Foundmine
Member
Hello from Central Idaho! And thanks to all the mods and developers that made this great resource. Thanks very much for having me on your forum.
My wife and I purchased a 1996 L400 LWB Exceed (High Roof, 4M40) from Nomadic Vans of Sun Valley this past spring. We decided on it after spending the winter in Mexico in our 1998 F-350 crew cab, fitted with a Thule/Tepui RTT on a ladder rack and two Yamaha TW200s in the bed. The truck was good, but way too big, and we used the motorcycles a lot less than we intended. The RTT was good, better than expected honestly, but on past long-distance drives we really enjoyed being able to stealth camp in our vehicle and park over night in truck stops and PEMEX gas stations, and the RTT really wasn't appropriate for that. RTTs are great, but they are a little conspicuous when you set them up in an urban area or in a truck stop, and we have found that when we are doing long distance drives we end up in urban or suburban areas more often than expected.
So, while we were holed up in paradise over the winter, dodging the Omicron variant and eating tamales, we got to day dreaming about the next rig. My wife and I had started our relationship by flying to Ohio from Colorado to buy an old E-350 ambulance, sight unseen. We had found it on craigslist before ambulance conversions were cool, and bought it for a song. It was priced so well we sent the seller money blindly, and just hoped he and the van were real. We flew to Detroit one way, talked an old friend into driving us deep into Ohio farmland, took delivery of "Campbulance", and drove him home to Colorado the long way, via Vermont, staying in truck stops and napping in Cracker Barrel parking lots the whole way.
Campbulance was good, but lacked 4-wheel drive, and was powered by a pre-powerstroke 7.3L NA diesel engine that drank fuel and made noise but didn't do much else. The engine was shoehorned into its compartment, and the passenger seat was cramped due to a doghouse cover that allowed access to the back of the motor. This made the passenger's foot well really hot on long drives, and the sitting position was uncomfortable, and neither seat could slide or tilt back very far because the ambulance box was mounted directly behind the cab. That said, there was a door to the back, allowing use to move from the living space into the cab quickly. We liked the pass-through, we liked that we could park in a standard parking spot, and we liked the living space, but we didn't like the driving comfort, the overall size, the engine, or the Ohio rust.
Our next rig/camper/adventure/mistake was a 1995 International/Thomas 3600 Vista school bus, 6-window. We were searching for a smaller school bus thinking we needed more space, for kayaks, rafts, scooters, litterboxes, kitchen, etc. We found a used school bus turned church bus in Missouri, bought it, and broke down 5.9 miles later as the alternator gave up the ghost and the batteries ran out of juice. We camped in the mechanic's parking lot that night, got the charging system sorted, and moved on. It took us a few months to convert, and we drove it from Missouri to San Antonio to Corpus Cristi to Arkansas to Boise and then to West Glacier, where we lived in it for a season at a rafting base while guiding in and around Glacier NP. It was great parked. Read into that what you will. We liked that we could stand, and that we had a large bed that we didn't have to pack away to move, and that we had a wood stove and some kitchen space, but driving it was a pain, and it wasn't constructed very well, and a breakdown that needed a shop would require an EXPENSIVE tow.
While we were in West Glacier we started day dreaming out a better, proper "overland" vehicle, with a smaller wheelbase, more capability, more park-ability, and less of a "skoolie" vibe. We found a Stey-Puch Pinzgauer 712W for sale in Portland, and boarded an overnight train clutching one-way tickets and a fistful of cash, bound for glory and questionable decisions. Our Pinzgauer was a really good example of the brand: very clean, low miles, good tires, very few electrical upgrades, great vinyl soft top, clean oil in the diffs, and a nice big fiberglass workshop box. We hastily converted the box in West Glacier, then departed for a winter in Baja, Mexico, to finally live the dream of international van life. We stealth camped on the streets of Portland, and in Walmarts, and PEMEX gas stations when in urban areas, but we much preferred spreading out on the beaches and lagoons of Baja Sur. Traveling in the Pinz was fun, but slow. The driveline was limited to just over 60MPH, the carbs were finicky, and the fan on the front of the engine created A LOT of noise, more than the 33" BFG mud terrains, so long drives were tough. We eventually swapped the carbs for a custom EFI, installed Scheel-Mann touring seats, increased the fuel tank for better range, and mounted a custom roof rack for more storage, but we couldn't shake the truth that Little Foot the Pinzgauer was built for narrow forest roads, not the Pan-American Highway. We lived in him as we built our house, and sold him to a dealer a few years later. Selling him was the right decision, but I do miss ripping 6-wheel-drive donuts in the Idaho snow.
After the Pinz came the F-350 mentioned at the top of this post (that is quickly getting away from me), and its length, fuel consumption, engine displacement, and weight prodded us back into day dreaming. We toyed around with the idea of mounting a FourWheel pop-up camper, or selling it for a smaller Toyota truck, or buying a JB500 camper, or buying someone else's adventure machine in Uishua or Cape town and driving it back home. None of these felt quite right, and we kept coming back to the same handful of qualities that we wanted in our next rig:
My wife and I purchased a 1996 L400 LWB Exceed (High Roof, 4M40) from Nomadic Vans of Sun Valley this past spring. We decided on it after spending the winter in Mexico in our 1998 F-350 crew cab, fitted with a Thule/Tepui RTT on a ladder rack and two Yamaha TW200s in the bed. The truck was good, but way too big, and we used the motorcycles a lot less than we intended. The RTT was good, better than expected honestly, but on past long-distance drives we really enjoyed being able to stealth camp in our vehicle and park over night in truck stops and PEMEX gas stations, and the RTT really wasn't appropriate for that. RTTs are great, but they are a little conspicuous when you set them up in an urban area or in a truck stop, and we have found that when we are doing long distance drives we end up in urban or suburban areas more often than expected.
So, while we were holed up in paradise over the winter, dodging the Omicron variant and eating tamales, we got to day dreaming about the next rig. My wife and I had started our relationship by flying to Ohio from Colorado to buy an old E-350 ambulance, sight unseen. We had found it on craigslist before ambulance conversions were cool, and bought it for a song. It was priced so well we sent the seller money blindly, and just hoped he and the van were real. We flew to Detroit one way, talked an old friend into driving us deep into Ohio farmland, took delivery of "Campbulance", and drove him home to Colorado the long way, via Vermont, staying in truck stops and napping in Cracker Barrel parking lots the whole way.
Campbulance was good, but lacked 4-wheel drive, and was powered by a pre-powerstroke 7.3L NA diesel engine that drank fuel and made noise but didn't do much else. The engine was shoehorned into its compartment, and the passenger seat was cramped due to a doghouse cover that allowed access to the back of the motor. This made the passenger's foot well really hot on long drives, and the sitting position was uncomfortable, and neither seat could slide or tilt back very far because the ambulance box was mounted directly behind the cab. That said, there was a door to the back, allowing use to move from the living space into the cab quickly. We liked the pass-through, we liked that we could park in a standard parking spot, and we liked the living space, but we didn't like the driving comfort, the overall size, the engine, or the Ohio rust.
Our next rig/camper/adventure/mistake was a 1995 International/Thomas 3600 Vista school bus, 6-window. We were searching for a smaller school bus thinking we needed more space, for kayaks, rafts, scooters, litterboxes, kitchen, etc. We found a used school bus turned church bus in Missouri, bought it, and broke down 5.9 miles later as the alternator gave up the ghost and the batteries ran out of juice. We camped in the mechanic's parking lot that night, got the charging system sorted, and moved on. It took us a few months to convert, and we drove it from Missouri to San Antonio to Corpus Cristi to Arkansas to Boise and then to West Glacier, where we lived in it for a season at a rafting base while guiding in and around Glacier NP. It was great parked. Read into that what you will. We liked that we could stand, and that we had a large bed that we didn't have to pack away to move, and that we had a wood stove and some kitchen space, but driving it was a pain, and it wasn't constructed very well, and a breakdown that needed a shop would require an EXPENSIVE tow.
While we were in West Glacier we started day dreaming out a better, proper "overland" vehicle, with a smaller wheelbase, more capability, more park-ability, and less of a "skoolie" vibe. We found a Stey-Puch Pinzgauer 712W for sale in Portland, and boarded an overnight train clutching one-way tickets and a fistful of cash, bound for glory and questionable decisions. Our Pinzgauer was a really good example of the brand: very clean, low miles, good tires, very few electrical upgrades, great vinyl soft top, clean oil in the diffs, and a nice big fiberglass workshop box. We hastily converted the box in West Glacier, then departed for a winter in Baja, Mexico, to finally live the dream of international van life. We stealth camped on the streets of Portland, and in Walmarts, and PEMEX gas stations when in urban areas, but we much preferred spreading out on the beaches and lagoons of Baja Sur. Traveling in the Pinz was fun, but slow. The driveline was limited to just over 60MPH, the carbs were finicky, and the fan on the front of the engine created A LOT of noise, more than the 33" BFG mud terrains, so long drives were tough. We eventually swapped the carbs for a custom EFI, installed Scheel-Mann touring seats, increased the fuel tank for better range, and mounted a custom roof rack for more storage, but we couldn't shake the truth that Little Foot the Pinzgauer was built for narrow forest roads, not the Pan-American Highway. We lived in him as we built our house, and sold him to a dealer a few years later. Selling him was the right decision, but I do miss ripping 6-wheel-drive donuts in the Idaho snow.
After the Pinz came the F-350 mentioned at the top of this post (that is quickly getting away from me), and its length, fuel consumption, engine displacement, and weight prodded us back into day dreaming. We toyed around with the idea of mounting a FourWheel pop-up camper, or selling it for a smaller Toyota truck, or buying a JB500 camper, or buying someone else's adventure machine in Uishua or Cape town and driving it back home. None of these felt quite right, and we kept coming back to the same handful of qualities that we wanted in our next rig:
- Driving characteristics of a modern vehicle:
- Good highway speeds
- Manageable turning radius (The L400 LWB is way better than the F-350 crewcab long bed even if it isn't a roller skate of an L300)
- Comfortable/quiet cabin
- Manageable fuel efficiency
- Parts availability better than a Pinzgauer
- Van body, allowing us to move from a bed to the drivers seat without exiting the vehicle
- Stock/factory 4x4 for mild to moderate conditions
- A low overall height that would allow us to enter Mexico's Auto Motels
Last edited: