Ultimate Stealth Camper Van Tour | Nissan NV200 Self-Converted Build Walkthrough

Hey! So I'm gonna give you a tour of  this stealth camper that I converted   I lived out of this van in San Francisco  for a year and I was able to park overnight   almost anywhere I wanted to even in front  of people's houses so let's get started   so the design of this conversion is very simple  there's two major parts the first part is the   base cabinets down below this is where I store  most of my stuff and where I sleep on top of   the second part is the cabinets in the back  which houses my plumbing and my electrical   so let's start with these bottom cabinets so  this compartment here is one of my larger ones   and here I keep some clothes some  cookware camping stuff and larger items here is my foam mattress that  I sleep on and this unfolds to   cover the whole length of these storage cabinets   if you take a look at my passenger seat you can  see that it's folded down and pushed all the   way to the front and this allows me to add this  extension which gives me more space for my bed so this compartment here is basically my  bathroom here I keep my cassette toilet   uh basic bathroom stuff and toiletries in that bin   on the other side have dirty laundry and  cleaning supplies so basic bathroom stuff   and I even have a shower in this compartment  so what I do is I take this whole lid out then I take all the stuff that's in the  compartment out underneath all this stuff is a   shower pan with a drain that goes straight through  the floor and into a gray water tank that's   mounted underneath my van then I take a board that  unfolds to create the stall for my shower right   now you can't see it but underneath that lid is a  sink in the faucet and that's where I get my water   the inside of my van it's not tall enough for  me to stand up in so I do have to crouch or   sit down when I'm showering not the  most convenient thing but hey if I   wanted to shower in a parking lot without  anyone noticing then the option is there alright so in the back here is my desk last  sink right now it's a desk because the lid   is closed and it's where I sometimes work  from right next to my desk are wall outlets   and USB ports so it's a super convenient  place to charge my phone and my laptop   how I set up the seat for my desk is pretty  simple I take the lid and I fold it in half   then I sit on top of it like a bench then I  take some of the stuff out from underneath so I   have a place to put my feet then I can slide  the lid up so I can sit closer to the desk so now I'm going to show you the sink so this is where I brush my teeth wash my  dishes and for the past couple of months   I've been shampooing my hair in this little  sink because the showers at the gyms are closed   and I don't feel like setting up my  shower that's inside my van every day   this faucet here has a built-in electrical  switch in it so that when I turn on the water   it also turns on the water pump and when I  lower the handle down it turns everything off   right next to my faucet is my shower  hose hookup and my soap dispenser so right next to my desk is a  little compartment where I store   some small tools and some charging cables   right next to that is my reading light that I use  every night when I'm getting ready for bed on the   side here is a little hand towel holder and this  here is probably my favorite storage compartment so this drawer is probably one of the more  intricate things in my van it uses what would have   been dead space on either side of the sink basin  you see that's the sink right there so in the   house this would normally be a dummy drawer front  so it would have been wasted space but i wanted to   use every single last square inch of this van  and this joy is a really good example of that   there's also a cool hidden feature with this joy  you see in that gap right there i can reach my   hand through this gap and turn a valve that  switches the tank that the pump draws from   this is going to make more sense when i  show you the back so let's head back there   all right so let's continue on with the plumbing  system so down here are my two fresh water tanks   and this right here is my wallet pump now the  pump draws water from one of these flexible   hoses that feed to the bottom of each of my  tanks when i finish one tank i have to switch   to the other one using that valve right there and  having access that valve from the inside of my van   means that i don't have to walk out here and  open this door again the idea is i'm in a   city and i don't want to enter and exit my van  unnecessarily and potentially attract suspicion   now behind my two tanks is the drain pipe for my  sink and it is a flexible pipe that i curved in a   way to act as a trap in order to prevent some of  the odors in my green tank from entering my van   the pipe goes uh through the floor and eventually  ends in the gray tank that's underneath my van now   how do i empty the tank well in theory this switch  right here is supposed to open a mechanical ball   valve that's attached to the bottom of the tank  and empty it that way but i never use it this   entire plumbing system had no leaks except for the  grate tank there's a small tiny little leak that   causes it to drip until it's empty and because  it drips so slowly it only leaves inconspicuous   puddles of water which eventually dry up and  this imperfection ended up making my life easier   because I don't have to go out of my way to dump  the water somewhere special the tank empties   itself so that's pretty much the plumbing  now i'm going to move on to the electrical all right so down here is my deep cycle  battery that supplies power to the whole system   and it gets charged by these two solar  panels up here and the two panels   connect to a charge controller that's located in  this upper cabinet now the charge controller is   pretty much the brain of the solar system and it  knows how to deliver a correct charging voltage to   the battery this right here is my positive  and my negative bus buy and these split   power throughout the whole system everything  is protected by in-line breakers like this and   this one right here and they also allow me to  cut off power to separate parts of the system   this right here is my 12-volt fuse box that uses  these little blade fuses down here is my thousand   watt inverter that's mounted above my battery  and that supplies 120 volts for my wall outlets   and this right here is the switch for the  inverter and the reason for the switch is because   inverters always have a phantom load meaning  that they always draw a small amount of current   from the battery even when it's not in use   so this switch cuts off that circuit entirely so  i don't have to worry about that and i mounted the   switch in a specific way that allows me to have  access to the switch from the inside of my van and the last thing is my automatic charging  relay now this is supposed to automatically   charge my battery when the alternator of  my car is running and but in my experience,   this was unnecessary because I would park my  car and not drive it for weeks and my battery   would still be full from just the solar panels  so that pretty much covers my electrical system   this right here is a privacy cover magnet  that's magnetic and these cover my windows   down here is my two mirror setup that I use  to cut my own hair and I use this little   round mirror to get a little angle  so I can see the back of my head   now the idea is that I would drive somewhere  out in the middle of nowhere where no one will   bother me and that's where I cut my hair so  that is pretty much the back of the vehicle   and now I want to show you what it  looks like when I am inside the van all right so let's start out with lighting so I  have these uh four bright overhead lights that   I can control with the switch back here and also  my reading light here that's on this flexible neck   uh as you can see I like hanging my clothes uh  which is why I made this open closet using this   metal rod that's attached to the ceiling  up here is my rooftop vents last fan   and I will keep this open in the summer  when it's hot and at night when I'm sleeping   and because this is such a small living  space I have to make sure I have good airflow   that way I get fresh air and also I avoid  building up condensation on my windshield   when I turn on this fan it draws air from the  front to windows and up in through the vent on my windows I installed these uh wind deflectors  which allow me to crack them open slightly without   people noticing that they're open and they also  allow me to keep them open even when it's raining um for my ceilings and walls they're all insulated  and my walls are lined with vinyl upholstery uh this right here is my ice chest and it doesn't  hold an awful lot of food because I usually pack   this thing with three-quarters of the way with  ice and it doesn't leave me with a whole lot   of space left but it does keep my food cold for  like maybe a week and a half in winter and maybe   more like five or six days in the summer now how  do I cook I have two options the first option is this hot plate here and I would plug this into  a 12-volt socket and it would heat up food in   a glass Tupperware now the only issue with  this is that it takes about uh like two or   three hours to get food hot so uh if I plan ahead  before I get hungry then it's not the worst thing   um the second option is a butane stove now  what I would do with that is I would um take   this ice chest and put it right outside my van  and I'll put the stove on top of the ice chest   then I would use my bed as a countertop  space obviously this isn't stealthy anymore   so I do have to drive out somewhere like a big  parking lot where no one will care and I would   cook there now I'm going to show you what it  looks like when I get access to my toilet so   I open this lid up here and then I have this bin  and just lift up like that just put that aside and right here is my toilet and I can sit on it like  like so so super easy to get access to that now   the next thing I'm going to  show you is how I set up my bed so this for mattress fold out like this  then all my bedding is in this cabinet here   you know I would lay this out like so and I use a down sleeping bag as a blanket so  what I would do is I it's actually a mummy bag   and what I do is I just unzip it all the  way and kind of just use it like a blanket   like this all right so I'm gonna put that away now hey so I hope you enjoyed this video and if you're  new to this channel you should know that one of   my goals is a create community that's why I'm  planning meetups here in Santa Cruz California   where I currently live full time in the van so if  you want to join me in person along with others   that follow this channel please sign up down  below to get more information if you want to   support the videos I make please leave a like  comment and subscribe and consider supporting   me on Patreon my name is Evan and this was the  van that's behind stories from a van. Take care!

Channel: Stories From a Van

Views: 2,402,471

Rating: 4.9462123 out of 5

Keywords: van life, san francisco, santa cruz, story time, travel, self-development, living in a van, van conversion, stealth camping, story of my life, van tour, van walkthrough, NV200, Sprinter van, self converted van, small van conversion, van solar system, van plumbing system, van storage system, stories from a van, life hack, lifestyle, tiny home, custom van conversion, van life walkthrough, stealth camper van, nv200 camper, nv200 camper conversion, nv200 camper van, camper van

Id: 8HL4RQb-ROA

Length: 15min 15sec (915 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 02 2021