The Maiden Voyage of the "ELWOOD Transporter"

"Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight" (gizmoq) 03/08/2016 at 05:39 • Filed to: None

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I’ve been very close hold about my ELWOOD Transporter. I wanted to have it complete enough to present the whole package to this illustrius group. Lo and behold, I didn’t get as much accomplished over the winter as I had planned. Yet, we took our first real trip this weekend. I had a car show I signed up for months ago and the weather had a possibility of some rain. So we decided to load the car on the bus and take it that way. I also wanted to check out Big River State Park and overnight there.

Of course, we had no idea what all we needed for the trip. We packed everything we thought we’d need, but inevitably we forgot stuff. Also being our first trip, we had no plan for where or how things should be stored. I left that up to her and we failed miserably. We filled every orifice on that bus and still needed more. We have a few ideas to remedy the space issue, but the packing and organizing is going to take time and planning.

I kept most of my tools in the garage section in case they were needed, luckily they weren’t.

We arrived in Peoria late for the start of Cars and Coffee (as expected) so I had to park on the absolute far end of the parking lot in order to get a spot I knew I could get out of.

Gotta look hard and squint to see it way back in the back just left of center.

I think I was parked in the spectator parking lot.


So by the time I was parked and chocked, It started to drizzle. It was already colder than I expected. The fog on the way had me bummed, the bus struggled to climb the hills to get here, we’re late, and now this. I decided to open up the garage and wait.

Pretty soon I realized the car would have fit right in, but the bus was actually a bigger attraction.

Pretty soon (word of mouth spreads quickly) mobs of folks were all around the bus asking question, wanting to see the interior, asking how it was built, by whom, telling stories of other conversions they’d seen. After an hour, I decided to just leave the car in it and enjoy the show. We locked the garage door, locked the front door and walked around and enjoyed seeing the other cars, truck, and bikes in attendance.

I couldn’t resist taking a picture of a bumper sticker I want for the bus:

I may need this when we start boondocking long-term in any given place.

My gal fell in love with the Audi R8:

And we both drooled all over this COE truck:

By noon the show was over. We walked across the street and had lunch. Got back to the bus, buttoned it up, and set off for the next 90 miles to Big River.

Even without the Spring colors, Big River State Park is pretty nice. There are a variety of locations (by the river, by the road, way back in the woods, a couple group sites, a playground, several buildings throughout (I saw one marked as a “warming station”). We went to the office but they posted a sign “Out in the Area” and couldn’t find anyone to take our money. We waited an hour and decided to find a spot and let them come to us.

We setup in a nice spot by the road thinking if the staff ever came back to the office, they’d be able to see us from the office and come over.... they never did. We knocked, we called, we left a note.... if that’s not due diligence screw it our night there was free (and OBTW, our phones had no signal, but my WiFi extender was able to pick up a signal from the office so we had that).

The night in the park was nice. I think we were both guilty of overcompensating to insure the night went smoothly. I stayed up front while she hopped from couch to dinette to her nav seat looking to get a feel for the accommodations. The bathroom surprised her at its efficiency, convenience, and surprise, surprise it worked as advertised - no smell, no mess, no issues. What we hadn’t anticipated was the temps dropped rapidly after sunset. By 10PM, it was below freezing outside and it was getting chilly inside. So I broke the cardinal rule of boondocking - I fired up the generator and turned on some heat. I know ... kick me later.



Bed time was another learning experience. She stored the bedding below the dinette. I opened the couch before it was retrieved and we both realized the open couch made the storage under the dinette inaccessible. So we had to put the couch back upright, get the stuff out and do it again. The bathroom is not enough room for dressing so we’ve decided to create a dressing room by curtaining the bathroom across to the fridge. The slide-in decorative panels of the fridge are going to have to be replaced with a mirror-like surface for this dressing room. The couch was fairly comfortable to sleep on. The console to the right of the driver’s seat made a perfect bedside table. Next time I want to lower both the couch and the dinette and sleep over there so I’ll know what a guest is going to have to deal with.

Sunday morning was glorious. It warmed up faster than I expected outside so we opened a few windows and listened to the birds and the river. PJ cooked breakfast in our tiny kitchen with no problems. We ate at the table with a spectacular view. Then explored the area and loitered about till we just couldn’t stay any longer if we wanted to get home before nightfall. We slowly packed everything away and headed for home.

Overall, PJ’s happy, I’m happy, she wants to do it again (YEAH!), and I didn’t need a tow truck - success. 435 miles, appx 7MPG, and no breakdown. A mile or 2 before we got home, I filled the tank and had ET weighed at Flying J. Max GVW on the bus is 23.6K; the scale with a full tank and the car in the back was 22.1K ... I could add another thousand pounds and still be under my max, whoopie!

I still have a lot of little tasks and the motor and tranny probably both need to be rebuilt, but I’ll get it done. I’m really motivated right now to get things done. More storage space will go in this week. The bathroom vanity and dressing room curtain and mirrors will be her job. I think this is going to work for us.

TL;DR If you got this far, I guess I better give up some specs. The bus is a 1978 Wayne Lifeguard 67 passenger school bus originally in service somewhere in Illinois (probably in the Champagn area). The previous owner added the tailgate and roof raise/vista skylights, extended the front bumper, and changed the gearing for highway speeds. He used it to haul his tractor pull racecar and had mimimal furnishings (I think he and his buds draped hammocks across the interior for sleeping and camped outside for cooking, etc.)

I gutted it and started with a clean slate. The garage section is 18' with a flatbed trailer inside to level the car during transport. The “house” section is 16' with a navigator seat across from the driver, a jack-knife couch, a dinette with seating for 4, a kitchen with sink, running water, a stovetop, microwave, refrigerator/freezer, and most importantly a bathroom. Underneath I installed fresh water and grey water tanks, a 6500 generator, and a bank of deep cycle batteries.

The bus is registered as an RV and is now fully self contained.

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Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight 03/08/2016 at 06:11

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This is great, what’s it like driving such a large vehicle on the roads? On our standard licences in the UK were restricted to 3600kg so the largest I’ve ever driven was a lwb transit van.

vondon302 > Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight 03/08/2016 at 07:17

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That is great! Good post too! Keep em coming. Fantastic idea!

Snuze: Needs another Swede > Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight 03/08/2016 at 08:22

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This is AWESOME! I love school bus conversions into, well, anything! Fantastic job, and nice write up.

I’m curious, what’s the powerplant in that bad boy?

Birddog > Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight 03/08/2016 at 10:01

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This is cool!

You actually have a Car hauler mounted inside of the Camper?

Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 03/08/2016 at 10:25

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I don’t have any reference to compare it to since the largest thing I’ve ever driven was a 20ft U-Haul truck with a car trailer. The U-Haul was much quieter and faster cause it weighed much much less. With all the windows and the front end not yet insulated/soundproofed it was like riding in the engine bay at full throttle all the time, but that will get remedied in the coming months. The steering is light and the air ride helped immensely floating down the road.

Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight > Snuze: Needs another Swede 03/08/2016 at 10:28

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I wanted a bus where the generator and the engine would both be fed off the main gas tank. And this fit the bill. The gas tank is 80 gallons. The motor is a gasoline 366HD Chevy with a five speed manual transmission.

Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight > Birddog 03/08/2016 at 10:30

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Not the whole thing just the platform and axle.

Snuze: Needs another Swede > Gizmo - The Only Good Gremlin, but don't feed me after Midnight 03/08/2016 at 11:05

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Ouch. Those 366HDs are pretty awesome engines but definitely not doing you any favors in terms of fuel economy. Major props on the 5 speed though! I don’t know why, but I like rowing gears in a big behemoth like that.

I always thought it would be cool to get a bus and swap in a Cummins or Duramax out of a fullsize pickup.