VAN TOUR | Transit Van Converted to Tiny Home for Full-Time VAN LIFE

hey guys I'm Tim and I'm Katie and this is our newest van build that we converted for clients who are going to be living full-time on the road we're super excited about all the new features let's check them out [Music] as you can see this is a Ford Transit it's a 2022 with the 3.5 liter EcoBoost and it is rear wheel drive first off we're going to talk about the bathroom because we really tried to pack a lot of function in here we have the Nautilus self-cleaning and retractable shower door and then we went with the Jolie filtered shower head as requested by the clients in the corner we installed the niche to hold toiletries we also installed the toilet so that it pulls out into the wet bath and we really think this is a game changer in the van because it gives you privacy and it keeps everything hidden in this bench seat so we use this stainless steel gasketed access door by accudor it just opens by turning these there's one top and bottom as that swings open there's a locking 500 pound drawer slides with the Cuddy composting toilet so that slides out all the way it locks in place the cool thing with this composting toilet is the agitator is at the front so we would just slide the drawer back a little bit pull this out and then you can mix it with the mulch or coconut husk whatever you have in there and then let's say it's getting full and you need to empty it then you just lift both things up and you simply lift out the liquids or the solid spin at the back and dump them just for reference I'm 6'2 and with shoes on I can still stand up straight in the shower just want to show you how the toilet will work with someone being in here there's still enough room to turn around even with these big boots on I can sit down and use it if I want some privacy before that open that up and then you just close the lid pull the lever slide it back in that latch on that latch and it's fully sealed the other cool thing about this toilet is that it has a built-in fan and carbon filter so it's just wired to the to our 12 volt system um it's always running very low power draw but it's awesome because you don't have to run any external venting outside the van so as you can see the Cutty toilet retracts into this bench seat right here where in our previous Vans we housed the recirculating shower components there so obviously we chose to forego the recircuit and shower and put the composting toilet there instead we installed this waterproof Dometic toilet paper holder and it turns as you open and close it so it retracts the toilet paper back into the folder every time so the last thing we added in the shower is this retractable clothesline so you just grab it in the corner pull it across and hook it there and then you can hang clothes and different things to dry and then when you're done with it look at this extract it back and it's out of your way and above me here is the max air fan we like to position it nice and close to the shower so that when you're showering and the steam will come through this little spot and get drawn out of the van through the fan we also find that if you crack the windows at the bed it will pull the air up and through and it creates a bit of circulation through the van we've never felt like we need a second fan at the back in the kitchen we have a full-size stainless steel Crow sink as well as the cross faucet and the soap dispenser this nozzle is great because it reaches outside of the van and you can spray things off out there in the corner of the sink here we have an illuminated switch for our pump in the back and we like the fact that it's illuminated because you can't forget to turn it off which is very important if you leave a van if there's ever a leak somewhere or you forget to turn something off it doesn't completely drain your water but also you don't come back to a flood the same pump provides hot and cold water to the sink shower and outdoor shower the sink specifically has a filter under the sink for the cold water so you can drink directly from the tap all of the cabinets as well as the walls are made out of Baltic Birch in this van so we'll start with the base cabinet this is our push to Open Pantry it holds a lot of goods and the drawer slides are very strong so it will never swing open as you're driving under the sink we have this cabinet with our garbage and we tried to plummet so that we would have as much storage space as possible we used a hippo valve instead of a P-trap and then you can see behind here is the water filter we have a fire extinguisher in this area and then all of our pipes going up and down towards the gray water tank next we have our Cutlery drawer with custom insert to allow for a good organization of your utensils in this van we also use the novacool r4500 if you haven't seen it before it has a very large area for the refrigerator itself and then it has the smaller freezer up top it's a 12 volt compressor fridge so it's very efficient and uses very little power next we have the impava two burner induction cooktop we love this cooktop because it doesn't create a lot of extra heat in the van like the cooking with propane and by not using propane in the van whatsoever we don't have to worry about an extra fuel source another big addition to in this van is the Brava Smart Oven it lives in this drawer and once it comes out this opens and obviously the pan can go in it has lots of airflow around it when it's in this open position so it's intended to be used like this and then once you're finished cooking it cooks with light so it's cool that you can put we'll say carrots potatoes and Chicken all on one pan selected on the screen put it in and in 30 minutes come back and all of them will be cooked to Perfection at the same time obviously the main concern with a Smart Oven like this is the amount of power that it will draw in the van at the most it will draw 1800 watts but because it cooks with light it fluctuates quite a bit so what you know certain portions of the cook it'll draw that 800 watts and then it'll drop down to say 500 watts so over a 30 minute cook time it might use a total of around 80 amp hours I'm really excited about the Brava because when Katie and I were traveling in the van we found the induction limited our meal choices at times so I think this will give them a lot more options and allow them to cook almost anything they want in the van I've even joked with Katie that maybe we should get one for the house so I'll be a little bit more motivated to do some cooking at home so all the cabinets and drawers have the slam latches but on the Brava drawer we put two just to make sure that it doesn't open during travel there's one last drawer in the base cabinet and it's just more storage this is the area we did a floating table which will allow for maximal leg space underneath our clients both plan to work remotely full time so it was really important to them to have two large workstations this is one of them and I'll show you how we can expand it into the workspace so if you look underneath you can see that there are pins that we removed from these Leaf extenders slide out we have the leaf which matches the rest of the Butcher Block here you can see the bottom has two pieces of rubber for grip and then these brackets to help it stay anchored on put place this on that clicks into place and we have lots of room for two monitors and across from me here is a couple plugs and the USB ports one of the things we're concerned about with adding a leaf is that it would kind of block off access to the rest of the van but you still are able to get through you just kind of have to shimmy on by but you are able to access the back of the van or the front of the van if you need to next I'll show you a couple of the storage features that we included into the dinette area first we have storage under this rear bench seat I remove the cushion and then it's actually quite deep in there in that area is the AC ducting as well as some pipes so we wanted to make sure that was all protected from anything that you put into this cabinet we wanted some lockable storage so we added a key lock onto this bench seat we have the storage under the floor of the dinette pull it up and it's about three and a half inches tall so definitely enough room for a couple pairs of shoes or any other small items that you might have and want to keep a little bit hidden for the second workstation we installed the swivel on the passenger seat and a USB USBC and 120 volt Outlet on the side here and then a lagoon table Mount over near the door so I'll show you how we set it up so to start take the Lagoon table arm s put it on there we keep the table behind the driver's seat so we slide that out and place it on top as you can see it is a large table they wanted this table to be as big as possible because they're going to have a two monitor setup we beveled the edges and cut it so that you can easily get in and out one neat thing with this table is that it can also be used outside the van so I'll show you that we just loosen these levers and we can lower it down it sits flat there and then you can swivel it out this way or print it like this and use it more like a standing desk in the doorway also under the passenger seat here I was able to install the S Bar b4l heater it's the larger version so it's a four kilowatt gasoline heater that Taps into the fuel tank of the van really glad we're able to fit the larger version in because this is the extended length Transit and it has no problem heating it up we went with the S Bar because it works well at higher altitudes so up to about 10 000 feet without any issue I also like that it has the temperature sensor in the remote that's up on the control panel there as opposed to in the heater itself because obviously there's a big temperature difference between up there and in the heater a couple more things at the front of the van we have our vancelery headliner which has our window covers which we'll show you in a little bit and then we have a blackout curtain for added privacy we have six overhead cabinets for additional storage they are all made out of Baltic Birch again we have two in the kitchen area they stay up really nicely with these gas struts and again as Tim said before we have the Slime latches to keep them closed during travel another huge add to this van is a full length queen size bed and that was made possible by installing capsules on both the passenger and the driver's side giving us a total of 80 inches from head to foot and 56 inches wide as you can see on the bump out portion that we framed we tried to maximize as much room as possible and even tapered out towards the back we chose this bed height so that when you're sitting up here you won't be hitting your head on the ceiling and you can just hang out here comfortably we installed the switches for the lights as well as some charging ports on the bump boats I'll show you what they all do this first one here is a three-way dimmer switch for the main string of lights so that goes on off and then you can also just switch it this is a USB charging port on this side of the van we have the switch for the recessed LEDs in the bump boats at the head of the bed and at the foot of the bed this switch is for the heated floor 12 volt heated floor and then again at the bottom here we have USB ports for charging and this is the event for AC and we have another AC vent at the foot of the bed there for these windows the frame is aluminum so the magnets won't work unless you put a piece of flat bar Paint It Black and then the magnets that are sewn into the window covers fit and hold it up just fine we really like having these windows by the bed because you can crack them open just a little bit overnight for airflow and then turn on the max air fan that we have and then that limits the condensation that will form here we have the control panel first off at the bottom here we have the victron multi-plus inverter controller basically it's just a remote on off switch next we have the seamarine Pico Monitor and it's pretty much the brain of our system so it shows us the battery percentage how many amp hour and how much time remaining and then our fresh water and gray water tank levels so we have a 34 gallon fresh water tank and a 20 gallon gray water tank mounted under the van both the shower and the sink drain to that 20 gallon gray water tank next we have interior and exterior temperature sensors and then we also installed an inclinometer which tells you the pitch and roll of the van really cool thing is that all this stuff can be viewed via your phone through the van's Wi-Fi next we have the switch for the electronic ball valve on our gray water tank so you just push this button it'll slowly open and it'll start dumping in the gray water next we have the starlink on off switch so because starlink comes with its proprietary plug on a 120 volt system I didn't want to do the 12 volt conversion so instead I just wired in a small 300 watt inverter at the front of the van near where starlink is and this switch will turn on that inverter which will turn on starlink here we have the easy start Pro thermostat for the sbar heater under the passenger seat it allows you to obviously turn it on and off puts that different schedules and set the thermostat or the temperature however you would like it lastly we have the thermostat for the 12 volt under mount air conditioning this is a really cool system because the condenser and the compressor are mounted underneath the van and then the evaporator is mounted inside the van this frees up extra roof space for more solar on the high setting this unit provides around 16 000 BTU of cooling capacity and draws around 80 amps so with our 800 amp hour battery Bank we could run it for around 10 hours straight without any extra charging the low setting draws around 55 amps which in this van is really neat because with our 800 watts of solar on a bright sunny day you could basically run the air conditioning indefinitely and entirely off solar this thermostat has its own SIM card so you can control it remotely through an app on your phone and monitor and change the temperature from anywhere Let's Talk internet because the clients are going to be working full-time remotely from this van I did a ton of research trying to find the most reliable high-speed system for them we decided on The peplink MAX Transit Pro router and the peplink 7 in one antenna for the roof so it's really cool it's a dual SIM dual modem router what that means is you get two SIM cards and each of them can be simultaneously connected to different carriers this is great because depending where you are in the country you know you might have a better signal with one carrier over another and you can pick and choose they also have starlink as a backup and that's connected via the WAN port on the router I know a lot of people love starlink as a residential service but the reviews for RV service seem a little bit more mixed and I don't think it can be relied on full time especially if you're demanding On It high speed every second without any dropouts we're confident this will be a good system for them and that when they're in cell service they'll have two different carrier options and then when they're outside cell range they can set up the starlink as a backup so we did a number of exterior upgrades on the van the first was the black rhino mid Hill rims and then we added wild Peak AT3 tires these tires are quieter than the ko2s we've used in the past and they have a better all-weather rating we installed these van speed capsules which between both sides adds six inches to your total width we also added this Overland Pros 207 degree bat wing awning which was really cool and then it gives a ton of shade coverage it's nice if you're boondocking and setting up somewhere for like a week at a time you can just set it up have a great shady area and then collapse it before you leave but compared to a standard simple wheel out awning it does take a lot longer to deploy and retract the deploying isn't so bad but the retracting is a bit tedious and as you can see I can't reach it so you need to have a extendable ladder or something to be able to get up there we think this awning is a great fit if your travel style is more like boondocking where you're going to stay somewhere for five six days maybe more than a week but if you're planning on retract deploying and retracting the awning every day this might not be the one for you we store this collapsible ladder behind the driver's seat and I'll just show you how we go up on the roof [Applause] I designed this custom roof rack to hold eight 100 watt solar panels and then a small deck area here at the back to store things we also you can see the max air fan and in front of that is the peplink antenna I was pretty excited to fit all this solar and a small deck up here on the roof and like I said in perfect sunlight this should be able to power the air conditioning non-stop then I also installed two ports on the driver's side rear corner of the van the larger one here is a 15 amp charging port that goes to the victron inverter charger then this is a Nutri connector for starlink so I crimped this end on starlink's proprietary cable and we'll show you how we take the other end from Dishi which I also crimped on a new trick connector and you can plug in here for completely waterproof connection because they're using starlink as a backup we chose to have a removable connection here rather than have it stowed on the roof all the time this is because if the van is parked in a shady area or any trees over it dishy will not get a signal with the satellites especially a consistent one so this way they can take up to 150 foot cable plug it in here run their dishu well away from the van and hopefully still have good internet and this is our 20 gallon gray water tank mounted right here under the van just wanted to show you how low profile it is there's six bolts on the bottom to remove it if you ever need I rigged up this hose with a quick connect so you just reach under right here pop it on the end of the electronic ball valve and then hit the switch inside and you can run this wherever you want to drain your gray water tank okay now I'll show you the garage the buyers didn't have any bikes to store back here and wanted some extra storage space so we came up with this massive drawer system it has hidden latches and it pulls all the way out it's on 250 pound drawer slides and as you can see on the side there's just little eyelets that you pull and that's how you're closed and it locks in place and then you can open and then even once it's fully open if you want to remove it say to work get something larger in there or to work on either side to access the components you again just push these down pull it right out now that the drawers out I can just slide these back [Applause] and I'll show you the rest of the components back in the garage so on this side we have our light switch just for the underground lighting and then three outlets at the back here controlled on the main inverter an event by the inverter on this side of the garage we have our fill port and our outdoor shower so in this cabinet we keep our fill hose [Applause] so you can obviously connect this to us like a hose end spigot open this up and then pop it in and control your flow right there we normally just watch open this cabinet up and you can watch the side of the tank fill up as you go so you know it's completely full and these doors are all magnetic so they won't slide open while you're driving here we have the outdoor shower and this is the RV Quick Connect by Aqua Water Systems we normally place a little suction cup on the window here ideally on the other side if so this unit I really like in this connect and it swivels on and the cool thing about this is when this is not connected this cannot leak so even if I was to open this valve no water will come out until you connect that fitting and then this is just our mixing valve so again we have hot and cold water at the outdoor shower too now just to show you inside the slider doors we have our 34 gallon fresh water tank on this side right in here our pump and accumulator and strainer are all up top there and these doors are all secured or held tight by magnets on each side at the back on this one there's a vent this is airflow for the evaporator unit of the air conditioner and if we open it there's our evaporator with the ducting and then our four gallon hot water tank back there all the plumbing valves are easily accessed here as well so each different set of lines can be isolated now the massive electrical system so we have two 400 amp hours self-heating voltium batteries so this gives plenty of power for everything in the van the multi-plus 12 3000 inverter charger and then our breaker panel right here for our 120 systems these batteries have a 10 year warranty and they're rated for more than 6 000 Cycles they're self-heating and they can be charged to temperatures of minus 40 degrees Celsius and lastly these 400 amp hour batteries sit in the exact same footprint as our 300 amp hour batteries and our last fan so we get a total of 800 amp hour 12 volt battery in the same space without having to change our design or layout so on the other side we have our second voltium battery we have the blue c 12 volt fuse block the victron smart solar charge controller or mppt and then a nice in the housing our high voltage disconnect for our solar panels and then a blue seat on off and switch and lastly we have this ctec d250se and smart pass 120s combo for charging from the alternator this is a really cool little setup because it allows us to charge at 120 amps anytime we're driving and this is off the stock 250 amp alternator on the Ford Transit we're really excited for the bike fires to pick up the van and take it on all of their exciting Adventures this van is definitely a bit more of a challenge because of Levi helping us out so we're so thrilled with how it turned out thanks so much for watching feel free to leave any questions or feedback in the comments below and we'll catch you on the next one [Music]

Channel: Tim & Katie

Views: 547,708

Keywords: Van conversion, vanlife, van, cargo van conversion, ford transit, sprinter, diy van conversion, RV solar, hot shower, van shower, off grid, off grid camper, minimalist van, luxury van, transit cargo van, transit conversion, van reno, van renovation, diy, diy rv, diy rv conversion, solar power, sterling, renogy, gopower 3000, nautilus shower door, sprinter van, van tour, van build, 12V AC, Undermount AC, tour, conversion, tim katie, Van build, Volthium, Victron, Lithium, LIFEPO4

Id: EpPZ2slykHA

Length: 23min 44sec (1424 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 14 2023