Post by Kam on Oct 31, 2013 8:45:46 GMT -8
Hi everyone!
I don't know what it never occurred to me to post in the forum until now, but 6 months ago I purchased my very own bus :-)
She was in very rough shape when I got her but I've put a lot of work in and I now use her to make a weekly run between Nanaimo and Duncan to the Medieval Chaos LARP
every Saturday.
We call her The Beast :-)
I have a Facebook page for her with some cool photos and I regularly post the projects and work I'm always doing.
www.facebook.com/thebeast
Here is some info about her:
I don't know what it never occurred to me to post in the forum until now, but 6 months ago I purchased my very own bus :-)
She was in very rough shape when I got her but I've put a lot of work in and I now use her to make a weekly run between Nanaimo and Duncan to the Medieval Chaos LARP
every Saturday.
We call her The Beast :-)
I have a Facebook page for her with some cool photos and I regularly post the projects and work I'm always doing.
www.facebook.com/thebeast
Here is some info about her:
Ride The Beast from Nanaimo to Medieval Chaos LARP in Duncan and back every Saturday!
Description
This page was created to be a place to post news and be a diary for The Beast. She's an old girl now as far as vehicles go, so she takes regular tinkering and attention to keep her in shape. The more I work on her the more cool stuff I find and the more I develop an appreciation for how she was built and all her little qwerks.
Keeping her running is an ongoing labour of love. This is the place I will share and talk about the cool stuff I find.
The Beast is a 1982 GMC, 24 passenger school bus. She was originally outfitted with a side load wheelchair ramp, but at some point the ramp was removed, the door welded closed and extra seats added.
The Beast is build on the GMC 6000 Series Medium Duty chassis, the same chassis as the Top Kick single axle dump trucks of the day. Everything about her is massively overrated and heavy, but that strength is one of the things that makes school busses safer than most vehicles.
Her brakes are a dual hydraulic plus vacuum assist. She has a large vacuum reservoir under the hood as well as an additional tank under the frame, so if the engine quits while driving, you have lots of reserve vacuum power to safely bring her safely to a stop.
In addition to the vacuum boost, she is also takes hydraulic boost from the power steering pump. All that brake power drives two isolated hydraulic brake cylinders on each wheel. You could have a brake line completely blow out and still have full braking power from the other half of the system and make it all the way home.
The last line of safety is her emergency brake which is completely separate from the wheel brakes. The emergency or parking brake is actually a drive shaft mounted drum brake, so when its pulled on, the shaft is locked in and both back wheels will not move, even on a huge incline.
She is powered by a standard GM 350 engine converted to run on propane. The engine is connected to a Fuller industrial 5 speed transmission that drives a low geared rear axle. (8.83:1) The result is that she could probably pull her way up a rock wall in first gear, but her top comfortable cruse speed is about 70 to 75 Kph at about 3800 RPM.
All this makes her very strong, very heavy and very hard on fuel. The average cost to run her is about $0.60 per Km.
Description
This page was created to be a place to post news and be a diary for The Beast. She's an old girl now as far as vehicles go, so she takes regular tinkering and attention to keep her in shape. The more I work on her the more cool stuff I find and the more I develop an appreciation for how she was built and all her little qwerks.
Keeping her running is an ongoing labour of love. This is the place I will share and talk about the cool stuff I find.
The Beast is a 1982 GMC, 24 passenger school bus. She was originally outfitted with a side load wheelchair ramp, but at some point the ramp was removed, the door welded closed and extra seats added.
The Beast is build on the GMC 6000 Series Medium Duty chassis, the same chassis as the Top Kick single axle dump trucks of the day. Everything about her is massively overrated and heavy, but that strength is one of the things that makes school busses safer than most vehicles.
Her brakes are a dual hydraulic plus vacuum assist. She has a large vacuum reservoir under the hood as well as an additional tank under the frame, so if the engine quits while driving, you have lots of reserve vacuum power to safely bring her safely to a stop.
In addition to the vacuum boost, she is also takes hydraulic boost from the power steering pump. All that brake power drives two isolated hydraulic brake cylinders on each wheel. You could have a brake line completely blow out and still have full braking power from the other half of the system and make it all the way home.
The last line of safety is her emergency brake which is completely separate from the wheel brakes. The emergency or parking brake is actually a drive shaft mounted drum brake, so when its pulled on, the shaft is locked in and both back wheels will not move, even on a huge incline.
She is powered by a standard GM 350 engine converted to run on propane. The engine is connected to a Fuller industrial 5 speed transmission that drives a low geared rear axle. (8.83:1) The result is that she could probably pull her way up a rock wall in first gear, but her top comfortable cruse speed is about 70 to 75 Kph at about 3800 RPM.
All this makes her very strong, very heavy and very hard on fuel. The average cost to run her is about $0.60 per Km.