Accrete's Chevy AWD & Ram Promaster projects

[accrete]

Originally Posted by kiloloop

I had some questions about that roof vent fan. Would you recommend it?..

Greetings and thank you for the VanKudos.

While we’ve not put more than a couple trips with the PM on the map yet the roof vent has been great to date. The low profile, always-same-look outside is nice, the simple-twist-to-open interior ceiling vent is out of the way and convienient. Time will tell, but the only down side i can think of coming from the 10 speeds of the MaxFan in the Chevy-build would be the single speed fan that is basically on high, or off (in/out).

: ) Thom

[accrete]

Greetings,
I will put up some images of the Chevy AWD Van now that the old accrete.com domian has been sold.

Enjoy : )

The "Closet" has been mentioned before and i what holds our bathrom items. We are currently utilizing a simple Thetford Porta Potty for the toilet and "Pocket Shower" with water heated up on our camp stove for shower use (and a simple cement mixer tub from HD for the foot pan).

The other images are of bed (with Froli Sleep System under a full size futon) and street side above-bed closet. Above both cab and rear-bed are attic storage areas created by keeping the stock roof in those areas.

Thom

[accrete]

In the past i've mentioned our luv for the off-pavement handling and abilities of our Chevy AWD van. We've logged many happy (uneventful) miles over the past 8 years. We've now begun to take van two (the Promaster) out to many of the same places. This post is about a recent trip...



I went back and forth pondering if we should take the Chevy Express AWD or the Ram Promaster. Why? Well because in the past the last mile or two of the access road to the camp was in rough shape and difficult to drive. With the Promaster’s lower clearance and longer wheelbase (over the AWD) I struggled with the decision, but we took the chance and drove the PM to the end of the pavement… While I did take a dozen or more pictures while driving that last mile to camp, none of the images did justice to just how bad the road was, so I’m not going to bother posting any here. What I will share is that Cari & I were totally pleased with the handling and ability of the PM to handle the poor conditions. One particular spot in the road was a ~20% uphill grade about 50 yards long that was rutted/washed out. I approached the grade from a standstill at the bottom gully basically as a test to see how the PM would do with the KO2’s. There was no slippage and the PM climbed right up the grade.



We set up one of our 12′ x 12′ Kelty Noah’s Tarp between trees & the roof tie-offs and used the area as an outside dining/lounge area. For meals we didn’t even bother since we had decided to do a 5 day fast during the adventure. Yea, crazy…but we felt great all week and we only brought water and herbal teas with us and were an hour’s drive from the nearest store so there was not going to be any chance of cheating!



We spent most of the time reading, relaxing and some easy walks. It was a wonderful Zen-time.

[chamster]

Hi Accrete, thanks for the details on your build. Very useful info. I have a 2005 Chevy Express AWD and am researching passenger seat swivel options. I've found a couple after-market solutions but they get mixed reviews. Also the one that seemed most promising moves the seat 2" up and 2" inboard. That seems like it would make the seat uncomfortable for normal driving. Here's a link to that equipment:


Chevy Van Seat Bases,driver,passenger seat bases


Just wondering how you accomplished yours. Thanks.

[accrete]

Greetings and THX for the comment & Q.
I'm not sure of the details on the swivel that Van Specialties installed so unable to share any info other than the ride bought compared to stock is nearly the same.

Best wishes on the build.

Thom

[accrete]

Greetings!
It seems like a gazillion adventures since i've posted, my wife and i've been super busy downsizing, retiring, moving south

So downsizing? Some might recall my wife and i have called a 43ft toyhauler our tiny-house for the past few years while winding down our Costco careers. I put the rig up for sale on RVTrader in July and by the first week in August it had new owners driving from New Mexico to take her south to be used as their new tiny-house!



And on that day, August 12, 2018 marked day one of our #VanLife adventure as we moved into our rigs, counted down the days to retirement (September 27, 2018) and would head south to land in Nevada that would be developed for a quiet place to visit between adventures in the Southwest states.

Here we are at the pumps at Costco in Warrenton on our way south...It was bitter sweet as this had been our "Family" for the past 25 years!



I do have quite the detailed write up over at my blog that i will link to (non commercial, nothing for sale, just trip logs and such):

OverlandWith.Us yea, kind of a cute twist on words and domain suffix : )

Basically we drove south from Astoria in 4 legs.
Leg one was Astoria to Ashland Oregon where i found a nice free USF camp ground below Mt. Asland:



Leg two was from Asland Oregon to Burney Falls State Park CA where we enjoyed some nice hikes and great views:



After Burney Falls we drove to Cari's folks house in Reno Nevada and stayed a few days for a long awaited visit, last time i saw them was over 15 years ago.

From there we drove to Mono Lake CA, spent some time at the Visitor's center, then parked for the night on some USF land overlooking the lake.

The next day we drove south to Lone Pine CA to an area i'd found on freecampsite.net called "Alabama Hills - Movie Town Road" WOW...what a great find! It is located just east of the Mt. Whitney range and there are dozens of sites to park and enjoy the views.



We initially were just going to spend a night and head to our place in Nevada...four nights later we were still there...



and on the fifth day... we reluctantly broke camp and drove through Death Valley as seen below.



One thing i will mention that is worth checking out is a vista rest stop at a place called Rainbow Canyon - Star Wars Canyon. I had never heard of this area and what a treat!! It is used by military aricraft for close-quarter terrain training. We saw three fly bys while we were there that morning. We will be going back (it is about 2 hours from our place in NV). If you search YouTube you will find some great videos

So that brought us "Home" to our little acre slice of desert heaven which we are developing as mentioned for a pit stop during our planed & hoped-for adventures.

Thanks for following along, I try to get any adventures up within a week following a given trip over at the new blog at OverlandWith.Us

Enjoy the adventure!

[marret]

Congratulations. Sounds like you are executing your plans and really enjoying yourselves.

Nice little trip report. Wish you all the best moving forward.

Like your blog too.

[accrete]

I just realized it’s been about a year since the post above & wanted to share an update.



As I post my wife & I’ve been on the road over 13 months traveling in our #TwoVanCaravan

We put about 10,000 miles on the vans and explored various areas in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, Washington, and back to our home base in southern Nevada.

(our camp on the Mogollon Rim in Arizona:


All camps except one from May through October were on USF or BLM land. The exception was our visit to the Overland Expo in Flagstaff as we had family visiting and they would be more comfortable with facilities provided at a traditional campground. We really lucked out as Saturday was the best-weather day...

An image of our snow-dusted camp Sunday morning:


Ther were so many amazing campsites over the summer!


I will close with mention that we chose to spend the $$ on having the 10 year old Fiberine top color match auto painted by a pro shop in our home town. It looks better than new!

[marret]

Awesome, all the way around. Thanks for posting.

[Otter]

Welcome home! Enjoyed the post and your blog.