Betty

So this is Betty the old '76 Toyota Coaster my Hubby and I are turning into a motor home. We paid $800 for her and got her towed to our house for $200, by the biggest, coolest tow TRUCK I've ever seen. Betty was, to put it lightly, dirty. The previous owner said that she had gone "through" a flood at one time.  After watching the pile of mud that we washed out of her grow and grow I came to the conclusion that not only had she gone through a flood, she had sat smack bang in the middle of a raging torrent.
This is how we first saw her. Everything still pretty much attached except for one bench seat, and of course you couldn't start her, and even if you did, there were no breaks, mirrors, seat belts or anything that remotely made this bus roadworthy. Hence the big-arsed tow truck. She needed to come down a mountain range, so you can see why we opted for the truck.
So far we have, hosed it, stripped out all the seats, hosed it, ripped up the flooring and side walls. Hosed it again. Realised that a hose wasn't going to cut it, so bought a high pressure water cleaner. Took out the windows and back windscreen, and cleaned up the window spaces. Took out the dead motor (which was epic in itself, involved some tricky maneuvering, lots of swearing, and the use of some ancient Egyptian techniques in moving heavy objects over soft ground.) We have a brand new engine, ready to be put in and bring the old girl back to life. The radiator is off being fixed. The floor  joists are all de-rusted, primed and painted. The outside have been de-rusted, bogged, primed and ready to paint.  Our next big job is to cut the top off the roof, raise it up about 30 to 40cm, and fill in the gap with steel. I will be doing the mig welding, having been more experienced at it than hubby :) So that is where we are up to at the moment. She is coming along, not quite as fast as we wanted to due to hubby being sick, and other stuff going on. Our plan was to head off at the beginning of next year to co-inside with our son starting his new year at home schooling. But since we are starting him sooner we don't really have a time table now. Just working on it when we can.
LS