God's Grace Skoolie

So I am trying my hand at a blog about our School Bus Conversion. I've never done a blog before, so bear with me. This first post covers the last 20days that we have owned the bus, so lots of pictures WON'T be on today's post, but future posts will contain picture of each days work.

So on 3FEB2017 we bought a Bus. It's a 1996 AMTC school bus that used to hold up to 57 kids. We bought it from Western Mountain Bus Sales in Nampa ID. It used to transport the kids in and around Lapwai, ID, which funny-enough is only about 70 or so miles from us, and yet we had to drive 200+ miles to go buy it! Odd huh!

Anyways, we were looking for a bus to buy to transform into an RV so that we could travel the coast and do whatever it is that God has in store for our lives. (We feel a very strong urge to travel the west coast and talk about what God has done in our lives.) So we decided to give the entire deal to God to show us His will, and I'll tell you what, God had his hand in this entire transaction! I say this because originally the bus was listed for $5500, and with no haggling at all, God gave it to us for $2500!   

So we drove down to the Dealer, checked out the bus, took it for a test drive, and then told the Dealer we would buy it. We found out the actual price right when we got the invoice. We put total faith in God that if He wanted us to have this bus, that He would give it to us for the amount of cash we had, and that we wouldn't have any problems with anything. Well He definitely did that, Praise His Name!

Since then we have been very busy people! From doing lots of research before and after buying the bus, we found out that we needed to pull out the seats and pull up the rubber floor and the plywood underneath. The reason to do this is to get rid of all the rust that forms under the plywood after years of driving on wet and snowy roads. 

Moisture gets in there from the bolt holes that hold the individual seats in place. There are 4 holes for each seat, so the bigger the bus, the more holes there are! I think we had over 100 holes to worry about rust around! So we got some clear rust converter (prevents future rust growth) and painted the whole floor. After we painted it, we filled each hole with silicone and covered them with metal tape to seal out any air/moisture that might try and get back through.

 Next came the floor insulation. That steel floor doesn't do a very good job of keeping heat in the bus! We put down foil-backed foam insulation and then covered that with 1/2in OSB plywood. We could have gone with thicker foam and plywood, however I only have 5-6 inches between my head and the roof, so clearance is an issue. Once we got that all down we put a wood sealer/primer down and then second coated it with outdoor waterproof paint.

 So tomorrow I will post up what we did today since I am wicked tired from a long day, and am about to fall asleep doing this. Good night all, and may God bless you.