Introducing our HZJ78 - GeoCruiser expedition truck

[RobGT]

Hi Guys,

We (Rob and Nettie from the Netherlands) want to make some major trips on some continents The last 4 years we converted our truck from a van into a small expedition campervan.
Our truck:
LandCruiser HZJ78 (2000) - Innovation Campers pop up roof - BFG T/A 235/85 R16 - A.S.S. bucket seats - LongRanger 180 L extra fuel tank - Garmin GPSmap 278 - 2 solar panels - SV4x4 rear bumper - Eberspächer diesel heating.

In that conversion process we changed our built-in cupboards and seats from wood into aluminum.
If you want to have some inspiration, read our report (with a lot of pictures): GeoCruiser.nl
It ‘s written in Dutch, but you can use the Google Translate option for better reading. The pictures tell their story too.

Cheers, Rob and Nettie

 

[KC Cruiser]

Beautiful!

 

[Christian P.]

Superb. Makes miss mine.

 

[Rot Box]

Very nice

 

[Toy-Roverlander]

Awesome vehicle! Looks well setup too.

 

[RobGT]

Hi Guys,

Thanks for the compliments.

Rob

 

[theside00]

That is a sweet cruiser. Looks like an awesome time traveling the world in that.

 

[mtnbike28]

Very nice! Post more pictures here please!

 

[NGUDE]

great interior build ! so excited to see pics of the finished product

 

[RobGT]

@ Adam,
Yeah, our GeoCruiser proved to be a complete and capable expedition truck in the stone desert and sand desert in Morocco during a 6 weeks trip. We enjoy driving our truck anywhere.

@ Jay,
What kind of pictures do you want to see

@ Ngude,
Our interior is indeed one of a kind. There was no commercial company in the Netherlands, Germany and Belgium that wanted to make a complete interior with these materials for us. So I had to design it and make it myself. We camped with this interior for more than 6 weeks now and it proved to be comfortable and efficiënt to use.

Cheers, Rob

 

[targa88]

Nice set-up.
More pix!

 

[Dan Grec]

Wow.

I like that very, very much. Great work.
I'll be using this for inspiration for sure.

Do you have a rough guess on
a) How much this cost in materials to build?
b) How much it weighs? (Do you think it's significantly less than using wood?)

Thanks !

-Dan

 

[4Rescue]

She's a BEAUTY!!! Makes me miss both Australia and my 70's (Ute and a Troupy). Stupid America... no 70-series cruisers *mutter mutter mutter*

Cheers

Dave

 

[RobGT]

Hi Guys,
More and more compliments, thanks

Colin,
We let the roads find us. I'll post some more pictures

Dave,
I've been Down Under 2 times in total of 14 weeks and it's 70-series heaven over there. In Europe we have some 70-series and we see them hardly in traffic. But within a few weeks we go to a meeting “BuschTaxi Treffen ” in Germany and we expect to see about 700 – 800 LandCruisers and a lot of them are of the 70-series.

Dan,
You can find the materials here : http://www.handytube.co.uk
I don't know the weblink in the States.
I used:
• 73 meters tubes (240 feet) $ 600.-
• 110 joints $ 575.-
• 17 m2 alucobond sandwich panels (remainder sale) (183 sq feet) $ 130.-
• 1 leg of a table $ 130.-
• 1 combi sink - double gas stove $ 275.-
• 18 push locks $ 105.-
• Small materials (pop rivets, glue, nuts, bolts, &#8230 $ 100.-
In total: US $ 1915.-

Extra tools, electric switches, wiring, tubes, floorboard and other materials are not included.
I'm not a professional (I worked for 40 years in a hospital laboratory) and it costed me about 7 months (= 30 hours a week) to design and build it, that's about 900 hours of work and thinking.

I didn't weigh the interior cupboards.
The old interior was made of square woden beams 42 mm and 12 mm plye wood. The weight of the new interior felt almost as heavy.

Cheers, Rob

 

[RobGT]

On several requests I posted some extra pictures. Have fun.


GeoCruiser in England


GeoCruiser in the city of Tata, Morocco


GeoCruiser in good company in Lyon, France


GeoCruiser in the mountains of Andorra


GeoCruiser in Spain

Cheers, Rob