pnwginger
Adventure Truck Builder
Hello,
Welcome to the build of Trucky McTruckface. Trucky is a 1999/2010 BAE Systems- M1088A1 Expedition Vehicle Build.
For 6 years I served in the USCG, the last three, I was a Lifeboat Driver at a remote surf station on Washington's rugged Olympic peninsula. As the adventures were plentiful and to maximize our time outdoors i decided to buy a sprinter van and build it out. After living out of it for two and a half years, and finishing my Coast Guard enlistment, we parked it in march of last year to hike the Continental Divide Trail. Hiking for months, my knee decided to act up and called our trip short after hiking from the Mexican boarder to Salida,CO. Deciding on the next step, we Loaded up the Wonderbus with gear and headed back to Colorado to ride motorcycles and enjoy the mountains. Our venture began when we decided to sell our incredible The Wonderbus and buy a surplus truck from the army. After bidding on a few trucks over a few weeks, we finally won an auction just as the cell serviced dropped out on the gondola ride up Heavenly Mtn at Lake Tahoe. A week later on our flight to Tucson, we were hit with the reality of what we were about to do. Arriving to the DRMO lot, and seeing our Truck for the first time was wild! especially since we were notified during our flight that our insurance policy was cancelled. after scrambling for a few hours in 115 degree heat calling and trying to find an insurer and being shot down dozens of times, we finally found a broker who was willing to work with us. as we were about to leave, we asked Debbie, the Gov Planet rep to take our picture with our new truck. (Just them i decided it was the moment that i missed out on while hiking the Mountains of colorado) I proposed..... I asked Stefani to Marry me in a DRMO parking lot, in front of a giant military truck, after waking up at 2am to catch a flight to AZ, after spending the last 4 hours in 115 degrees and about to drive back to oregon in a truck without AC, double hearing protection and not knowing if the truck would make it. She said yes
. after 3 solid days of driving, we made it home. what a miserable 3 days. preparing the shop and prepping the sprinter for sale, we Began building the truck in October 2016 with strip down and initial planning, i haven't had much time to broadcast what we are doing until now. To this point the chassis is nearly ready to mount the subframe and fiberglass composite camper box. Over the past 6 months I've completely gone through the chassis with sound dampening, insulation, wiring harnesses, body work, paint, prep, painted the chassis and cab, installed air ride seats, stereo system, developed and built racks, light bars, entry steps, subframe design and have processed 90% of the necessary materials and waiting to tidy up my air system to move the truck outside to use the floorspace to weld up my subframe. Arriving this week is a custom made 150 gallon fuel tank to replace the stock 54 gallon tank, custom sized cargo boxes should also be here within the next week or two.
I could type for hours about the things that I've done to this truck with a full breakdown of components and processed that i used to get it to this point. but ill just show you a few pictures instead.
For how those of you interested in following along as the build progresses, Please check out our Instagram page @overlandAdventureTruck or like our page on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/overlandadventuretruck/ here are a few photos of the work we've done so far.
Welcome to the build of Trucky McTruckface. Trucky is a 1999/2010 BAE Systems- M1088A1 Expedition Vehicle Build.
For 6 years I served in the USCG, the last three, I was a Lifeboat Driver at a remote surf station on Washington's rugged Olympic peninsula. As the adventures were plentiful and to maximize our time outdoors i decided to buy a sprinter van and build it out. After living out of it for two and a half years, and finishing my Coast Guard enlistment, we parked it in march of last year to hike the Continental Divide Trail. Hiking for months, my knee decided to act up and called our trip short after hiking from the Mexican boarder to Salida,CO. Deciding on the next step, we Loaded up the Wonderbus with gear and headed back to Colorado to ride motorcycles and enjoy the mountains. Our venture began when we decided to sell our incredible The Wonderbus and buy a surplus truck from the army. After bidding on a few trucks over a few weeks, we finally won an auction just as the cell serviced dropped out on the gondola ride up Heavenly Mtn at Lake Tahoe. A week later on our flight to Tucson, we were hit with the reality of what we were about to do. Arriving to the DRMO lot, and seeing our Truck for the first time was wild! especially since we were notified during our flight that our insurance policy was cancelled. after scrambling for a few hours in 115 degree heat calling and trying to find an insurer and being shot down dozens of times, we finally found a broker who was willing to work with us. as we were about to leave, we asked Debbie, the Gov Planet rep to take our picture with our new truck. (Just them i decided it was the moment that i missed out on while hiking the Mountains of colorado) I proposed..... I asked Stefani to Marry me in a DRMO parking lot, in front of a giant military truck, after waking up at 2am to catch a flight to AZ, after spending the last 4 hours in 115 degrees and about to drive back to oregon in a truck without AC, double hearing protection and not knowing if the truck would make it. She said yes
. after 3 solid days of driving, we made it home. what a miserable 3 days. preparing the shop and prepping the sprinter for sale, we Began building the truck in October 2016 with strip down and initial planning, i haven't had much time to broadcast what we are doing until now. To this point the chassis is nearly ready to mount the subframe and fiberglass composite camper box. Over the past 6 months I've completely gone through the chassis with sound dampening, insulation, wiring harnesses, body work, paint, prep, painted the chassis and cab, installed air ride seats, stereo system, developed and built racks, light bars, entry steps, subframe design and have processed 90% of the necessary materials and waiting to tidy up my air system to move the truck outside to use the floorspace to weld up my subframe. Arriving this week is a custom made 150 gallon fuel tank to replace the stock 54 gallon tank, custom sized cargo boxes should also be here within the next week or two. I could type for hours about the things that I've done to this truck with a full breakdown of components and processed that i used to get it to this point. but ill just show you a few pictures instead.
For how those of you interested in following along as the build progresses, Please check out our Instagram page @overlandAdventureTruck or like our page on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/overlandadventuretruck/ here are a few photos of the work we've done so far.
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