When we last left off, we still had water flowing uninterrupted into our precious living quarters. Well, maybe it was only a trickle, but it was still entirely too much. With the bus stripped back down to bare metal, we tried to figure out a solution. But the bus still had obligations to meet.
Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival in Oak Hill, NY. The bus was profoundly missed last year, and this summer was a welcome change of pace. The deck added a fun perspective to the weekend, and held a few brief jams. We’ve been nothing but impressed with its strength.
We spent Grey Fox without a splinter of wood inside the bus, and when we returned home we went back to stopping the leaks. It was Nishi who discovered how to properly seal the windows. It doesn’t take too much caulk, but it does take a lot of time and patience – her prop skills continue to be valuable. After dealing with the worst windows, we reached a place where we were no longer concerned with water ruining our hard work, and resumed construction. In early October, some friends of ours were getting married, and we made that our deadline for a presentable interior of the bus.
We used new insulation on the walls, thinner than what we had before. Though the insulation I had scored off craigslist had been the right price, the fiberglass paper sides were a tremendous nuisance, and they protruded past the ribs making it impossible to square anything. These thinner, foil covered boards are a breath of fresh air, and will still keep us plenty warm.
Our old insulation fit easily in place on the floor, and we covered it with 1/2″ plywood this time instead of 1/4″. This does give us a more smooth and even subfloor to build on. We skipped the rosin paper entirely this time, as it seemed to provide no benefit.
We insulated the wheel wells, and began the process of reinstalling everything we’d taken out. We were able to get the counter and the 13′ port bench installed by the wedding, and the two starboard benches were installed shortly after returning home.
We did run into one mechanical issue – the lift pump in our engine stopped working. In brief, the lift pump is what supplies fuel from the tank to the high pressure pump on the engine. Luckily, it was a relatively easy fix, and we were on the road in no time.
Charlie came along to the wedding, and it turns out he’s quite the bus-dog. Though he doesn’t much care for the highway, he’s pretty happy lounging around on the benches and looking out the windows.
Passive solar heating continues to impress me. We have the entire port side of the bus facing South, so sunny days heat it up nicely. 40 degree differences are common so far, and it’ll be interesting to see how that holds up as the outside temperature drops.
And one last note, we’ve officially changed the domain of this site to bus.life (much better).
