Ford E350

[dar395]

We have lots of plans for next year as we're traveling back out west for a planned 30 day trip, back roads, ghost towns, rail towns and hiking. the USA offers us a lot of options as we track down the back roads. We are amazed at where we can go, see and the people we meet. You look at a simple stone built building or just a flag blowing in the wind with a forgotten rail town of the past, vanning is a great way to travel!

 

[Bikersmurf]

Hey Dean, Cool that you're using the front hitch for the carrier! If you have any pictures of the bike on the front I'd love to see it as I've been contemplating a front hitch to carry bicycles or a winch (we've found some limitations with a light van and street tires!).

Enjoy your continued travels,

X2 on the front hitch pics... I may skip the 12k winch though.

Light isn't a problem I have (5800 lbs on just the rear axle). So far I keep being surprised by what it can do with just LSD and duallies. Being used to an Fj40, it's a whole different game. A two foot wide ditch/trench isn't a problem... Nor is a 4' difference between the highest and lowest wheels corner to corner.

 

[dar395]

Getting the Van out of the side yard winter storage to prepare for the fast approaching summer months, new stereo system and speakers added and completing the storage area for clothes and dry goods that just didn't get to last season.

 

[dar395]

We're planning on put'in 7-10k miles on the van in 2017, we're starting out with Eastern KY TN into VA with a bit of the Dixie Highway tossed in this coming end of May - 1st of June, we have plans for Michigan Rec area in late June in the US forest on the west side of the state, in early July we're doing the Plate River area out of Empire Michigan.

WE have plans to do three rivers in the early part of summer, all here in Michigan: Muskegon approx22miles, Plate River approx. 7 miles and the Manistee approx. 8 miles, along with some trail rides on the dirt bikes and many city streets on the Honda Urban's, we hope to always take the van "fully loaded" with the roof rack, front and back hitches carrying all of the toys! We hope to put the van to good use and are planning on taking it slow and easy enjoying the back roads of our life. I'll try to bring back some great photo's and stories all while watching you build and use your van's in your travels.

 

[dar395]

Installing 12v House Battery Charging System from engine for under $60!

After using the van last year with only a plug in system for charging our two house batteries I spent some time on looking for a system that I could under stand and found a system from "The 12v Life" on line.

The system took about three hours to install at a cost of just under $60 all purchased materials came from ebay and all were shipped free!




Everything simple, cheap and easy to understand.

 

[dar395]

With this system the shopping list was not very long:

20 feet of 4ga Battery wire

Two 250 fuse connectors with fuses

A continuous service solenoid (It must be a continuous unit)

6 cable ends for 4ga wire

Wire loom guard

16ga wire

wired fuse holder for the 16ga wire and small fuse (I used a 15amp auto style)

A few 16ga wire crimp ends

A way to connect to the batteries







A number of zip ties

 

[dar395]

The install took about three hours, puts out 14.2v and battery charge of 13.2, I already had the house batteries installed in the Frame mounted boxes and they are wired into the van and shore charging service that was installed at the time of the build. The engine charging system is an upgrade for road traveling. This cuts my install time as this covers only the added system.




The placement of the solenoid on the front radiator mount with the control ground wire in place.



The first Cable fuse being installed to the solenoid this will be attached to the + side of the battery at a later time




The cable fuse is a low cost insurance to protect the van and us from fire and shorts, my system has a fuse on both ends of the charging battery cables.



I took the time to buildup the other cable fuse that will be at the house battery end of the cable, I'm using the cable loom on all of the cable just as an added insurance in case of rubbing wear it also seem to increase the zip ties in holding the cable in place.

 

[dar395]

One other item that may wished to be noted as I my self learned in this research, on the solenoid the two small control wires that need to be connected at the small post needs to be one grounded (body) and the other is a hot (positive) fused wire that is controlled by the key in the run position. All the solenoid really is a electric magnet that connects the two larger (battery cable) post. By using the key as your switch you will never forget to disconnect the charging system from the house batteries.




Looking under our van the house battery can be seen I have the two post tops; one wing nut and other standard post this makes the attachment easier for the connecting cable.



Dropping the battery box is easy with the factory frame mounts, moving the flip latch from one side to the other gave me the needed room to make the connection at the house battery and the install of the cable fuse.

 

[dar395]

Sorry for not completing the post on the charging system, BUTT! I got a call and here in Michigan Trout season is now open and I had an invite to go so off to "Lame Duck" rec area and then had to stay and enjoy a nice Brown on the grill with cold beer and a nice hike, the first of spring and the first trip with the van for 2017, The charging system working like a champ but I'll try to complete the post now!

The Van is equipped with a 220 amp alternator if that is of interest; I used 4ga battery cable for the charging power running a short cable from the + side of the vehicle battery through the 1st 250amp blade fuse with the long 4ga wire connected to the output side of the blade then running it under the vehicle back to my frame mounted House Batteries where before connecting another 250 amp blade fuse is placed between the charging wire and the house batteries and the 4ga wire is also incased in the wire loom cover as an added safety.



The OME frame mount batteries have been a great investment and space saver, I'm showing the frame safety cables and handles on the boxes for the ease of the install or lowering of the house batteries



After running the complete charging wire with the blade fuses in place then I ran the power wire to solenoid finding a spot in the power system box under the hood that was + with the key placed in the run position so that the system cannot run down your starting battery. This + connection was not fused so I added a fuse link to again protect my vehicle as much as I could




As you can see it was a one man show in finding the live port!



With all of the wires connected zip ties added to clean it up and spray to protect a charging system was added for under $60!

We're leaving for a Southern trip this week and a two week test of all of our new added items in the van, this one we're sure will keep our beer cold, music on and the fan running!

 

[dar395]

Adding the completed solenoid photo as my last post was too large. It's a great way to travel in the van, a few simple tools, ideas and small amount of money and for the most part the would is ours!

 

[Gat]

Looking good with the electrical upgrade!

I may have to steal some of these ideas and do the same. So far we don't have much in the way of extra electrical load in our van but the security of running accessories off a dedicated battery plus charging on the fly is great!

 

[dar395]

Our Update

Sometimes it's as we lose a long time friend in our travels, it happened to me this summer of 2017. A busy travel year for us as we were on the road for 67 days, the van was to the east coast then all the way to the back roads of Mississippi deep in the over growth and on to Louisiana in places so deep you can't see the sky! You can find living creatures so long and dark that a chill enters your body the van takes to amazing places.

My travel partner of sorts had to be left behind this past summer, we never really spoke before the end, but we were together for many years, the Keys and mile marker one down on the beach to the east of the key for morning coffee, walking the streets of Europe, Boston, Cincinnati, Chicago to the gay fest in Toronto (Second best festival for me & trust me I'm not gay!), and the Italian festival in New York (Oh you've never seen the girls until 5am there) and the biking up and down the Board Walk at Ocean City MD in the wee hours of the morning and the one time we were on the East Side of Detroit and there laid the Dead Body! I could go on as we've been together for many a years we even shared AC-DC (Little Bobby) playing with The Stones (Mic & Richard) in front of us and 450 thousand others and Charile comes to the Mic and says "Titties" I have that on film!, most never take time to see the world but here we were together most of the time with our Honda 50cc Urban Expresses in cities, national parks, beaches living a great life but the end happened and it was time to part until I looked back at photos of the past many years I never understood how close we had become, can't be replaced, never! Helped to build the van, helped drive and park it!




I never thought I'd ever have to say good-bye to these sandals as we traveled thousands of miles!

 

[dar395]

We keep growing in the way we use the van and how much we really do with it, there is always a way to improve it to make it more "Ours", it's kind of a growth that many will never understand and the places we add to our portfolio each year is in itself a reward many will never understand.

We clocked just about 10,000 miles on "Delta Dawn", our van in 2017 and we found some updates that will make 2018 travels even better, we or I should say I watch as some new comers start there own builds, some give up and others never look back. We learn by others mistakes, Bosco's approaches to teach us from his adventures and than there is the new 6 Ford Diesel Step van that I read an I awaited the flow of wisdom didn't happen, but what a great new build to learn from!

Our one big change is our motor bikes:



We have as we think explored many cities and towns and many other sites with our Honda Urban Express, load them on the hitch racks and off we went!

We found we out grew them, in 2017 we moved up on the motorbikes to the sh150i Honda's, fast, easy butt!



They were nice. quick but were heading for the Wild West! We're not kid's but we love adventure! So were upgrading a little further!

 

[dar395]

In the bike "hunt" we were looking at many factors, we're looking at trips of 150 miles+, and than weight is a big factor as we want to haul them on hitch carriers, in days gone by we have had Honda Gold Wing and Yamaha Venture, both being large and a soft ride, moving all the way down to the Urbans we found that a slow ride let you see, which was a big change over number of miles rode. After learning the "see" factor we never want to go fast again on our motorbikes. We used the Honda sh150i's for the later part of summer, we carried them on our Harbor Freight carriers which started to fail and need to be replaced.

We started looking at Dual Sport bikes, with Honda's and Yamaha's being on top of our choices, both making great bikes. We have settled on Yamaha TW200's for many reason's but the top item's are weight:281 pounds, lots of support; Racks, Shocks, Bars, Seats and they're cheap!

I found hitch carriers from "Discount Racks", the Black Widow model for just $71 each on the Scratch & Dent sale and they have arrived at 69 pounds we'll be carrying about 340 pounds on the frond and back of the van. I'm working on "helper Springs" to help with the added weight. I'll post some photo's this week-end.