It’s been so long since I gave you an update, and I swear it’s for good reason. Right after my last update, a friend came over and helped install a tricky piece of plywood, it had to be cut around a few different obstacles, so I let someone with a little more experience assist. (He did it all while I watched.) Then the rains came again….this time with severe weather attached…tornados, lightning, downpours of rain…I live in the Brazos Valley and there was flooding everywhere….when it was over–it wasn’t. The majority of my family lives downriver and in an extremely low lying area to boot. I knew it was all headed their way and so we took our bus on an impromptu trip to try and help with evacuation of lives and property. We took our kids mattresses(one twin, one crib) and some couch cushions and made one big sleeping pallet. We took an ice chest and went. We ended up not leaving until very late at night due to reinstallation of a seat for the kids…I slept on the bed the whole way there…Yes, I do know that is unsafe but really, the first night in the bus felt awesome…it was so hot and there were mosquitos but man…it was cool. …Unfortunately, no one really believed the flood was going to get very bad and did not take our assistance. I try not to dwell on the should-haves and the why-didn’t-we’s..no one could have predicted what happened. The worst flood in memory before this was 1992 and people just didn’t imagine it would be very bad……a week later there was feet of water everywhere….ranging from just a couple of feet all the way to ten. Most of my family had water in their homes. I believe only one house was left dry on the inside..
In the way home from the evacuation attempt, our bus began overheating. Luckily we were only about ten miles from home and we made it without damaging our engine. I’m thankful our first trip was the perfect length to diagnose our bus without harm. A sensor popped up that looked like a rectangle with a droplet inside and it had a little thermometer next to it. When we got home, I stayed up all night googling and determined that the indicator light was for my hydraulic cooling fan. That terrified me…I’m no mechanic, that’s why I spent more money on my bus….to avoid mechanical issues until I had time to brush up on how to work on them. So instead of continuing our build, I had to drop that and dive into my engine. When we bought it, they told us it was due for service, so I decided to start there. I figured, in the process, I would learn a little but about my engine and how it works. So I changed out the filters and fluids and in the process discovered that the thermostat in my cooling system was stuck closed. So I replaced that too. The oil change was not fun. The oil pan plug felt like it was welded in there. At first I thought my girls arms were the culprit,but two grown ads man attempts later, I realized I’m not at fault here. My mechanically inclined buddy, Lee, used a blow torch and vice grips to finally get the drain plug out. I was slightly skeptical, but we had tried everything else, and the next step was going to be dropping the oil pan. Once I was finished with fluids and filters, the issue was resolved (thermostat) so I didn’t have to mess with the hydraulic cooling fan at all.
Lee and his wife Liz, agreed to letting us park the bus at their house and I am terribly grateful. Liz lets us use the electricity for air conditioners so we’re not having Texas heat strokes and I love her so much for that.
We have decided to move to the flood affected areas to help rebuild, so our priorities in the build have shifted. There is a general order of operations when building a housebus, and we’re having to deviate a bit so we can move in sooner. We’re putting up all the insulation and ceiling panels first so that we can live in the bus as a glorified tent for a little while. We’re working on our game plan now, but everything is so crazy…. I’ll try to update more.
4 Carrs in a bus 