Spring Purge ~ Reducing Our Worldly Possessions To Fit On A Bus

Our Future Home

Spring is starting, as is the 30 day count down for our move date back to Montana and into our temporary home, while we work on restoring Norma, our 1955 school bus conversion. Currently as I write this, there are 27 days until our estimated departure date. Only 27 days to get all of our worldly possessions, our beloved stuff and things packed, sold, donated, trashed or whatever we ultimately end up doing with them. Only 27 days to clean the house out. Only 27 days to say good bye to family and friends. Only 27 days to transfer my son into and online school. Only 27 more days to make enough money for our trip. Only 27 more days until we go traveling for another 14 days. Actually, I only have one more day until I start my epic moving sale, which really puts the pressure on whole getting rid of stuff part; and really I should be preparing for the sale rather than blogging about it. But people have been asking for updates, and well...I am quite stressed about the whole moving thing and need to vent a little. Its my blog, I will do what I want.

I am actually quite pleased with my progress in the house mostly. Matt and I had a strategy for packing which has made it easy on my son and I. We allocated Rubbermaid tubs to the amount of space we will have available on the bus. My son gets three tubs, plus a traveling duffel. I get the same. Previously about three years ago, my son and I packed up everything we own into a small SUV and moved from Phoenix to Tucson. We just have not accumulated very much stuff since that point and lucky for us, we can fit everything we want to keep into the allocated tubs.

Im gonna miss my tortoise! 

Poor Matt though, he has had a hard time condensing. As a carpenter by trade, he has accumulated an egregious amount of tools that he mostly never uses. There are also the skis, the golf clubs, the bikes, the camping gear, the car parts and stuff and things. For me, its whatever~I got rid of that kind of stuff years ago. I have felt the feeling of liberation once I packed up my life. Matt is having the nostalgia complex with the stuff he has accumulated. Its okay. Honestly, there is enough room for all of his stuff, if he so chose to keep it, but I think he feels like since my son and I have gotten rid of so much that he should too. One way or another, the moving sale starts tomorrow. When we are finally packed up, I know Matt will finally feel that moment of true freedom and liberation. Like a tortoise, carrying everything he owns on his back. Along with two dogs and a puppy, a kid and myself.  Yea. Its gonna be a fun trip!

Wiggles is a Road Warrior -
This time she will be pulling a small trailer

Its gonna be even more fun on the road. I have quite a bit to look forward to this season. Our exit from Arizona begins with an epic 5 day regional gathering in the Northern part of our state. After the gathering, we will travel North towards Montana via national parks and Hot springs. While we considered going to the four corners, because none of us have seen that yet, we wanted to avoid more "boring desert" as well as the Tetons and Yellowstone National Parks because of the terrain. We are likely going to head west, and hit more of the Grand Canyon as well Zion National Park. After that we will head to Mystic Hot Springs, continuing North via Utah and Idaho while camping at more Hot Springs along the way. There is no way to avoid the Rocky Mountains, but the route we chose is good and direct. Ideally we will make it in three days. Realistically, one of the hot springs we stop at will be just too amazing to leave, and we will wind up camping an extra day somewhere. Five days max. I really want to get back to work at Eckstrom's Stage Stage by May 10th. Setting all kinds of future plans in action. Details of which will be released when my brain has time to process further forward progress...probably once we get to Montana. 

For now, I really need to think about setting up this moving sale. Cleaning my house would be ideal, but everything is such a cluttered mess at the moment I cant make any forward progress until everything is out of the way. So with my next step determined, and sufficient venting, I feel still strangely terrified and excited. Maybe its the coffee... But at least I know what I have to do. 

Thanks for reading and following...I would love it if you could leave a comment. Any type of support if meaningful and helpful. 

Inspecting The School Bus: Will Norma Run Again?

Its been a while since I have given anyone an update on Norma, my 1955 International school bus conversion, and there sure has been quite a bit of progress over the last month or two. Time flies when your busy working on your bus conversion. Or waiting for manuals and parts to come in. Sometimes it feels like restoring a bus conversion is more of a waiting game than a restoration project. Once we got Norma home we focused on making sure she was going to run, after all Matt and his step father did just drag her over 100 miles, after not being able to get her started or evaluate the brakes properly. We knew there was a possibility that she was going to be a permanent home for us in mamas back yard, although we were hoping that was not going to be the case. We would rather be able to drive back to Arizona before the snow happens here in Montana.
Inspection of the mechanical workings of the bus revealed that our biggest problem was not in getting spark to the engine as we had originally thought, but it was actually that the back brakes were broken. The back drivers side wheel cylinder was not functioning properly and brake fluid would squirt out of it. Matt tried honing it, replacing the dust cover seals, resizing the cup that goes inside, pretty much everything short of taking it to a machine shop, which was our next step. However, his wonderful and mechanical genius of a father did some serious research and found a guy who was able to find the part and get it ordered for us. That new wheel cylinder for our 1955 International R180 school bus is currently in shipping, scheduled to be here this week. All in all it took us almost a month to figure out what was wrong with that part an find a new one. Bus problems, go figure. I expect we will run into more eventually.

So here are some progress points that the inspection revealed.

• The distributor cap and point was bad. When we found someone who knew about old engines like ours, he was able to replace it easily, as well as give us part numbers, and direct us to the parts store that has been really great about finding the other parts that we need. 
• All the radiator hoses were pretty cracky, so we replaced them all, and bought spares for everything. 
• Replaced our stock air filter with a K & N lifetime filter with the largest air flow possible. 
• Freeze plugs were rusted out. Had to have a machine shop make us more. Were also installed a block heater while they were out.
• The alternator was really old obviously, and I think it was drawing current from the battery and draining it, so we had it refurbished by an alternator specialist. 
• The engine, transmissions and gas tank were all full of gunk. Not as big of a problem as we had initially thought. Again, his mechanical genius of a dad did some serious research and referred us to the old timer's method. It involved wall paper remover. I don't know the details really but it worked like a charm.  

All in all, it looks like Norma is going to run like a champ once we get the brakes put back together. Which is great news for me, because its really getting cold here in Montana and I am ready for some sunshine. There are definitely a few more hurdles we are going to have to jump before we can take her on a journey south across the country, but we are almost there. 

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How to Tow A 1955 School Bus Coversion

Pulling A 1955 International School With A Dodge Truck

This is the story of Norma, a 1955 International School Bus Conversion. I bought her just over two months ago now, and getting her home was quite an adventure. As it turns out, getting a School Bus towed from Whitefish, MT was not going to be an easy task. The towing he had promised fell through several times. An axle had broken on his buddy's trailer, and the towing for 150 dollars was not panning out. After researching tow companies and getting a couple dozen different quotes, the average price to tow a 1955 International School Bus 150 miles was between 800 and 1000 dollars. The terrain between where I was located just outside of Missoula, and where Norma was stuck in Whitefish, is 150 miles of switchback mountains with some steep grades and serious turns, along with a couple of giant hills. I put out craigslist ads and calls for help to my friends. I had a trucker friend suggest a bidding company online, but no one would take on the haul.

 After a month and a half of almost patiently waiting, Matt and I decided that he was going to go to Whitefish and try to make Norma run, or tow it home himself. So Matt embarked on this weekend long adventure with his step father to make Norma run again. After days of trying and not succeeding, and a lot of wrong parts, they still couldn't get the spark Norma needed to run. At this point, exhausted and frustrated, Matt and his step dad, decided to tie Norma up to his step dad's Dodge, and pull her home. The above picture is after 20 miles, they made it into Kalispell, MT. They had to stop in this parking lot to cool off the brakes, and add more brake fluid. Apparently they were having problems with a cylinder. They said at this point, that they had many people pointing and shouting and taking pictures. They even had a sheriff come up behind them and just shake his head. If your wondering, they just have a 40 foot tow strap rigged up to pull the bus behind the dodge.

The rest of the trip was not easy going either. The brake cylinders gave out or blew up something, and they had to stop and compress them over and over. Matt was literally having to stop a 33 foot school bus with his own legs and an emergency brake. They had a lot of close calls. They pulled over in every town, considering whether they should just give up and drop the bus.  But they never did. They just kept on hauling. After the worst of the hills, and another close call, the brakes went out again. Matt was down to one back break and the emergency brake. The sun was going down and they had been in tow for over 6 hours already. They rigged up the brakes again and attempted the last leg of the journey down into Missoula. It was dark as they arrived into town. Wouldn't you know, that finally after 8 or 9 hours of towing, they got pulled over.

Matt said he had never looked so pathetic. He was covered in diesel soot (there is no windshield in the bus) sore and exhausted, he almost shed a tear to the Sheriff. The Sheriff was very understanding, and although he wouldn't let them tow it any further, he did allow him to call a friend to follow behind the bus with his hazards on for the rest of the 20 miles to where we live. The breaks went out altogether as he pulled into the yard to set her in her place. She also took out the fence on her way in. Poor Norma was as tired and sore as Matt.

Matt had to take two full days off of work to recover after literally being the brakes for the bus most of the way home. At least I know he is capable of stopping her if there is a complete brake failure. We have not fully assessed the damage of pulling Miss Norma yet either. I imagine, the brakes are going to be a doozy. We have pieces and parts that need to be exchanged, because some of the original parts that we got were for a 12 volt system rather than the original 6 volt system that is installed. There is a lot of questions we have about the motor itself. I do have some books on order, and hopefully a manual in the very near future...

So Norma made it home. Now the fun part begins. I am restoring a school bus. Its actually happening. I passed on the burn this year, in hopes that she will make it to her true home, next year. Next year was better anyways. )'(

Follow my blog to start seeing some before and after pictures of Norma. I would love to hear some feedback from you readers! If you have any good links, tips, suggestions or information for a 1955 International School Bus, I would love to see them. Thanks for reading.

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• Inspecting The School Bus: Will Norma Run Again?
• Restoration Dreams