um six foot plug for the jackery um the way they wired it they just put it in so you know here's the wire and then so i didn't want it kicking around and getting damaged so i put it up in here and i just clip it so it stays in one place and the lights are just running off of the um little tiny mini charger and i had them hooked up to the z to the jackery when i went camping last time and it they were on for about seven hours and it drew no power at all you know it was amazing led it's amazing okay so this is the jackery 500. i am super happy with it um i have a a lamp which is this lamp here plugged into it right now in the electric side um these are usb chargers you can charge your phone your laptop all of that stuff this is the 12 volt um charger so when you as you see the lights on here so anytime you're gonna use it you put it on and then it'll tell you how much power you have left and like the lamp right now is drawing six watts so you'll be able to run that a long time at 92 percent and i think it's great i mean you know there's such a big debate about jackery and versus other brands and things i i love this thing i think it's wonderful it's it's not that heavy for me to be able to carry around either which is good when i um want to charge it with the with the solar chargers i mean the solar panels you just plug it right into there and then you actually can take this right outside you know and sit it right next to the solar panels while it charges so let me show you my garage in the back [Music] and i always try to get this particular campsite because first of all it's the one of the biggest and pretty much most of the private there's no one really next to me over here but also um my husband passed away five years ago and half of his ashes are sprinkled over there in the woods so this is a very special i think it's here you know very special sight to me so this is my what i call the garage and i used to have all of these things these drawers inside the van and i found for myself that all day long you're going in and out and in and out and up and down those steps trying to you need a fork you need a you know whatever you need and so i got the right idea because i went to florida i had way too much stuff i had all this stuff in there in the front and i was miserable so i came home ripped everything out of the brand and started over and now i have all my kitchen stuff here and this is the little stove i'm using right now you just put the you know it sits the propane canister sits right there i don't i mean it's okay and i've had it for years and it works fine i just feel like if you have a big pan or something it's very precarious i always feel like it's gonna fall over and i don't like that so i just ordered another stove um so i keep my electric cords here for when i'm at a place that has electric and then i have things like um i actually bought holes and magnets to make a tarp i haven't had a chance to use it yet but this is the um the tar i'm not a tarp what do you call that a canopy so this is the tarp for it and i have like different electric cords you know sometimes if you go to a campsite and they have the 30 amp plugs i always try to have different plugs with me just in case because you just don't know and zip ties you can't live without zip ties and duct tape and bungees you have to have all those things so i have an extra fan in here an electric fan but also runs on batteries um i have some fire starters and then i have i bought these screens the screen doors that have the magnets in them that you know you walk through and i put them back here and i'm gonna get another set for the side door i put them back here and i just clipped them right onto the rubber with um office clips or other clips that i might have and it works fantastic and there they have um as you can see they have pictures of butterflies on them so they actually you can have them and it's sort of private you don't feel like you know people are just walking by and looking in your van and then this is just all my kitchen stuff um bowls and stuff like that and silverware and i have extra propane here because i went camping a couple weeks ago and i don't know why but the stove drained the i just drained them i had no propane so i thought you better carry extra propane sandy thank you very much for taking the time today to give us a tour of your beautiful diy camper van conversion and thank you for sharing that you reconfigured the floor plan after your trip i guess when you build something out and you use it your needs might change or you realize that it's not working exactly the way you want and i guess that's the beauty about building it yourself because you can just reconfigure it and you're not going to know until you do it that's the thing you have to you know i mean there's still things i still move around in here and stuff but you know you have to just try stuff and then if it doesn't work you scrap that you go on to something else that's all i mean that's all you can do from my experience in the rv business when people buy an rv and it doesn't work for them they trade it in yes but if you build one yourself you just take it apart and you put it back and you do it over that's right that's right can you help our viewers there's a lot of viewers that watch the channel that want to build their own and they might be in a similar situation that you were and had a start out maybe a minivan or maybe just went from tent camping and looking for a nice upgrade can you help them and tell us some of the challenges that you might have had when you first started this conversion well my son actually actually built me a bed in here and i was i'm able to sleep um sideways so he actually built me with plywood which now is exorbitantly expensive i still wish i had it uh he built me a really nice bed and everything so we tried to go that route and have stuff underneath and all it just wasn't working so while i was in florida i actually ripped the bed apart myself and put it out for garbage and so um i just you know i don't know i i mean i've been camping for so long i don't even think it did i don't know how to explain it i don't even think about it you know what i mean like i don't feel like anything was too challenging i mean i had these draws already i own them already this one i just got because i i was finding that when this door is closed um if i just want to get a fork or whatever you know or something out of the kitchen little area um i have all that over here in which case then you have it open both doors it's not a chore but you know it's just easier to open one door and get what you need and and that's all oh the fan yes well as i said earlier i live in lancaster pennsylvania and i called a million places trying to find anybody that would put a fan in my roof and um nobody would do it i called rv dealers they acted like i was asking for the moon um i called garages body shops any place you could think um i finally found this uh custom van solutions i think it is and they they commercial commercial van solutions they work on commercial vehicles and um i called up and i asked do you people put fans in the roof you know roof fans in and she said yes and i said oh please make me an appointment like i was so excited because when i was in florida i didn't have the fan and it was hot and humid and i realized that if i want to camp in here in the hot weather that's not gonna happen if i don't have a fan so i'm happy for it did you watch a lot of youtube videos that's all i watch i just i just constantly sit and watch youtube video for hours and hours and hours and hours yes i've seen many of patrick's yes was there any inspiration from some of the videos that you might have seen maybe outside of my channel that uh gave you some ideas for this one yes and i still get ideas you know you watch the videos and you think wow that's a really good i'm gonna i'm gonna try that my van or whatever and even with the fan um i follow um vancity van life and chrome his name is chrome and um he goes out in the boondocks out in the middle of nowhere in british columbia and he just pulled over to the side of the road in the woods one day and just got up on the roof and cut a hole in his roof and put in a fantastic fan so i asked my son if he would because i couldn't find anyone and i asked would he be willing to try and he was really reluctant and then i and i thought well if i don't want to even mess with that because all you need is to have a leak and then you're got a big mess so i was so happy to find that place oh and patrick just taught me a trick today um the doors i've had the doors were pretty much open just about to here and when he stopped by earlier he said you know these doors open wider and i said i do know but i didn't know how to do it so he showed me how to do it you're gonna make me do it huh so you just pull this out am i right i mean i forget now pull this out now close the door a little bit more and then pull a little bit more a little bit more up to here yep right there oh okay okay i'll it'll take some practice i'll get it eventually but it's a game changer because i have whacked my elbow on that door a million times so i'm thrilled for this i never understood why they made the back doors you know they open beautifully but these forget it well it is patrick with new jersey's outdoor adventures youtube channel hope you enjoyed this video please like this video comment share and subscribe i love it and we'll see you soon thank you

Channel: New Jersey Outdoor Adventures

Views: 75,432

Rating: 4.9590683 out of 5

Keywords: vanlife, van life, camper build, camper van, van build, sprinter conversion, skoolie conversion, transit camper, spinter camper, airstreams, van buildout, promaster camper, mercedes camper, ford camper, Budget camper, Chevy camper, Van life

Id: O_m9b05Lmjs

Length: 20min 42sec (1242 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 03 2021