NEW VAN TOUR | Self Converted Promaster to Beautiful Luxurious Tiny Home | Full-Time VAN LIFE

[Music] hi everyone we're dom and marie and this is vanessa nessa our second home on wales that we converted this year starting in january tom's dad is actually the one who converted the van for us and it's amazing it has everything we need in there it's a four-seater there's a full space to work we have a hot water shower a full kitchen unit plenty of storage a huge garage a fixed bed and a massive electrical setup that we can't wait to show you so let's jump in right now because we all know you want to see this van tour we are dom and marie we were traveling around the united states and covet him stuck at home we sold our first van vanessa to build a bigger one after a few months in the shop we are now back on the road with our new home on wheels that we named vanessa nessa tune in every sunday for a new episode of van life saga [Music] so this is a 2021 ram promaster 159 extended high room two swivel seats and two 20 amp hour that were already included in the vehicle now coming in the van and because we know we are going to be spending a lot of time working from the van when you come in it already feels like a pretty big open space we need a step do we need we need a step it's super high [Music] the bed is located at the end on the left side here is where we have the water unit right side is related to cooking and then the front here work and eating starting with these two swivel seats that swivel very easily and you just pull on this thing here it swivels allowing us to have four people at the table so two front swivel seats and one big fold-away seat and what's really really cool about it is that it folds away so the way you do it is you remove the table now once the table is removed we remove the second table as well this lowers like this and then this one here folds away so this gives us plenty of space in the van if the seat is not in use and we are loving that space well you can do yoga there since you have that much space i'm such a yogi yeah i know no because we didn't want a dinette in the back like our previous van we have included a lagoon mount set up the table here moves around and we have also made a second table much bigger right here that we are eventually going to be putting a second mount like this and it goes right here so this table will allow us to have a lot of people well four people 20 people 20 people eating with us at the table or if we have a really busy day at work both dom and i can be working at the table at the same time or dom has a lot of things and he can be working here and he has a lot of extra space now over the sitting area right here is where we have the bookshelf we could have installed another cabinet but again we felt it would look just a bit too crowded we were scared we'd hit our heads when going up and down from the seats so we installed this in our previous van we had the books flying everywhere they were on the counters in the cabinets and it was just all over the place so we decided we'd make it you know the van feel just a little bit more homey installed everything there and we've also included a little cork where we can pin pictures so bookshelf dom's idea and it's really really great featuring my fake plant that i love and that i will name it wilda starting today all right it will does in the corner what's her name here and will that wilder [Music] now in terms of lighting we have a lot of puck lights in the van starting with this main alley right here in the middle on another circuit we have a puck light right here over the water unit and then on this side we have one over the bed on the passenger side one over the bed on the driver's side and then two puck lights right here located over the kitchen unit what we love the most about the lighting is this little thing here allowing us to turn them on and off in the bed but also dem them which we love and they're also on different circuits so i could close one and then have just a certain one open so that is something that we love in the van now moving to the kitchen area the first thing that you will see is this max air fan what we love about this fan is that it creates a very nice ventilation it is close to the cooktop so when we are eating all the smoke will be coming out here or from the door it also creates a very nice draft with the back windows when we are sleeping it is remote operated it also has a rain sensor so if it rains it'll close um you can also adjust the speed and what's really cool about this fan and that's something that's different than the previous fan that we had is we can drive with the fan open because it has because it has a shield now you may be noticing this black thing here over the fan and what it is it's just a fan cover that we got from rolex and it's just very very nice the way it works you undo this and you can zip it all around so it creates a very nice blackout sometimes we're sleeping in walmart parking lots and it's very very bright outside so this clears it and in the winter it uh prevents the cold from coming in the van and it's just very simple you just roll it and you are good to go now kitchen area starting with the counters these are bamboo counters that we got from rona we cut to the right dimensions they are very light they are also very very durable all you need to do is sand them when you get them oil them and you're good to go so bamboo counters on both sides of the van now in regards to our cooktop this is a gasland chef two burner stove that we got from our friends at the cabin depot it is connected to a 10 pound propane tank that is located in the back that is properly sealed and ventilated and the way it works you just start the inverter and you turn it on and it is easy as that that's a very cool cooktop we love it we had something similar in our previous van but this one is just very very sweet now on the counter is where we have this little thing here and a lot of people are wondering what it is and it's a vent that is connected to our heater so it is an s par backer b4l bar whatever it's probably the the hardest name to pronounce in the whole van in the description is it german yeah everest yeah so we have one vent here uh just you know to have hot air in the bed when it's really cold in the winter and we also have one located right here in the front to have hot air coming in the front as well and the reason why we chose this one in particular is because it automatically adjusts to the altitude let's remember that in march 2020 we were in utah it was freezing cold our heater which wasn't nsbar broke and we had to spend a couple of nights below zero and it is darn cold so this heater is something that we love about the van now as you can see here we have a massive fridge in the van this is an isotherm 130 so cruise 130 and it is 130 liters it also has a six liter freezer filled with ice cream look your surprises right there these are my things these are maggi only okay and again i just i mean we just love this fridge because it is massive we can go on for days without having to stop at the grocery store and it's not a cheap fridge but it's super super super very low on energy consumption and it's also very silent when we're sleeping or when we're driving around whatever you cannot hear this fridge it is very very silent and you can fill it up with ice cream so two upper cabinets related to the kitchen unit on this left one here is where we have our cups uh mugs we have our jetboil and our magic bullet and then here we have a little bit of dry food big bottles our italian press and mugs and these hold in place thanks to these little pistons here that can hold up to 40 newton so these are very very nice so we can be cooking and we can just leave them open like this and obviously when we're driving they do not make a single sound because of the pistons and they never open now going to the bottom is my main special feature on this van i've talked about this in previous videos this pantry that i love so spices are on top we have our coffee uh almond butter beans and then in the bottom rice and other sorts of dry food so this little thing here that locks in place thanks to this little locker right here first drawer is where we put our utensils and placemats uh this looks very very fancy but we got this on amazon and it just helps keep everything organized did you misplace this second jar here is where we have bigger utensils for cooking uh bottle opener cheese grater scissors lighter knives and big spoons to cook opening these two doors is where we have our cups and plates so we have made a little divider and for everything not to ramble when we drive we just added these little things here that we got on amazon as well we also have you know our strainer bowls and we have our pots and pans let's stick one over the other and then we just have like some reusable plastic you know tupperware's everything is located here now moving to the water unit under here is where we have our undermount sink it is a 16 by 16 lk sink made out of quartz or granite if my memory is right and on the bottom we have this protective grid here we do like it because it's quite big so we can have a lot of dishes here and loving this piece that we put on top just because it allows us to drive without the dishes rambling around and falling on the ground so that is something that we love we also use it as a cutting board when you need to cut vegetable now coming to this faucet it is from lk it is black again single hole and what we love about it is that it has a pull out spray so the way it works you just turn it on it is connected to a pump located right here under the bench and you just turn it on the spray put it back to the o's and the reason why we always locate the sink on this side near the sliding door is just that you can easily pull it out and wash i don't know a dog your shoes dirty pots and pans anything and that's it in regards to water we have a big tank in this van it is located right here it is a passenger wheel well water tank provided by curious campervan it is connected to a seaflo 3 gallon per minute water pump from cabin depot that brings the water to the sink and to the shower in the back now in regards to waste we have a 22 liter gray water tank located under the van that we empty at the designated areas or campgrounds or whatever now in the winter because it tends to get really really cold and eastern canada we can't have water in the pipe so what we do is we have this big area here on the site where it's possible to have a seven gallon water jerry can that we will bring in and out of the van now this little thing here does look like a fake drawer but it is not we found this sponge tray in dom's parents garage and i thought it was clever to install it in the van so we never really know where to put the sponge and brushes and everything so we're putting it there we can actually put our toothbrush in there as well yeah with all the dirty sponges that's perfect isn't it a great idea and then in the bottom is where we put you know soaps detergent for the dishes and everything and then this pull-out garbage can something that we love as well we have one for recycling and one for compost in our previous van we just had one small trash can and we had to empty it every day now we have two so we can go on you know a couple of days without having to empty the garbage can so that's pretty sweet and finally in this door here is where we have our dometic 972 portable toilet that we usually put just right here in the middle you can put your chemical products in here this is to pump to add air this here brings water water in the tank and then you just take this waste part here you empty it where it is to be emptied and that is it so loving this toilet um if you want to know why we chose this particular toilet and why we have one you can look at that video can you have the card pop right here yeah it's exactly there where your fingers poop upper cabinet right here again same process for the newton pistons and this one is related to you know toiletry kits paper towel this is like a junk basket this little thing here where we have our plasters so toiletry kits and everything related to you know water is located right here do you want to take it from here now here we have what my father and i call boat shelves so it's basically shelves that are that have a good contour here so things don't fall when you're driving around we soon realize you can put a whole lot of stuff in there including our sound system and here come closer since we have a very big water tank that is hidden underneath the bed we have a water gauge to tell us how much water is left in the tank so we don't have to go underneath to check every time probably the best feature in this van every back storage we've seen in a van have a front door now marie and i decided to go with with a very precise type of door it's called a tambour door it's like a garage door and the way it works is pretty simple you just push it up and down like a garage door the reason why we have this kind of door is simple we didn't want a traditional door because it would have hit all the cabinets around and we needed to manage as much space as possible so this door basically disappears in the ceiling of the garage in the back meaning we're not wasting any space so if you move that little very cutesy macrame you have a victron energy controller here this is basically the inverter whenever we want ac power i just flip it on like this and all the ac plugs in the van are fired up so we can use our laptops and all and and every kind of electronics that needs this kind of traditional plug this is the eberspacher control and just to make sure we know what it is i wrote hita underneath here and power underneath the other one so uh we don't you know confuse the two but he's looking at me like can you whatever we also have basic usb plugs like this so 2.4 amps plugs for our phones and all the electronics that we use that are super small and here is basically just the solar or the battery monitor uh which tells us how many volts we have in the batteries and how healthy or not the battery bank is this is the spaceship aka the control system this one here is basically just a 12 volt outlet here for the iphones or the small electronics and behind the lagoon table we have an ac outlet we also have 12 volt switch gears this is for the wattage w-a-t-a water meaning the pump and these are for the lights here and the lights of the central aisle right beneath it you have your fan remote control with your fancy little towel holder now looking at the bed this is a real sleeping mattress four inch thick mattress it's a 54 by 72 inch mattress and we have all the regular sheets that we use at home during summer and during winter we have alpaca wool coverings here just to make sure we're warm enough the tons of cushions on the bed i don't know what they're doing here we should ask the people buying stuff for decorations in that van they're just comfortable they're comfortable okay over the bed section we have four upper cabinets this is usually where we put all the clothing in the front we put all the daily things like t-shirts pants shorts underwears etc because maggie and i can reach them from the front in the back cabinets we put fleeces uh big sweaters coats uh raincoats etc because we can have access to them from the back or from the front if we kneel on the bed plenty of storage in that van we are not gonna miss any space anytime soon so basically what we decided to do is repeat the curtain rolls that we had in vanessa meaning it's just a simple cork fabric that we that we roll on top of each window it's totally blacked out um even humidity sticks to that side but this side is always dry it's nice aesthetics and it's fun to make so basic curtains here that we can roll up during the day roll down during the night we clip it with a little leather strap that he can make at home and that's it [Music] in the back we have first the shower section right here starting with the echotemp el5 this is a on-demand hot water system and it's basically connected to the propane that we have right here so the propane is in its own little room right there it's sealed and it's vented in the ground or in the floor of the van outside and the way it works is very simple you just connect the propane to here the water to here you have your little shower hose and you can take your shower right here like maggie demonstrated two weeks ago in the kingston trip video that we had moving to the other door we have the spa meaning the place where we have all the soaps and products to clean ourselves and to feel better starting with the little wood mat on the ground that we did this is a waterproof wood mat on which we step to avoid having sand and dust and dirt on our feet when we go back into the van the mat hangs here and we have all the body soap the shampoo and the conditioner from the ascendant company that we use daily in the center here we have a very big and very useful storage space where we can just put whatever we want depending on the trip we're doing super useful it is very wide it is maybe four or five times what you have in your normal car trunk so it's uh it's very useful underneath the driver's side in the storage here we have our electrical system by battleborn 600 amp hour battery bank in the back over there this is why it is ventilated we want it to be as fresh and as cool as possible right here you can't see it but i'll show you pictures of when we installed it we have a 3000 watt victron and this is what is used to generate ac current in the whole van what's nice with that inverter charger is that it is linked to your phone so whenever there is a problem you can just check the status on your phone and you can basically see what's going on with your solar panels or with your battery bank to finish the driver's side here we have a 12 volt a classic you know cigarette lighter here we also have a standard usb outlet here that we can turn on and off like this we have an ac plug for stuff that we could plug outside if we're ever camping or on a picnic table and this here is the main breaker for when we are plugged with our shore power which is on the other side of the wall so the second that we're plugged we flip on those breakers and the whole van becomes a part of the house or the camping where we're plugged talking about breakers our breaker box is right here including all the 12 volts and all the 120 volts breakers from the systems here and it's going to tell me exactly what's going on in the overall electrical system inside the van [Music] we have a swing arm for our spare tire here that clips directly to a custom made bumper by flansbirium the guy you saw when we reinstalled this on vanessa nessa and the custom swingarms on the right as well is especially made for our norva box that we kept from our first van perfect little box for storage and it looks amazingly great we got ko tubes again just to make sure we never get stuck in sand ameri although we always get we always get stuck in sand so yeah these are good ko2 tires uh mountain plus snow rated uh they're very good honestly we never got stuck anywhere except when i when i'm not careful um and it makes the van look great we have this custom built ladder from boreal camper i love the tubular style so meaning it's made of tubes it's powder coated so you don't slip on it when you go out and it comes with a full rack for the 159 promaster 2021 so it's pretty sturdy probably one of the best ladders you could buy in the province of quebec right now i know he sells in the united states as well for our friends down south and it's basically made of aluminum railings and extruded aluminum bars that you can just assemble yourself in a matter of minutes in vanessa we had yellow stripes that were equal to five horsepower each now we received a phone call from a printer a couple of weeks ago and he said i have 10 horsepower stripes if you want them he was able the printer to print the exact same yellow that we have on our logo and cut the stripes to length for our new van he said when he installed it be careful compared to what you had before these stripes are now 10 horsepower for a total of 40 additional horsepowers on the road i was like is that even legal and he didn't say yes so we are visiting this printer in two weeks and he's gonna explain how he did this it's and it's basically the same rap as we had before the exact same thing and do you know how he called it the printer how the horsepower yellow it's the whole can't believe how serious you are about this so [Music] so this is it i think this wraps up the van tour of vanessa nessa now if you want to know how much this conversion cost did cost how much it cost uh stay tuned or subscribe to the channel because we will let you know in next week video so next sunday we'll be doing a full budget video on the van in the meantime if you have questions about the build we just presented don't hesitate to ask them in the question below i will be in the comments section with my father on sunday morning but during all the week to answer your questions next week it's hot man super hot i'm like super sweaty you are super sweaty yeah i'm super sweaty like uh i can't focus it's so freaking hot you can never focus yeah but i can't even more focus than before you cannot focus on the focus of the now [Music]

Channel: Vanlife Sagas

Views: 13,681

Rating: 4.9859157 out of 5

Keywords: vanlife, campervan, campervan hacks, campervan tips, vanlife tips, vanlife tricks, campervan tricks, van tricks, diy van conversion, diy campervan, vanlife tips and tricks, van must haves, campervan must, diy van, decoration, interior design, hot shower, instant heater, van tour, vantour, cargo van, conversion, van build, tiny house, tiny home, build, DIY, off grid, small space, architecture, design

Id: fFZqymrlHGk

Length: 25min 11sec (1511 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 22 2021