2001 Chevy Express 3500 w/ Ford front end 4x4 conversion, $19,000 OBO
TurtleTop Bus body, 4x4 conversion done by Salem Kroger in Red Bluff, CA
Located in San Luis Obispo, CA
My wife's been trying to get me to sell this awesome rig since the day I bought it in October of 2016.
It's a long story so buckle up.
I bought it with 145,676 miles on it as a rad family trip hauler & to kick off a MTB shuttle service. It's been awesome at the former, but the business never really took off and remains an occasional side hobby that can be accomplished by a minivan. And like I said, my wife hates it other than it's supreme utility. How else do you carry a family of 6, friends, a couple of dogs on adventures where each kid get's their own row?
Shortly after I purchased it, the speedometer and odometer died... All the rest of the instruments work, it has an auxiliary tachometer, and my phone tells me my speed so I never fixed it. My estimate of mileage over the past 5 years is 20-25,000 tops. It's a summer road-trip and long holiday weekend adventure vehicle. It's barely driven monthly. My only way to validate this would be "tire wear." One of the first upgrades I did in 2017 was wheels and tires which still have plenty ~50% of "life" left.
Also when I purchased it, I'm 90% sure it had a new or rebuilt engine. I'll need to find some validation of that. Its the 8.1L gas. It has plenty of get-up and go in the mountains and likes cruising at 80mph on the interstate on its 35" tires on 20" rims. It gets 7-8 mpg. We got 9 once, downhill with the wind at our back...
I got rid of the back row of 5 seats and put in a bed platform (twin mattress). I also flipped the front 2 seats to rear-facing and built an "RV style" table. Bus has 10 seats and seatbelts.
I also built custom dual receiver bumper so I could tow if needed w/o needing to remove the bike rack. I think I towed twice, a trailer of dirt for some bike jumps I was building and when I moved a few blocks away.
I installed an invertor to power the TV, DVD player, & charge devices.
It may not be clear from the pics, but most of the clearcoat has peeled. It looks like peeling sunburn.
Front AC is marginal. I think there's a flow restriction somewhere because you can hear it running and there's a trickle of cold air, that only intermittently works. I think it freezes over, thaws, etc. The rear AC more than makes up for it. I'll freeze my kids out across Utah in the summer and stay comfortable enough with the overhead mounted fan circulating the chilled air to the driver.
Bike rack not included.
Here's the maintenance highlights I have receipts for over the past 5 years:
Rebuilt transfer case
New transmission
New shocks
new radiator
new front & rear brakes (pads, discs, drums)
master cylinder & booster
rebuilt rear differential
New power steering pump
other misc hoses etc...
It's an awesome spacious very functional vehicle and a great overland vehicle. I'd choose this over a narrow bodied "generic" sprinter every day of the week. I expect to buy a much newer, nicer, non-yellow version on the E-350 chassis with the overhead front glass in the turtletop in the next year or so and then convert it to 4x4 when I move back to the mountains. I'm sold on the spacious body, as the base for an ultimate overlander family build.
TurtleTop Bus body, 4x4 conversion done by Salem Kroger in Red Bluff, CA
Located in San Luis Obispo, CA
My wife's been trying to get me to sell this awesome rig since the day I bought it in October of 2016.
It's a long story so buckle up.
I bought it with 145,676 miles on it as a rad family trip hauler & to kick off a MTB shuttle service. It's been awesome at the former, but the business never really took off and remains an occasional side hobby that can be accomplished by a minivan. And like I said, my wife hates it other than it's supreme utility. How else do you carry a family of 6, friends, a couple of dogs on adventures where each kid get's their own row?
Shortly after I purchased it, the speedometer and odometer died... All the rest of the instruments work, it has an auxiliary tachometer, and my phone tells me my speed so I never fixed it. My estimate of mileage over the past 5 years is 20-25,000 tops. It's a summer road-trip and long holiday weekend adventure vehicle. It's barely driven monthly. My only way to validate this would be "tire wear." One of the first upgrades I did in 2017 was wheels and tires which still have plenty ~50% of "life" left.
Also when I purchased it, I'm 90% sure it had a new or rebuilt engine. I'll need to find some validation of that. Its the 8.1L gas. It has plenty of get-up and go in the mountains and likes cruising at 80mph on the interstate on its 35" tires on 20" rims. It gets 7-8 mpg. We got 9 once, downhill with the wind at our back...
I got rid of the back row of 5 seats and put in a bed platform (twin mattress). I also flipped the front 2 seats to rear-facing and built an "RV style" table. Bus has 10 seats and seatbelts.
I also built custom dual receiver bumper so I could tow if needed w/o needing to remove the bike rack. I think I towed twice, a trailer of dirt for some bike jumps I was building and when I moved a few blocks away.
I installed an invertor to power the TV, DVD player, & charge devices.
It may not be clear from the pics, but most of the clearcoat has peeled. It looks like peeling sunburn.
Front AC is marginal. I think there's a flow restriction somewhere because you can hear it running and there's a trickle of cold air, that only intermittently works. I think it freezes over, thaws, etc. The rear AC more than makes up for it. I'll freeze my kids out across Utah in the summer and stay comfortable enough with the overhead mounted fan circulating the chilled air to the driver.
Bike rack not included.
Here's the maintenance highlights I have receipts for over the past 5 years:
Rebuilt transfer case
New transmission
New shocks
new radiator
new front & rear brakes (pads, discs, drums)
master cylinder & booster
rebuilt rear differential
New power steering pump
other misc hoses etc...
It's an awesome spacious very functional vehicle and a great overland vehicle. I'd choose this over a narrow bodied "generic" sprinter every day of the week. I expect to buy a much newer, nicer, non-yellow version on the E-350 chassis with the overhead front glass in the turtletop in the next year or so and then convert it to 4x4 when I move back to the mountains. I'm sold on the spacious body, as the base for an ultimate overlander family build.
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