VANLIFE | FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT Style Tiny Home DIY Campervan Conversion for Van Dwelling - Full Time

hello this is patrick with new jersey's outdoor adventures youtube channel today i'm hanging out with connor and connor has a really cool diy ram promaster camper van conversion he built out himself it has so many details inside you got to come join us [Music] hey guys my name is connor this is my ram promaster he's a 3500 159 inch wheelbase extended come on in i want to show you inside all right so welcome inside let's give you guys a little uh brief tour first and then we'll get into some specifics up front we got the cab nothing too special going on there back here we got um bike microwave toilet we'll get into that got tons of storage up here got the lagoon swivel table everyone's got that and then this is my bed couch chill out area and this is harry my best buddy so i got into van life because i was living in san francisco i was doing this corporate hustle i've always had this dream of moving to new york and when the pandemic hit i decided let's like build a van and get out of here it was like my big break to take some time to myself and learn how to do all this this thing was an empty cargo van when i started i had absolutely no idea how to build any of this i mean i built like ikea cabinets um so it was all learning process but one of the messages that i want to show in the videos if you have a dream and and you have some time to learn then you can do it anybody can build something like this i started out my journey in august traveled across the country had this incredible adventure got to see the wolves of yellowstone and the canyons in utah and all this cool frank lloyd wright architecture in wisconsin got to new york in november and i've been living full full-time in new york city in this van so as i was building the van it was really important to me to make it both ready for city living and then to feel as much like an apartment as i could so that was sort of the design approach so everything is pushed back as much as i could and i tried to create lots of clean linear lines um and then put systems in so i could live in this thing full time on the road so let's get started up in the front let's put it down there so this is the front um there's nothing too special it's pretty standard cab up here although the seats do swivel but i don't actually use them all that much mostly because harry here takes this one and so it's always a process to clean it off but they do swivel and then i got this insulated curtain it's black on the front side and that helps keep it a little stealthier at night nobody can tell that i'm in here at night so it keeps it nice for city living and then i have this mega cabinet this was like one of the last things that i made when i was doing the van and up front it's got a microwave and a mirror down here i've got my bicycle it's a folding bicycle and comes out on these 300 pound drawer slides i love this thing it's gorgeous it's really easy for cities and it's nice that you can bring your bike inside and one of the nice things about making a van yourself is you can design the cabinet any way you want so here i made this um shelf uh this door rather to fit so i didn't have to take the back satchel off it's purposely shaped like that and then down here we got the composting toilet so again slides out i love this thing you don't realize how nice it is to be able to use the bathroom in your van until you have something like that and because it's composting you went through the the liquids like every couple days and the solids every couple months it's actually really great and then we got the mirror so this was the original mirror and i realized you have to like bend down to see your head um so i put a shaving mirror up here so you can see yourself um but like i said this is my everything cabinet it was it was like where i squeezed everything that i hadn't put in yet in the van got an isotherm fridge this runs on dc power and it's super efficient i love this model because it has a full width freezer so the doors that swing out for some reason they only do half size freezers but you can fit a ton of food in here and then every door in here is on a magnetic latch so you just hold the magnet and i don't know if you can get a picture of that but it undoes itself and then we got a great tank down here um a little expandable shower pan and a pinch although most of the time i just shower at the gym and some storage this tank is great at seven gallons and you hit a switch and it dumps itself the switch is right up here and you can kind of hear it queuing on and then it'll start to dump itself when you're in a responsible place to do that and then got some usb outlets here and also have the pump for the sink on a switch and you want to do that because if the water runs low then the pump will just keep trying to pump itself and it'll burn itself out if you don't have it on a switch same on this side got all these drawers on these magnetic latches so i've got silverware peripherals all my toiletry stuff it's probably more than i need and then harry's favorite door with the dog food and also got some garbage down here don't forget to put a space for garbage in your van people leave that to the end um got you know knives and aluminum foil got this thing which i love for the dog [Music] that was that was my alexa i guess we said something um so this govi switch tells me what the temperature is for the dog so i can make sure that he's okay if i'm away i can cue in remotely and see it oh man i love this drawer i have a coffee grinder very important i make coffee using an aeropress every day and then have a blender so you can make smoothies make soup lots of stuff with that and then finally got an induction stove here that plugs in runs off the battery system and pots down there everybody um loves a little pantry so i keep all my extra goodies in here including a tea kettle and maybe you're wondering like where do you plug all this stuff in the outlets for this van are all here in the sink so it's easy i usually set up my stove or my blender or the coffee grinder right here just plug it in and get everything going and then i left all this for storage so one of the things i tried to do in this van was put all the systems in the bench area and then leave everything else for storage this is all storage up here is all storage so on this side i have clothes and i put everything in these bags makes it really easy to stay organized and things don't shift around the road so it's just clothes all the way down and then on this side we got dishes and then there's some peripherals that i don't use all the time but i keep them down there one of the things i've learned on the road is like i left with four plates and four bowls and four cups and you just you don't actually use that all the time so now it's all stored and i actually only use this side one of the cool things i did with these cabinets is i built this fabric backer and it's insulated with thinsulate and it pushes up into the corners of the van and it really creates a lot of space because if you're building a cabinet you have to square off the back but by doing this you have all this spacing you can really push things all the way into the corner so you end up getting a lot more real estate out of these cabinets and then on the ceiling um you know i i wanted to make it feel a lot more like an apartment like a cozy space and the slats on the ceiling weren't my favorite things so i went with these full plywood sheets this is quarter inch and underneath the ceiling and then in all the walls and behind the cabinets is half log wool so it's all natural it breathes really well it takes in moisture and lets it go really well it's great and then got these bands up here your max air fans they're on remotes so you can do it from bed if you're feeling lazy and these awesome covers are from man-made gear and they cover the windows and the fan tops and really helps keep the heat in so you can see these down here this one i store down here um but they also attach magnetically to the windows so all you have to do is let them snap in place and they stay there just nice so you don't have to find a place to store them so up here this is one of those challenging areas to build in a van but i found these uh so i built this backer piece and then i found these hooks at ikea that match the finished plywood really well and here i decided to turn this area into a shelf a lot of people will just cover this over but since there's already a big window here it's not like this area is that well insulated anyway so why not turn it into some storage so i keep gloves and bags for the grocery store and there's an umbrella down there and then during the summer months i have a tv window here from crl and it opens to create ventilation um so once you get the fans going and then you open this you get a really nice cross breeze in here so for the counter tops these actually come from ikea and their butcher block on the outside it's like uh i think it's like a two millimeter thick uh veneer and they've held up really well they look nice and they're a lot more lightweight than butcher block um from home depot because um the the inner core is like a particle material so down here this is one of the cool parts of the van i curved this wood and that allows it to curve around this corner to keep the profile pretty thin and then there's no screws on the outside you can see so this is actually held on to the the van by magnets there are three high-powered magnets in there keeping it in place same with like this one a lot of people put the fridge out here and it sticks out to the the front of your countertop i wanted everything to be flush that was important to me but to make the fridge recess in there i had to route out a groove to accommodate the flange of the fridge yeah so if you're under here you can kind of see it and then that meant i wasn't able to screw the countertop in so up here the countertop is actually held in by magnets and it's held in by screws back there and that creates this nice clean look where if you're looking the sidelines down the van or straight down and helps keep it open and then when you're building a van every inch is precious right so normally under a a a cabinet like this you just have wasted space toe kick space but instead i built drawers and you can kick any of these open for storage so under every cabinet i've got rags down here i have a scale and some tools and my glasses down here under this carpet we have engineered vinyl floor it's nice it has like a texture to it and so it feels like real wood and then there is radiant heating uh underneath the floors i saw them actually turn it on usually the carpet keeps my toes toasty enough let's see what do we got going on up here so i decided to build a shelf up here because i had a little bit of extra space and you don't want to waste any got this vacuum which is like key when you decide to have a dog in a van lots of hooks you can never have too many hooks in a van but these just come from ikea and they served me well hello hey hey um got the berkey if you want good tasting water definitely invest in the berkey they're a little bit pricier but they make water taste amazing and a lot of people will put them over the sink and then you're like putting your glasses into the sink to get water so i decided to build a stand for it so it was elevated um and like i said i'm really into frank lloyd wright there are a lot of little accents in here inspired by him and he blended a lot of square and circular geometry and that's what inspired me to put the holes in the side of the water holder along with this etching up here that's also inspired by frank lloyd wright so these circles and squares and circles and squares kind of echo each other up here this is a like a curved area of the van that's hidden by the cabinets in the back but it's hard to deal with so i decided that a little green accent with the plants would be nice and that also helps um obscure some of the structure and then got some good storage this is actually meant for our bathroom but it fits perfectly here in the kitchen space you know just keep spices and vegetable bags so we got lights all throughout the ceiling and also lights that run along underneath the cabinet and it makes a big difference when you don't have lights underneath the cabinet it it seems a little unidirectional right like it it seems a little bit more closed in one thing i did in this van was connected everything through the internet so these lights are on a remote that all runs through the wi-fi and you can cycle through different colors you can make them bright green if you want to but i like to keep them at this sort of neutral yellow and then this thing i'm really proud of this is another frank lloyd wright inspired element it's a stained glass and piece that i found online but the way that it's built into the wall it's actually like pushed into a hole in the wall and then it's backlit with the frame i built and just the like the engineering to make sure a thin piece of stained glass doesn't break while you're driving down the road in your earthquake machine is more complicated than people recognize and and i love this thing and then um back here got a fan i put it right over my head to make sure that if it's really hot at night you can blow it right on your head along with the two in the roof or ventilation and then we'll get into this more but for a little security especially because i'm in cities all the time i have pepper spray up here so someone was trying to break in i could grab that and defend myself and my little buddy so speaking of when you're sleeping it's really dark in here when the curtains are up and so i decided to put the curtain behind us on a remote so i can press a button from bed here and the curtain moves itself and that lets the light in in the morning and that way it doesn't feel like you're waking up in a cave you don't have to get up out of bed just to create a little bit more natural light in here all right so what do we ask what else do we got going on back here we got the table this is on a lagoon mount swivels you know all over the place and it's offset on the bottom and what that means is i can be seated here and really doing all my work and then something key about this van is i designed myself to be sitting here and to always be looking out windows i have these windows this window the window and the slider door and when the curtain is open i have the windshield and that helps make it feel really open because your your perception goes outside and you see beyond the walls of your van and that's part of why it feels open in here um so when this thing is not in use it lives back here it's like harry's favorite thing to climb on um one thing that i did also inspired by frank lloyd wright and his time in the american southwest was inlays throughout the van so this inlay you buy it at a store and you route out a channel and then you spend a lot of time gluing it in and there's little mistakes that i don't mind showing off like here i accidentally made the channel too big but you know it's all learning experience and again like this was my first time doing any of this and i really want people to know they can do something like this too and those inlays are replicated down here in the cubby holes so we got them right around here down here these cubby holes i rounded over the um the edges just so it's not you know square that would look kind of ugly i think but i think they look nice rounded over and shows off the plywood and then this bench is all about systems and storage so the systems are actually floating underneath and below everything else like under my butt there's a bunch of electronics here are all of the batteries and electric systems and all up in here are also electrical systems but down here are cubby holes where you can store things and since i'm in the cities all the time i don't want to get outside of my van to get stuff so as much as i could i put storage accessible from the inside so that i don't have to be outside to get things either in the winter or on a busy city street so we got a heater down here but like computer storage is up here and my blankets stay down here um but electronic stuff up here and then you know random stuff down here then the other thing that was important to me was that all of the systems are accessible from bed like you know you don't want to get up and move all the way to the other side of your van to turn your heater on or to turn your inverter on so the switch for the inverter is right here the heater got some usb outlets there a cigarette lighter and then the battery monitor down here and i don't have to get up to make all that stuff work let's talk about um the battery system and what keeps this thing powered there are 370 amp hour batteries from renegy so 510 amp hours total and then you can recharge those batteries with the solar panel on top it's 320 watts with a 40 amp dc to dc charger or the inverter can also be plugged in for shore power though honestly i haven't used that there's a 3000 watt inverter so you can run you know a microwave tea kettle you know blender all your normal household appliances then there's also different voltage systems in here so this wireless charging that all runs off a 16 volt system i installed um versus the like the alexa machine runs off uh a six volt system i installed and you don't have to turn your inverter on to do all that so that was really important to me these lights run off 14 volts so they're all these converters um in in order to make everything work without wasting energy leaving your inverter on and it makes it a lot more livable and then there's also a pretty um high-tech security system here i've got cameras on the back um and cameras in the front you can't really see this one but it blends in with the um with the black frame but yeah you can see that one up there and they're just amazon cameras they're blink cameras i can check them from my phone um but harry this guy he sets off the motion detection all the time so i also installed door sensors on each of the doors so if any door opens i get a text message and that way even though he's setting up the motion detection on the cameras if somebody breaks in and opens a door then i would know that someone is is breaking into the van and then i have a temperature monitor i showed you so that i can adjust the temperature so between those three things i'm always able to make sure he's at a good temperature that he's safe i can check in on him on the cameras and that's all enabled through uh like a wireless hotspot that i pay for but that stays on full-time it's underneath here in the van and it also gives me wireless internet so that enables the echo machine um it enables the uh the phillips light and then opening the curtains that's all through that's all through the wireless so it's a full-time wireless network in here and if you need to work on the road i wanted to make sure that this man is able to do that let's talk about the bed i'm sitting on four inches of high grade foam but the cushions i actually had them ordered from india and they're real leather they're really nice they're thick and since i have a dog you know i just wanted something that was easy to clean so you can wipe them down in a breeze and then when i'm ready to go to bed this table can dismount and it drops into the space so that's more if i have a guest or something to be honest i also designed this rear portion of the bed to be the width of a twin and then it's about six uh two down so i fit there fine myself along with this guy so most of the time i'll just lay down i mean going to bed is as simple as throwing a cushion on the floor and then putting the pillow down but if i feel like rolling around or lounging then i can drop this guy into this empty space all right so let's take a look at the systems uh underneath all the leather cushions we got these pads and that just creates ventilation so that the leather isn't pressing against the wood and you don't get any molds under there okay you [Music] so if you have to service something toss that aside and here's your sneak peek everything is on gas struts so i'll take you through a walkthrough of all the electrical we got a dc to dc charger that charges the battery when i'm driving and you can switch that on from a switch i installed up in the front of the van here's the mppt solar charger for the panel and then here's the dc distribution so this controls um all the stuff on the dc side and then on this side we have all the internet stuff so it's pretty sizable i wasn't planning on building this but i felt like i just needed more space in here here's the phillips bridge that controls the lights it turns the light bars on and off the mobile router the blink security system and this is the switchbot system for the sensors on the doors so in a nutshell that's all the electronics and again like everything floats above my blankets and storage here and i keep a computer here but you know all the wiring runs around and up here okay now we gotta lift this one come on so on this side we got water systems there's my computers down there and that shelf lifts up and out but we've got a 4 gallon bosch water heater and then a 30 gallon water tank so effectively just about 35 gallons of fresh water that you can keep on board along with the two and a half gallons you can store in the berkey um electrical runs all over the place here and it all floats above the water one thing i did when i was building this my big like build disaster was i had a small leak that turned into a little flood under the van when i was building and it dried out and everything but it freaked me out so i waterproof this whole container so now if there's a leak it you know just stays in there and then there are sensors down there that buzz you if they detect water they're like meant for basements but just in case i'm not taking any more chances again um so yeah i mean i i did this all myself and i knew nothing i i like took a electrical engineering course for free online to figure out how to do all this and yeah i like had to study for three weeks but anybody can learn how to do all this i mean and you can do it yourself and you can save yourself ten thousand dollars if you put in a little upfront effort so down here is the water fill and i put it inside so that uh you know you don't have anyone messing with your water also so it's not as obvious that it's a camper moon from the outside and it's easy i usually fill up once a month or so it's about how much 30 gallons lasts me you notice i don't have a shower in here unless i do something makeshift with the sink so that saves a lot of water and i normally shower at the gym or at ymcas yeah um behind here under this panel i'm not gonna lift this one up but um it's just laundry under there and tools and my ladder to get up to the roof and we can look at it when we go in the back and then back here [Applause] this one is not on a strut it doesn't really need it um but that's the inverter down there and there are a couple extra plugs if you wanted to plug more stuff in but right now the inverter is mostly for the microwave this water heater um and then the electrical outlets by the kitchen all right so now that you've seen the inside let's take a walk outside see what's going on put mr harry up here grab the jacket that's where i keep so many jackets and hop out [Applause] okay so i guess we could start with what's going on on the roof um i like to think that i have one of the best planned roofs i spent so much time measuring to get stuff up there so we got the 320 watt solar panel you can see it's kind of turned sideways and it it sticks out a little bit over the edge of the van but it doesn't really make a difference it's got a yakima storage box it's actually meant for fishing but it was low profile long so it fit really well and then on the other side there's a little roof deck up there that you can see from this side and i always feel really wobbly on the uh telescoping ladder so i built this uh little like a like latch like hold for the ladder and that helps it from swaying so i don't tip over either way um when i'm doing stuff and then you got the two fans up there got these um aluminus boxes it's my instagram if you guys want to reach out i especially would love to help if you're thinking about building a van or you know you just have questions totally let me know i can open these if you want to see this one the door actually folds down and makes a a table so if i'm out it's nice to eat outside and just got like a ton of storage in here a little bio light cam uh campfire uh extra you know bags for the bike tools um and then water stuff [Music] okay so these boxes swing away and then we got the back so hello hey hey so um when i'm ready to throw away laundry i actually just reach behind my cushion at night and i throw it down in there and then got a telescoping ladder you all saw the inverter um keep it right back there and here's more of the water so there is an outdoor shower down here um if you're you know in the middle of nowhere you can use that and then a dump for the tank just in case you need to empty it you're like going on vacation or restoring the van for a long time you want to dump the tank so it doesn't freeze that's pretty much everything we got going back here i put um these panels in i made these took a long time because they're fit into you know the contours of the van but they make it seem a little more homey and it matches the rest of the wood and then i removed the factory netting this is oem and just reinstalled it into the panel and up here i did the same thing but um i put a little more storage up there so cutting like out that profile is also difficult um but it's nice to keep sweaters up there and i keep some books up there and then last but not least the van is really heavy so it was definitely necessary to do a suspension upgrade so in the back there are fox shocks and then underneath there are also sumo springs so the two of them that helps in the back and then in the front are bilstein shocks and those are made specifically for the promaster so the van is also lifted it's two inches off the ground and that helps with clearance um a lot of people do it because they put their gray tanks underneath the van and they don't want it to get bumped as they're going down the road for me it was just nicer to be a little bit higher off the ground get to see some more cool stuff got the brush guard on here installed that myself it was not fun but again you can do it oh the other thing i did which we can't see now that is like my favorite thing is i put lights up here um spent so many hours crawling around underneath the van but from the inside you can queue it up with bluetooth and they run underneath the tires here and then all down the length of the van so you can go down the highway and be like the purple d-man or whatever color you want to be they go up any color thank you for taking the time today to give us a tour of your beautiful creation can you tell us about maybe one of the biggest challenges you had building a van camper for the very first time i mean first thanks for coming and doing the tour i think honestly the biggest challenge is just building the confidence to get going and making mistakes and realizing like you don't you don't have to have a background in construction to do something like this so for me it was like what kind of grade plywood do you use or how do you round over an edge you're doing inlay like this or how do you do electrical or plumbing and and just knowing that there's a path there's there's a way and as long as you trust yourself then just start exploring and experimenting and failing a lot but but you can do it like for instance the furnace i mean uh this is an s bar b1 and when i got it first the instructions are in german they send you a cd-rom nobody has cd-rom players and you just kind of have to go with it and installing it made me cry you have to drill holes in the floor of your van you have to route fuel lines and then wire all this stuff and then taking it out of the box it seemed like there was no way i was not going to have to pay a professional to do it for me but but i did it um and that's like everything in the van you just you learn and you run with it and do your best and and then the mistakes they they stick with you and and they're kind of endearing i don't notice the mistakes every day and i'm grateful that now i live in this thing that i know how to fix and yeah that's a it's a special process and a journey can you tell our viewers a little bit about some of the challenges you had maybe transitioning from a house or apartment into a van for the very first time yeah and i was i was nervous about that so i put all this storage into it and i tried to make it as much like an apartment as i could and then you get into it and to be honest it's not as much of a transition as you think it would be i mean it's it's different but it's not like i'm always sitting around wishing that i could be back in an apartment and i i wish more people knew that like this is an awesome incredible way to live um and you won't miss your apartment once you're in it having the adventures it's that freedom of the road being able to go wherever you want to like i i got to wake up in zion national park and go on hikes and then come back and take naps whenever i want and i got to watch the wolves working together in yellowstone when i was driving through and you know stop at frank lloyd wright's ancestral home and check out his studio i mean all those things make the trade-offs worth it which there's not that many you got heat you got food you know i can use a microwave like we're good to go so now that the van is done you did your big trip you're living in this full time what's next for you yeah i mean i got to new york city so that's always been a big dream i've been hanging out in a beautiful part of brooklyn and next i think is i want to take all the skills that i learned and build another van i definitely want to make one that's a little smaller i actually feel like sometimes i have too much storage in here for me and for city life and i want something that i can use for both some adventures on the weekends and city living so this one's for sale right now definitely check me out at instagram guy who goes if you want to chat about it i got myself a new studio space in new york to build and yeah i'm getting ready to to go with that project well thank you very much for giving our viewers such a really in-depth tour of your van camper there's so many details in this van there's so much thought that went into i would say the human hours building it is probably the same about the human hours thinking about it and researching and going online and ordering parts so i really appreciate that tour i'm gonna link to your instagram in the description so the viewers could hop over and check out their sale also uh this is on the marketplace so i'll make sure i link there as well so the viewers could click over and check out your ad well this is patrick with new jersey's outdoor adventures youtube channel hope you enjoyed this video please like this video comment share subscribe i'd love it and we'll see you soon thanks patrick

Channel: New Jersey Outdoor Adventures

Views: 114,927

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

Id: Xx16wqTHvOY

Length: 34min 34sec (2074 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 22 2022