Wanted to share our new-to-us, 2005 Ford E350 Super Duty, 6.0 diesel, EB50, 4x4 Sportsmobile-west-built rig. Many of you are probably very familiar with this particular setup as it seems SMB-west popped these out pretty frequently in the mid 2000’s – even so, it’s a unique snowflake to us. This particular rig has seen its share of the United States and them some I’m sure. My understanding is that I am the fourth owner; the previous owner being Cyclesomatic who owned it for a short while, but paid very close attention to maintenance and overall care leaving me with a van in great shape (considering the number of hands that have touched this rig, the interior is in excellent shape).
As some of you know, I jumped into the “affordable” SMB culture when I picked up our 1993 E250 RWD RB-13(?) down in Florida. It was a great starter SMB and was essential to introducing my wife and then 1y/o daughter to the great outdoors and camping – something that was very important to me as a kid (like I keep telling my wife, “you can’t put a price on memories” – it’s how I now have two SMBs and a boat). Now that my wife and daughter are hooked and we’ve had four years with the ’93, we were able to make a well informed decision with regards to the floor plan and amenities of our next rig.
Introducing our next rig.
Of course a ten year old SMB doesn’t come without some items in need of attention. The roof gel coat looks pretty rough and could use a good sanding and respray – most likely a bed-liner coat. The four solar panels all seem to be mounted with different hardware, at different heights/orientations, etc – this will need to be addressed and will be done in conjunction with the sprayed roof. The SMB components of the undercarriage show a lot of surface rust – mostly an eye sore, but could use some TLC soon. Front and rear springs and shocks are original and should be replaced before too long. On the flip side, it has brand new rotors and calipers, a fairly new inverter, two new 4D AGM batteries, new wheels/tires and a whole list of current maintenance among other things.
In the immediate future I plan to add an Aluminess ladder, repair the passenger swing arm latch mechanism (completely missing), mount the Fiamma 45s I picked up on my drive home from the west coast using 1der’s brackets, figure out what of few of these random switches in the van are for and generally enjoy what is left of the summer.
A big thank you to Carringb for taking some time to test drive the van for me ahead of time.
Here are a few shots from our drive back from Oregon.
IMG_8615 by
Joseph Stampfl, on Flickr
IMG_8634 by
Joseph Stampfl, on Flickr
IMG_8636 by
Joseph Stampfl, on Flickr
IMG_8641 by
Joseph Stampfl, on Flickr
IMG_8733 by
Joseph Stampfl, on Flickr
IMG_9037 by
Joseph Stampfl, on Flickr
IMG_9011 by
Joseph Stampfl, on Flickr
43 vs 19. Tied on the first race… the second race was over after the first two or three steps. I’ve got the speed, but not the endurance.
IMG_8778 by
Joseph Stampfl, on Flickr
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