The Ultimate Dream Van Build in a Nissan NV2500 Van

I had to think about building this section for about two weeks and scratched my head finally one day I got out and I built this section in here and the wall leans in so it was a little tough but I put a post in here that's solid and I went ahead and built in the screen door and as you can see this comes up but right here it tips in so the wall itself right here tips in and the the screen I trimmed that out and I put screen in it because I'm from Florida there's a lot of mosquitoes in Florida don't want them in the vehicle absolutely and then on the inside before I come out I was thinking it was going to be pretty cold so I have Plexiglas windows in it to keep the cold out and so yeah this is the unique part that you actually have a false door so to speak and so what inspired you to do that was it just the insects or something else uh no I had seen a one other van that was built like this an older woman in England had had hers built and I liked it and uh I used to have just the screen that went across here and they would tear and uh and you'd have problem getting them to close and I just got tired of it I took it out and built it in foreign I decided to build a door to section off the cab and I put it up there and if you look down below you will see my little doggie door that is for my little dog oh is your dog with you on this trip no she is not she's home with her mother because she does not like to ride so okay and what uh what's your dog's name Susie Susie uh so big shout out to Susie yes and uh then you just walk through and you can go right up to the cab my bed on this table right here drops I'm going to drop it the table drops down and the bed it just one finger and you can just slide it out and when you slide it out the back will drop down and you have a bed now it will come all the way out to make a queen bed I didn't there's four inches of memory foam and this is a bamboo oh mattress those I've heard are great those they are great and the reason I have the bamboo is because I had another van that had it in it and I removed it when I sold the van so I kept the bamboo and so why did you make the sliding system like that it's a very clever system how how did you come up with that well to begin with that just slides on the wood that's all and you can lift up on it and just slide it and you can pull it in and out with one finger wow that is excellent um to begin with when I first build it uh the the Wall come out to here and my wife complained that it was not enough room which I agree I went ahead and I sat and I thought about it and I've cut back my garage area in half moved it all back framed uh a wood bench over top of my water storage area and then I built this over here uh just for the seat and then I put I built the table where the table just flips up and so you really have seating for two right there right across each other on that table yes you have some big cabinets in here so what is what's all the storage for there um this is for my clothes I I I ended up taking more clothes than I'll ever need but yeah I do yeah so they're they're close they're pretty good sized cabinet first time I've ever made cabinets my neighbor who makes cabinets said it's just a box don't worry about it just make it now these cabinets I built the same way um they're smaller but they're just for storage for uh my dishes and my coffee cups and coffee and so on and so forth I have my my frying pan and a lot of my utensils on the wall I got tired of getting down here in these cabinets and looking for them so I just put them on the wall so I don't have to go looking for them and and I got a five dollar magnet that I put on here and uh you can just stick your your silverware or your uh utensils on it I like your silverware organizer here yeah tell me about that where did you find that I found that on Amazon I looked probably for an hour and a half for something like that and it's uh it comes with the silverware and it ran about twenty dollars and they have different colors and as you can see I just put a screw on each corner and now when I'm out here cooking and I want a spoon or a fork I just over and get it you don't have to get down in the in the drawers something else I put in here that I really liked is I have a stainless steel 10 inch deep sink and it's good for doing dishes and I've got I've got running water um oh wow yes that's a 12 volt pump underneath I wished I would have bought a smaller pump because it really flies out of here and how much fresh water do you have 12 gallons 12 gallons okay yes and what do you do for gray water uh I have a gray water tank under here also and then tell me about your stove system it's a nice looking stove yes um I bought it on Amazon as well as I bought everything else on Amazon it's just uh propane the propane tank sits in the rear of the van on the um on the driver's side in the rear this cabinet my wife hates it but this cabinet right here everybody likes the louvers and I painted it myself and I bought the cabinet in Texas at a Goodwill store I like the color I think it brightens the place up for sure yes I do too in here I'm this is a working project or a project that I'm going to do here this is all the canned goods that I have a lot of storage it is a lot of storage wow but now I find myself getting down low and going in here to get stuff what I'm going to do when I get back home I'm going to make a deep drawer put it in here where I can slide it out I'll be able to pull it out and be able to see down in here to what I have and what I don't have so it looks like there's also something underneath your can good it looks like it's the best seat in the house yes it is the best seat now I'm guessing that's where your toilet is yes I have a nature head toilet it just slides out now it was on a slider my wife will kill me for telling you this but it was on a slider the slider was about that high worked great she wanted it on a slider so when she sits on it her Feet's about that far off the ground and she complained so I had to I had to remove it so her feet would touch the ground you know I can't blame her for that that's uncomfortable with you Peter dangling where you go in the bathroom yeah we've been pretty happy with the neighborhood uh the nature had run me a thousand dollars and I would do it again today it is it's wonderful I love it I drilled a hole ran the vent down underneath of the van and it's got a it's got a very small fan that takes little to no power and there is no odor it it runs it right through it inspired you to buy a van and build it out I have had several I've had I've had sailboats that I've redone I've had um buses that I've redone and I got tired of reading them all so I had a bunch at home I sold them all I took the money I bought a new van I paid cash for it and then I decided to do it out it was going to be my last one and this is it oh excellent so this is the the ultimate build up for you yes but now I'm already thinking about maybe buying another one and doing it so it sounds like it's kind of an addiction for you like building things up I think so yes all right that's fair and are you do you have a carpentry background no and so how did you learn to do all these things uh I just I just have a knack for doing it and I just do the best I can sometimes I have to sit and think for a long time and look at it to figure it out but then I just do it now are you full-time on the road are you part-time on the road how often do you are you out on the road I guess oh I go home for about a month and a half or two months and I aggravate my wife enough and she'll say go ahead go on another trip and I get to go on another trip perfect so are you purposely aggravating her or it just happens naturally sometimes purposely sometimes naturally right I can I can relate to that yeah I get it it was around fifteen thousand I figured that that the build cost all right but uh I mean I'm talking about everything because you've got uh nature head toilet which is expensive you've got the air conditioner just the odds and ends when you add everything together it it adds up it does and you did mention those big big ticket items and so that definitely inflates the prices quite a bit so if someone were to maybe not do do some of those bells and whistles what do you think they could maybe build it for if uh you know a similar build but maybe not some of those bells and whistles uh if they're just going to put uh if they're just going to insulate it I use sheep wool you can get a little bit cheaper installation but I recommend cheap wool but um and then and then you got the wood cost and the wood cost is really not that much because it's not that big so you might be going maybe a thousand dollars on all of your wood including your flooring you're you're probably looking at somebody doing it for maybe maybe six thousand dollars okay it's almost half yes it is on the roof I have two 100 watt region Regency um solar panels and I've I ran the wiring back and it comes down through the back of the van and it comes down and it goes into this jackery 1000 that's what I have right now is a jackery 1000. okay it works great so no issues with the power supply at this point no issue at all or most of the things in this rig 12 volt at this point and there's no 120 volt uh there is 120. I've I've got I got the air conditioner up here with heat strip in it there I can plug in my generator which will run all of this and I also have a 120 strip in here it's back in here and if I want to plug electrical items in there I can plug them in there while the generator or while I'm hooked up to shore power uh the refrigerator is a Alpine cool um and I can open it up for that'd be great yeah foreign so it's in a little uh bag yes well you have to buy you have to buy the bag separate the bag's about seventy dollars but if you're somewhere where it's going to be hot I recommend that and it's insulated bag oh wow all right yes this is the freezer side and this is a refrigerator side I don't have anything in the freezer right now so you can see the controls over there it has the temperature and I just got both sides refrigerator right now the air conditioner comes with a control and it is a soft start air conditioner so that means it doesn't take a lot of power to get it started to run I bought it because it is a low top on top of the van and I parked the van in my carport which when I pull it in with this air conditioner on it it's two inch clearing I like it because if if you know if you buy a air conditioner for a camper they've gen really loud this is very quiet it has different speeds you can adjust it to where as soon as uh as soon as the air conditioner stops the fan will stop or as soon as the heat stops the fan will stop but it's it's very very quiet it's not like a rocket in here uh being shot up in the air or something this is a great air conditioner I think it run me eighteen hundred dollars but I believe it was worth every penny I drilled a hole in the side of the van and I put the shore power plug in so I can hook up here I've got two cables one that I can hook up to shore power which is about 15 20 foot long and I I made a short one this is homemade so it goes around and it will plug into my generator so when I start my generator I I have electric inside if I want electric the generators of 4 500 pulsar and it's a little over kill for what I have here it's rated 3700 a hot water instant hot water shower and you I I put this little deck on from the ramp so I have a curtain the curtain is uh down there and the curtain will go from door to door I can open both the doors up it goes door to door and I put the curtain up and I use clamps these clamps here to hold the curtain and then I can just take this out and I have it sort of tied up here a little untie it and I have a hook that I can hook it up here and I can stand here and take a shower or I can hold it and take a shower and it works great and what I use for water for the shower instead of using my fresh water in there I'll have a five gallon pail and I just dropped the end of it down in the five gallon pail and here's the pump for it I put the pump on here and I can just hit this switch and it will turn it on and it will start pumping water out of the uh out of the pail that I have and then you have hot water after I go in and I close up and I have my lights on inside and it's all lit up it seems like I'm in a little cabin and it is it's so homey and so comfortable sometimes I get home and sometimes I just want to go out and get in my my van in my little cabin and the bed in there is comfortable it is is it's just great I could see it it reminds me of like a little Cabin in the Woods very cozy very comfortable Wilford thank you so much for opening up your home to us and showing us all the intricacies of it and just the beautiful build that you did well I appreciate it and I hope that people watch uh the video and maybe they can get some ideas for their own rig absolutely and I think the advice you gave earlier was incredibly helpful just sometimes you have to just sit there look at the problem and see like how to solve that problem and I think that's going to make a big difference because I know I've done that as well just where I'm like I can't figure this out and you think sit with it for a while maybe invite a few friends over and say hey what do you guys think of this problem but I do think that not making rash decisions very very good advice yes so thank you thank you for that folks out there what did you think of the beautiful build have you ever seen a vehicle that had the false door there where you actually open the sliding door and then open it up would you do something like that in your build let us know in the comment comments below if you got something out of today's video please go ahead and give us a big thumbs up subscribe to the channel share it with friends and until next time we'll see you all down the road so long guys

Channel: CheapRVliving

Views: 206,470

Keywords: car, van, RV, Full-time, nomad, camper, camp, boondock, travel, caravan, tiny, house, RTR, Bob Wells, Nomadland, CheapRVLiving, Cheap RV Living, vanlife, van life, how to live in a van, van dwelling, van tour, van conversion, living in a van, camper van, van build, diy van build, sprinter van, van living, #vanlife, van dweller, campervan, vandwelling, diy camper van, RV Life, Living in an RV, Class B, Class C, Truck Living, Living in a car, boondocking, Living in a RV

Id: BZDr-dOpveM

Length: 16min 5sec (965 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 28 2023