Just bought an old coaster and want to fit out. Mechanically very sound. Not sure where and what to start on. Any advice would be appreciated.
madaboutled said
02:15 AM Feb 10, 2015
Thee first thing to do is grab a note pad & pen and start sketching down some layouts, once you figure what you want then draw up the layout to scale to make sure everything will fit.
Snail said
06:14 AM Feb 10, 2015
Check on YouTube. How to build a motor home
wasn_me said
08:13 AM Feb 10, 2015
A mate did the same thing with a 92 LWB coaster. After stripping it out, the first thing he found was the floor is not flat or level. This created a few problems
Cheers Pete
SnowT said
09:22 PM Feb 10, 2015
Give us some photo's of the interior.. It will give us a better idea..
One Factor..
How comfortable do you want to be...?
- Are you handy with a Welder..?
- or are you handy with wood..
What weigh does the bus weigh at the moment..?
- is it registered as a Bus or a MH or is it not registered..?
They are the important factors so far..
Juergen
Murraman said
07:25 AM Feb 11, 2015
Maybe a good idea to get others with Coaster to send in photos of their setups, Or to tell you how theirs is setup pros and cons. Ours has a rear shower/toilet right across the back. The cons of this is you lose the boot, our boot is only 100mm deep at best. But I can still store gear in their.
Ours has single beds down each side which I like, plenty of cupboards and shelves. It has taken a bit of working out what to take and what to leave behind but last trip worked well as we culled stuff and still had free storage area.
Good luck with you project.
Cheers Allan
anthonyc said
12:38 AM Feb 12, 2015
Thanks for all the advice. I appreciate it. I will take some photos and upload. At the moment it is registered as a bus. GVM is 5060kgs.
It is ok I can drive with my current licence. My current idea is not to have a double bed or single beds but to put it sofa beds. These can be used as seats until you convert to bed at night. The rest I plan to have minimal cupboards, shower/toilet, micro oven, fridge, sink and small cook top. Going to a local show to pick up some ideas.
SnowT said
01:26 PM Feb 12, 2015
Ok.. If you Don't have a Light Rigid License, you CAN NOT drive it...
It's needs to have a GVM of 4,495kg to be able to legally drive it...
--
a few suggestions..
- Take it to a registered Weigh Bridge and take it over the bridge and Record for your own benefit the " EMPTY " weight of the bus...
> The reason for having this figure is to make sure that you don't add to much weight to the bus so you DO NOT breach the 4,495kg Weight of the vehicle..
> Look at what you want to add. and were its going to go.... there are some limitations to where you can put water tanks under the bus and the sizes of those water tank's..
> Custom coaster has a supply of water tanks that can go under the coaster with no modifications[ 70-75lt capacity ]
> On the Weight issue Look at 1.1kg for every litre of water in the bus..[ 1.1 to allow for the weight of the tank and fitting's ]
- IF your On Facebook Look for the Toyota Coaster Group and Join it...
- On the issue of a Bed you would be better off going with a Fixed Bed setup.. [ unless you are a light weight and don't mind sleeping on a sofa bed setup... Plus Most sofa setups can be heavier than a bed setup]
What I'm trying to say is Weight is your enemy... to much weight is no good...
Juergen
jade46 said
03:16 PM Feb 12, 2015
You are better of with a permanent bed setup. Making and unmaking a bed twice a day is bad news after a while. Sofa beds do not compare with a good mattress for comfort and are usually quite heavy because of the steel frames in the conversion mechanism
-- Edited by jade46 on Thursday 12th of February 2015 03:18:16 PM
anthonyc said
12:42 AM Feb 13, 2015
I am sorry what I meant was I have a meduim rigid licence. But I am on the same track too much weight cost more fuel to run. Thanks for the other tip people the Facebook page could be handy too. The other tip about the bed is good but I am still investigating the sofa beds. True about the weight but good for space.
-- Edited by anthonyc on Friday 13th of February 2015 12:44:33 AM
SnowT said
08:49 PM Feb 13, 2015
I'm actually in the process of striping out the current bed setup in my Coaster as It is just does not work as well as it should..
It means i need to redo The Full Electrics, Main switchboards, Inverter location.. Battery's Everything......
Redo the water tanks and the plumbing from each...to the rest of the bus..
Juergen
The Doo crew said
01:57 PM Feb 15, 2015
Sounds familiar Juergen, started by pulling out the single beds (too bloody narrow) with that the battery's & pumps were removed, then the gas box as 4.5kg cylinders are getting harder to fill, then the overhead roof lining to fit a split unit air-con head unit, then all the rear wiring as it was very untidy with cut off wiring all over the place. The end result is 1/3 of the Coaster stripped bare this time. All the battery/solar wiring upgraded as although done by a professional company in QLD was just too small for the task causing voltage drop issues all the time, and who puts the bloody fuse box in the bottom of the wardrobe under the timer bottom????
Anthony you have the advantage of doing it right from the start, not having to modify some one else's idea of how it should be, so plan it well & take your time to get it right for you. Having re-jigged three Coaster fit outs the next one I do will be a blank canvas start, the last one almost was.
Most of the mod's done are for SWMBO but the bed is for me, take your time to plan it well, don't take shortcuts as they WILL come back to bite you later & spend the money on good quality wiring, plumbing & fittings as this will pay off in the long run.
As others have said weight is the biggest issue, the local weigh bridge is only 2kms down the road for us so the occasional trip over is worth it to check how were going as were almost at the limit fully loaded.
Our Coaster has been in the shed for 9 months now for this round of upgrades, it will be a much better unit on our next trip.
Mark Bolton said
06:00 PM Feb 27, 2015
I am doing much the same thing myself. When I got the Coaster it has already been fitted out and everything was just wrong.
I have stripped out most of the useless cupboards and replaced them with stackable 100 liter (clothes bedding) 62 liter Tough Boxes (pots and pans) and the 15 liter ? (packets of curry cutlery etc. ) from Office works and put eyelets on the walls to tie down to when travelling. I have a Engels fridge. The origional 3 way one is not working. It also came with a Rodin twin burner Oven. I never use the oven but I do sometimes cook a roast in my Dutch Oven on the fire. I figger I can lose the Rodin and instead use a portable twin burner on a stainless steel benchtop - yet to be built. The gas is built in and I dont want to touch it untill I know exactly where I ma going with it. I am using a butane gas mate as backup . These are brilliant for conveniance but you do go through the disposable canisters.
For a bed I have a fold up stretcher. On the floor I have those neoprene jigsaw edge "tiles" covering the disgusting ply floor where I have ripped out the lino.
The bus was getting a bit manky inside so I took everything out and set up camp under a tree- took ten minutes. Blasted the bus out with a Karcher. Waited till it was dry and moved everything back inside.
Just bought an old coaster and want to fit out. Mechanically very sound. Not sure where and what to start on. Any advice would be appreciated.
Thee first thing to do is grab a note pad & pen and start sketching down some layouts, once you figure what you want then draw up the layout to scale to make sure everything will fit.
Check on YouTube. How to build a motor home
A mate did the same thing with a 92 LWB coaster. After stripping it out, the first thing he found was the floor is not flat or level. This created a few problems
Cheers Pete
One Factor..
How comfortable do you want to be...?
- Are you handy with a Welder..?
- or are you handy with wood..
What weigh does the bus weigh at the moment..?
- is it registered as a Bus or a MH or is it not registered..?
They are the important factors so far..
Juergen
Ours has single beds down each side which I like, plenty of cupboards and shelves. It has taken a bit of working out what to take and what to leave behind but last trip worked well as we culled stuff and still had free storage area.
Good luck with you project.
Cheers Allan
It is ok I can drive with my current licence. My current idea is not to have a double bed or single beds but to put it sofa beds. These can be used as seats until you convert to bed at night. The rest I plan to have minimal cupboards, shower/toilet, micro oven, fridge, sink and small cook top. Going to a local show to pick up some ideas.
It's needs to have a GVM of 4,495kg to be able to legally drive it...
--
a few suggestions..
- Take it to a registered Weigh Bridge and take it over the bridge and Record for your own benefit the " EMPTY " weight of the bus...
> The reason for having this figure is to make sure that you don't add to much weight to the bus so you DO NOT breach the 4,495kg Weight of the vehicle..
> Look at what you want to add. and were its going to go.... there are some limitations to where you can put water tanks under the bus and the sizes of those water tank's..
> Custom coaster has a supply of water tanks that can go under the coaster with no modifications[ 70-75lt capacity ]
> On the Weight issue Look at 1.1kg for every litre of water in the bus..[ 1.1 to allow for the weight of the tank and fitting's ]
- IF your On Facebook Look for the Toyota Coaster Group and Join it...
- On the issue of a Bed you would be better off going with a Fixed Bed setup.. [ unless you are a light weight and don't mind sleeping on a sofa bed setup... Plus Most sofa setups can be heavier than a bed setup]
What I'm trying to say is Weight is your enemy... to much weight is no good...
Juergen
You are better of with a permanent bed setup. Making and unmaking a bed twice a day is bad news after a while. Sofa beds do not compare with a good mattress for comfort and are usually quite heavy because of the steel frames in the conversion mechanism
-- Edited by jade46 on Thursday 12th of February 2015 03:18:16 PM
I am sorry what I meant was I have a meduim rigid licence. But I am on the same track too much weight cost more fuel to run. Thanks for the other tip people the Facebook page could be handy too. The other tip about the bed is good but I am still investigating the sofa beds. True about the weight but good for space.
-- Edited by anthonyc on Friday 13th of February 2015 12:44:33 AM
It means i need to redo The Full Electrics, Main switchboards, Inverter location.. Battery's Everything......
Redo the water tanks and the plumbing from each...to the rest of the bus..
Juergen
Anthony you have the advantage of doing it right from the start, not having to modify some one else's idea of how it should be, so plan it well & take your time to get it right for you. Having re-jigged three Coaster fit outs the next one I do will be a blank canvas start, the last one almost was.
Most of the mod's done are for SWMBO but the bed is for me, take your time to plan it well, don't take shortcuts as they WILL come back to bite you later & spend the money on good quality wiring, plumbing & fittings as this will pay off in the long run.
As others have said weight is the biggest issue, the local weigh bridge is only 2kms down the road for us so the occasional trip over is worth it to check how were going as were almost at the limit fully loaded.
Our Coaster has been in the shed for 9 months now for this round of upgrades, it will be a much better unit on our next trip.
I have stripped out most of the useless cupboards and replaced them with stackable 100 liter (clothes bedding) 62 liter Tough Boxes (pots and pans) and the 15 liter ? (packets of curry cutlery etc. ) from Office works and put eyelets on the walls to tie down to when travelling. I have a Engels fridge. The origional 3 way one is not working. It also came with a Rodin twin burner Oven. I never use the oven but I do sometimes cook a roast in my Dutch Oven on the fire. I figger I can lose the Rodin and instead use a portable twin burner on a stainless steel benchtop - yet to be built. The gas is built in and I dont want to touch it untill I know exactly where I ma going with it. I am using a butane gas mate as backup . These are brilliant for conveniance but you do go through the disposable canisters.
For a bed I have a fold up stretcher. On the floor I have those neoprene jigsaw edge "tiles" covering the disgusting ply floor where I have ripped out the lino.
The bus was getting a bit manky inside so I took everything out and set up camp under a tree- took ten minutes. Blasted the bus out with a Karcher. Waited till it was dry and moved everything back inside.