100th Vaniversary

kzemach · 04-30-2008, 10:31 PM

This weekend marked the 100th night weâ€™ve slept in the van. Being a stats guy, Iâ€™ve kept some basic stats on it, some of which are interesting, some notâ€¦

STATS:

Nights slept in van total: 100
Broken out by activity category:
Skiing: 39 nights
Climbing: 30 nights
Other: 31 nights

Total ownership time: 16.5 months (500 days)
Thus, 1/5 of the nights since owned have been spent in the van. Not too shabby.

Total miles driven: 20,500
Miles driven per night slept: 205 (yikes)

COOKING FUEL:
Butane canisters: 14 (7 days of cooking per canister)
Jetboil canisters: 9 (11 days of hot water boiling per canister)
We use the jetboil for all water boiling and the butane for cooking. We go through WAY more jetboils in the winter as thereâ€™re multiple tea/coffee/cocoa sessions throughout the day.

Average MPG to date (only have data for 18k of the 20.5k miles): 14.92mpg
Assuming consistent MPG, total fuel used for 20.5k miles: 1,374 gal. Holy frigginâ€™ crap.
Estimated total fuel cost (adjusting for 2k miles in missing receipts): $4,396. Holy frigginâ€™ CRAP!

OVERALL THOUGHTS:
For skiing, itâ€™s been a godsend. It makes ski weekends so much better, easier, are more fun. Totally worth it. For climbing, I could go either way on that. In remote areas I worry a bit about it being broken into by either people or bears at the trailhead. Sure, itâ€™s great to take a hot shower after a long day of climbing, but thatâ€™s a pretty pricey showerâ€¦

Have voiced before that while the facade of the SMB is great, once you tear under the skin there's some pretty shoddy work in places, work quality that I would not expect for an $80k premium pricetag. There are no other options of course, so you take what you get. But still... and little QC on their part would go a long way.

But, they're pretty good people and are trying and no one's perfect, so in the end I'm fairly happy. If I COULD do it again, I would not have bought new, but would have bought one of the 60k miles used vehicles on the website and used the money I saved to make mods and changes.

BC · 05-01-2008, 04:03 PM

did you have to go and calculate overall fuel costs? I chose to try and ignore that (eventho I check mpg just about every tank). Dang. Just dont project fuel over next 2-3years please, I prefer to live in denial and when we crack $5/gal its gonna get ugly.

Ditto the comment on ski-wagon. Even for day trips to the mtn the SMB has proven to be awesome. Its a combo warming hut, lodge, gear hauler, rest area, and cafeteria all in one.

kzemach · 05-01-2008, 04:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BC

did you have to go and calculate overall fuel costs?

Yeah. I should have listed CO2 and diesel particulate weights as well... I do have to say that I am still struggling with the guilt of it all. If I'd gotten that less expensive used 2001 7.3L one, I would have paid the $5k to get an SVO tank and conversion on it. However, I can't bring myself to kill my 100k mile warranty just so that I can filter oil from McDonalds...

My poor rationalization of it is that when I ski (not getting into the CO2 load of a ski lift, of course) I am not taking a long hot shower in an overheated hotel room and eating out with all the extra waste associated. Who knows... overall my carbon footprint might be lower? No? OK, let me dream.

Ed in Montana · 05-01-2008, 05:46 PM

Congrats kzemach! You are about 50 nights ahead of us for the same time period in our SMB. Even though one of our Montana friends who introduced us to Sportsmobiles uses his for ski area camping, I can't bring myself to do it. It's just too dang cold here in most of the winter months.

I did sleep for a couple of nights at zero and below in February in the van, while we were staying at a Forest Service cabin. Even with the top down, I was burning the propane furnace like mad just to keep the temp near freezing.