building the Bullet XV

[guidolyons]

Wow.

I did a search for U Haul boxes/conversions...I never expected to see a U Haul box so amazingly transformed. Bravo. Amazing.
:sombrero:

 

[ujoint]

The Bullet is amazing!

 

[sarconcepts]

It's winter again.. .. & all as usual, this is the time I get to do things on the Bullet that I've been thinking about all year.. .... except, in this case, Bethany got on me because of a visit by Yves & Leslie ("in with the old out with the new"...no, "out with the new in with the old" something like that)!
she got jealous of their bikes on the back of their camper, she & I both like biking around, so I'm surprised I hadn't gotten to this years ago, but at this point the Bullet has 35,000 miles on it already, so we haven't been sitting around lazily.
My delay was because I hadn't figured out a good system to hold the bikes absolutely solidly, every bike rack I see has some bounce in it, inherently because it's mounted at 1 point, & let's just say I don't baby the Bullet, so they would have been banging against the back wall pretty hard while off road.
I finally figured I would not use the two upper receivers I built into the Bullet's back wall as that left the bikes hanging, once I left that train of thought, I made some progress.. ..

Here's what I had to work with & remember, the spare & fuel cans protrude

& here's how I got a 3 point connection

I welded into the main curving bar, a threaded coupler, so this bar will be bolted tightly to the 1 1/4" receivers, not just a cotter pin connection

plus a center bracket for the center post bike frame connection

then, for the bike components, I bought a Swagman XTC2 bike rack, & pillaged the parts I needed
(I had looked at many bike racks, but determined this one to have the parts I could work with the best)

Brackets installed & looking like small jet engines off the back!


& I'm not done yet!

 

[Every Miles A Memory]

This will be super cool. I love everything about this set-up

 

[Carlyle]

Nice work!

 

[sarconcepts]

Then, after sanding & powder coating I did my favorite thing this past weekend, putting all the parts together.. ..

assembled in the shop

& installed on the Bullet

you can see in this picture, the center post which holds the bike frames (not the tires),
but also has an upper threaded connection to the back wall of the Bullet, creating the 3 point rigid connection, no bounce or sway at all

& then with bikes..

you can see from the last pic, that I made the main bar such a distance from the back wall, so Bethany's handle bars have only about 1 1/2" clearance from the wall, however because they don't move at all, this was desired as I didn't want the bikes too far out the back end (another problem with most mass produced bike racks)

Another advantage of the Swagman parts I chose, was that the pieces that slide down the center post to grab the bike frames, also have holes for padlocks, which, when locked, don't allow the bikes to be removed, this plus a cable through the tires should keep everything safe

 

[ExpoMike]

Nice modification of the Swagman rack. I have this rack for our daily driver and it works well for street driving. I love how easy and simple this rack is and it secures the bikes well. Nice mods for making it offroad worthy.

 

[Overland Hadley]

for the bike components, I bought a Swagman XTC2 bike rack, & pillaged the parts I needed
(I had looked at many bike racks, but determined this one to have the parts I could work with the best)

This is great!

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

That looks great. And they are up high out of the way too. I wish I had a dollar for every time I see a bike rack hanging way too low off the back of a vehicle hit the ground. Especially with a vehicle like this that spends its days off in the woods.

Nice design. Had the same Swagman rack, very good design. I sold it only to buy a slightly more HD one as my DH bike was over the weight limit.

 

[sarconcepts]

More winter projects.. ..
This is one I've been thinking about for a while now, if you read the 'Bullet' site back in the beginning, you know I really didn't want to lift the Bullet's suspension as I wanted to keep the center of gravity as low as possible, remember I had a four wheel camper on a Tacoma, not the widest vehicle or lowest center of gravity. Now that I've had the Bullet for a while now, I realize just how wide the stance is, & how low its center of gravity is in relation to its width, it aint flipping over.. ..ever! so I've decided to give it a 2" lift, to raise the bottom step when deployed & get a bit more clearance, plus, the Bullet looks a bit too low for it's muscle as the weight of the Bullet has dropped the frame 2", so I just want to put it back where it belongs. It took me some time to figure out which way to go about this on this 5500 as no one really has any parts pre-made to lift the 4500 or 5500s. I looked at Carli, Timbren, ProRYDE, Saying "Sterling Bullet" threw things off even more. Of course there are air bags, but I respect the vehicles engineering as it is, it's tough as hell, & I don't want to add another thing that can go wrong in the middle of nowhere.
Kaiser Brake & Alignment, A local shop here in Eugene is really set up to work on large vehicles custom building anything they need, & this didn't seem to scare them at all, They make there own U-bolts, spring packs, blocks etc. In fact, a couple years ago I had them replace the solid upper control arms with adjustable ones, to make the rake & tracking better.

so this is what's been taken out so far.. ..

look close at the size of those things!
the U-bolts are 3/4" diameter, 16" long & needing to be longer, the shocks are 4 1/2" in diameter

more to come.. ..

 

[pappawheely]

Sorry if I missed it, Do you know what the completed box weighs? I am using a Uhaul box on my build and want to get a general idea on final weight.

 

[sarconcepts]

Well, this probably isn't the most visually titillating modification, but the body does stand 2" taller. You really feel it getting in!

looks like that house is settling pretty bad!

It's also nice not to worry about deploying the steps while over a curb or sidewalk, it always made it, but it was close. Now there's some room to spare


& to papawheely
post 39 has a breakdown of the Uhaul box parts & weights
the short answer is mine, after cutting it down in width & height, weighed in at just about 1000 lbs
mine was a 14' box (11' floor +3' cabover) & I cut down the width 7" & the height about 2'
now this is just the box, add everything going inside & outside as well. My total wet weight, everything included (except my 3-point pivot frame) is about 4300 lbs
edit - this weight also includes everything I did around the truck as well, like both steel bumpers, both winches, bridging ramps, hanging storage, firewood, chainsaw etc.

 

[mhiscox]

Well, this probably isn't the most visually titillating modification . . .

View attachment 268909

Don't be too sure. I'm easily titillated. :sombrero:

Seriously, it looks great. Just about the perfect lift, IMHO.

 

[sarconcepts]

Don't think that's all for this year.. ..Mike need his titillation!
I can always find something to challenge me, & this next thing was a four year challenge, as I never really had a way to make a specific trim piece until now, or should I say the technology is now readily available, & cheap too.
The inside roof corners on the Bullet are odd shapes, the front are simple enough, a round base that radius's upward like a quarter sphere, a conceivable shape, but hard to build & get in place. The back corners are square in plan, but also radius upward to a round top, a tough to conceive shape even harder to build, & as a result I never made these roof trim pieces, until now.. .. (in reality, I never really looked up into these corners, so it never bothered me from a visual standpoint, but it always did from the standpoint of this being the only area not 'finished' on the Bullet.
The roof shapes.. .. albeit old 'under construction' pics, but you can see how the inside shapes would be hard to produce in a finished manor

& the corresponding inside as it was the past four years
& the cheesy vinyl covered cardboard trim I made years ago (I really didn't look up there much!)
& the back with a piece of the vinyl cut out so I could match the paint

The reason I didn't just have these areas covered in vinyl with the rest of the ceiling was I needed access to run all the ceiling & roof wires.
Then it dawned on me this past spring that I could draw these pieces in Sketchup & have them 3D printed in plastic, so to town I went.. ..

If you look close at the drawings, you can see a back tab on the bottom, behind the actual curving shape, this is to fit behind the existing aluminum trim, with a front continuous bump that will lock these pieces in behind the aluminum, just like a puzzle piece, or a model. In theory, it will click in & stay there permanently
stay tuned.. ..

 

[sarconcepts]

& the corresponding 3D printed pieces.. ..
straight from the printer, not cleaned up at all, & the bottom filler not removed yet (it just peels off to expose the bottom tabs & bump)




add a little almond paint to match..& click those babies in place


total cost - $50.
I cant wait until 3D printing metal parts is affordable