LostInTheWorld
Builder/Traveler
Hello all,
I’m fairly new posting here, but I have been a long time expedition portal browser. I have also been very active on other forums for years (G503, cruisersforum, rotaryforum, and steel soldiers).
I want to share a bit about our newest project.
---Project Background:
I am a nature and wildlife photographer. My wife and I travel quite a bit in the US and sometimes internationally. We go on backcountry photography trips in our Wrangler/Autohome setup. We love our little jeep roof top tent (RTT) setup, but we are looking to significantly expand our trip capability with more internal volume, so we are selling our RTT and starting an expedition truck build. We are planning extended (months long) trips in the western US, Alaska, and Canada in the coming years, so we are building a new vehicle for that purpose. We typically use our 4x4 to access out of the way locations (often in snow, sand, mud, and flooded roads), but we don’t intentionally seek technical situations. Our new vehicle will be highway capable, but we are in no rush, so cruising along a highway at 55-60 mph is fine with us. We want it to be something we feel comfortable living in for extended periods off the beaten path.
---Build Capability:
I’m a certified welder (TIG and stick), I’m a machinist (I own a small machine shop), and I’m a mechanical design engineer. I have worked in the engineering field one way or another for the last 19 years. I have built several aircraft, and I have worked quite a bit with military vehicles. My wife is professional quilter, blogger, and was an aircraft design engineer for over 10 years. She has a great eye for design, color, and style. Basically, we are set up to handle most reasonable design/build projects.
---The Vehicle:
We are building an Expedition Vehicle with a ~110 square foot living space on a 21 foot long 1996 M1078 LMTV military truck chassis. We compared many truck chassis options (FUSO, Unimog, Steyr….). There are plusses and minuses to every option, but we felt that the LMTV fit our needs and budget best. After working on our LMTV for a while now, it’s clearly a pretty sturdy vehicle and has plenty of capacity for our project. When complete, our truck will be capable of remote operation for several weeks without supplies and will be registered as an RV and drive-able with a normal Class C driver’s license.
We removed the truck bed last month and fixed a lot of mechanical things on the truck. Right now we are cleaning up the truck, removing unneeded systems, and getting ready to paint the frame. We are also working on the design of the habitat. We plan to work on the truck this summer, and start the habitat build this winter when the weather favors indoor work.
Here is my wife driving our truck when it first arrived: https://youtu.be/U9NhmKjRN08
Here is our truck in its current state:
Here is our basic layout as of right now:
We have just recently started a blog on the project. I plan to post here, but you can keep an eye on our project on our build blog.
I’m sure we will have a million question as we work through the project, so I wanted to get the ball rolling.
Have a good evening,
Michael
I’m fairly new posting here, but I have been a long time expedition portal browser. I have also been very active on other forums for years (G503, cruisersforum, rotaryforum, and steel soldiers).
I want to share a bit about our newest project.
---Project Background:
I am a nature and wildlife photographer. My wife and I travel quite a bit in the US and sometimes internationally. We go on backcountry photography trips in our Wrangler/Autohome setup. We love our little jeep roof top tent (RTT) setup, but we are looking to significantly expand our trip capability with more internal volume, so we are selling our RTT and starting an expedition truck build. We are planning extended (months long) trips in the western US, Alaska, and Canada in the coming years, so we are building a new vehicle for that purpose. We typically use our 4x4 to access out of the way locations (often in snow, sand, mud, and flooded roads), but we don’t intentionally seek technical situations. Our new vehicle will be highway capable, but we are in no rush, so cruising along a highway at 55-60 mph is fine with us. We want it to be something we feel comfortable living in for extended periods off the beaten path.
---Build Capability:
I’m a certified welder (TIG and stick), I’m a machinist (I own a small machine shop), and I’m a mechanical design engineer. I have worked in the engineering field one way or another for the last 19 years. I have built several aircraft, and I have worked quite a bit with military vehicles. My wife is professional quilter, blogger, and was an aircraft design engineer for over 10 years. She has a great eye for design, color, and style. Basically, we are set up to handle most reasonable design/build projects.
---The Vehicle:
We are building an Expedition Vehicle with a ~110 square foot living space on a 21 foot long 1996 M1078 LMTV military truck chassis. We compared many truck chassis options (FUSO, Unimog, Steyr….). There are plusses and minuses to every option, but we felt that the LMTV fit our needs and budget best. After working on our LMTV for a while now, it’s clearly a pretty sturdy vehicle and has plenty of capacity for our project. When complete, our truck will be capable of remote operation for several weeks without supplies and will be registered as an RV and drive-able with a normal Class C driver’s license.
We removed the truck bed last month and fixed a lot of mechanical things on the truck. Right now we are cleaning up the truck, removing unneeded systems, and getting ready to paint the frame. We are also working on the design of the habitat. We plan to work on the truck this summer, and start the habitat build this winter when the weather favors indoor work.
Here is my wife driving our truck when it first arrived: https://youtu.be/U9NhmKjRN08
Here is our truck in its current state:
Here is our basic layout as of right now:
We have just recently started a blog on the project. I plan to post here, but you can keep an eye on our project on our build blog.
I’m sure we will have a million question as we work through the project, so I wanted to get the ball rolling.
Have a good evening,
Michael
Let me know if we can help you with our composite panels. 
