Converting a heavy-duty bus/coach/truck into a motorhome (page 66 of 161)

well, I’m looking to turn a bus into a big camper van😉 to live in year-round😎

but I’ve got a question: the engine’s in the back, so how can you fit a car in there😮

For me, money isn’t a taboo subject—after all, it’s what makes the world go round. Here’s my budget: 8,000 €, and not a cent more. I knew a guy who, back in the day, converted his coach for 45,000 francs, and honestly, it was spotless. After buying the battery (bought under the table at half price), charger, water pump, shower, water tank, toilet, ventilation grid, insulation, water heater, and of course the coach itself, I’ve got 3,000 € left to buy materials to partition it and pay for the *DRIRE Veritas* inspection. So yeah, it’s tight, but you don’t necessarily need 20,000 €. Basically, I’m keeping 1,000 € aside just in case, so I’ve still got 2,000 € to finish it, knowing I’m salvaging caravan interiors and have good contacts for wood. *Système D* (DIY hacks) on steroids—with 50,000 francs, you’d have a fully up-to-code converted coach. Don’t kid yourself: to do something clean and efficient for off-grid living, you’ll need at least 50,000 francs, I think. What do you all think?

😉Hi, we’re also budgeting 8000 to 10000 € for outfitting our bus DIY-style

@+

Hi everyone!

I’d love to know what license you need for a project like this!! Like, if you have a D license but the bus is reclassified as a truck, can you still drive it? And what’s the average cost for getting the license?

Thanks in advance and have a great evening!

Seb.

Your straightforward talk, Shanko, reassures me. It's true that converting a bus takes manual skills, precision, a good eye for design, and resourcefulness. The numbers you mentioned are realistic and have reignited my enthusiasm to keep working on projects. It's true that this kind of modification can't be improvised, and the last thing I want is a pile of useless rust at the bottom of the garden. fab

If you have the D license, you also have the C license, and on top of that, you can have more than 9 seats. For the budget: I bought my FR1 for over 10,000 € with a perfect engine. The conversion (furniture and partitions) won’t cost me much because I’m a cabinetmaker and carpenter, and it’ll come out of the offcuts. For accessories and details, I’m budgeting around 8,000 € plus a few odds and ends (OMM homologation control). In total, you can get there for around 20,000 €.

hi! on page 38 there's an example of a modified PR14. Doesn't seem like a bad base at all—certifiable as a camper van, anyway.

Mistake about licenses!

If you have the D license, you don’t have the C, as jose6440 said!

For a bus, you need the D license.

For a heavy-duty motorhome (a bus converted into a camper is considered heavy-duty), you need the C license.

For the budget, I’ve never hidden mine. You can dig through my posts.

Bus purchase: 3000 € ex. VAT Transport: 400 € ex. VAT Mechanical overhaul: 600 € ex. VAT Tires: 1800 € ex. VAT Bodywork modifications (sheet metal and rear door): 2500 € ex. VAT Bodywork repairs (dents, scratches) and paint: 5000 € ex. VAT Materials for interior partitioning, furniture, and insulation: 2350 € ex. VAT Front lounge (5 U-shaped seats, certified): 1150 € ex. VAT Plumbing (shower, toilet, sink, kitchen sink, pump, pipes): 1100 € ex. VAT Batteries (2 x 230 Ah): 400 € ex. VAT

Total: 18,300 € ex. VAT (just under 22,000 € incl. VAT)

You still need to add the water tanks to finish, all the electrical work (except the batteries), including the generator, charger, converters, protection panels, and gauges, the flooring, and the two tables.

Total: around 6000 € ex. VAT (around 7000 € incl. VAT)

I’m not counting the small stuff like the fridge, cooking equipment, TV, mattresses I already have, or the hanging bar and other odds and ends that I’m keeping track of separately.

The whole thing will cost me around 30,000 € incl. VAT.

If I take the valuation further, I’m factoring in the hours spent on the interior, electrical, plumbing, etc. (everything except bodywork and paint) at 25 € per hour (a low rate for a professional converter). At that rate, if I spend 400 hours on the conversion, that’s 10,000 € I need to account for!

So, once it’s finished, an expert will assess it, and I hope it’ll be valued at least at that amount! (in case of theft, accident, or... resale)

So, cost: 30,000 €. Value: at least 40,000 €.

But that’s for mine! As I mentioned, it’s undergone major transformations, and I’m loading it up with equipment.

If I wanted to make a spacious motorhome from a bus—just a motorhome (no need to haul a car, the motorcycle is on a rear rack)—you can do a great job for 20,000 €!

PATRICK26

hi

* When it comes to downgrading a coach to a heavy goods vehicle (HGV), do I have to take the coach to the DRIRE for them to handle the downgrade, or can I just fill out the paperwork without bringing the coach in?

* For VASP, HOME CAR, or MOTORHOME classifications, which option should I choose? (For me, it’s to live in year-round.)

* Once my coach is downgraded to an HGV, can I convert it into a motorhome afterward, or do I have to do it at the same time as the downgrade?

* Is there a time limit between the downgrade and the conversion into a motorhome?

* On the day of the downgrade to an HGV, I’ll keep 9 seats including the driver’s, then reduce it to 2 seats for a total of 4. And I’ll add a table—does that count as 9 + 4 = 13 seats, or do the 4 seats not count?

* On the day of the conversion, can I drill or weld, or do I need to get authorization from the manufacturer?

* I know the HGV license is okay for driving, but do I still have to retake the FCOS even if I’m driving the downgraded coach?

A 1987 Van Hool Acron 815 coach in good condition, asking 8,000 € before tax

Is the price reasonable or not?😕

Bodywork looks good

Paint job about 5 years old

Regularly maintained by a passenger transport company

700,000 km

Hey, You’ve gotta bring the coach, of course—they want to see everything, otherwise what’s the point, what are they checking?

You’ll have a VASP body type labeled CARAVANE (Home Car is the term for HGVs to differentiate from campers for light vehicles).

You need to reclassify it directly from COACH to Camper Van, otherwise you lose the seating unless they’re equipped with seatbelts. But you’ll also need a partition strong enough to hold the payload value (it’s a nightmare right now—the DRIRE isn’t a fan).

No time limit—why would there be one? For a house, you apply for a building permit, you’ve got 2 years to start the work and your whole life to finish it (I know what I’m talking about). But for a coach, there’s no building permit to file—it’s replaced by the MINE dossier. If you take too long like I did with the master, you just reapply at the start of the year. I’m on my third one now—one in-depth inspection, one motorhome that was used as a coach, and another dated 2006 (just one line changed).

Seating is a pain—I got rejected for that. You’ve gotta keep 9 original approved seats for the road. After that, it’s up to you. I had 14 seats, 10 of which were original, and I had to remove one.

Drilling and welding—check out PATRICK26’s post on that.

The FIMO certification is for transporting equipment that isn’t yours, including passengers for coaches (it’s equipment, after all). I transport MY equipment, so I don’t need FIMO.

Anyway, for everyone else, I still have an 8.6m vehicle approved for 9 seats for sale.

You’ve got to check how often the mechanical parts need replacing.

At 700,000 km, some things are bound to give out, and heavy-duty mechanics aren’t cheap. You REALLY need to inspect the maintenance log and get tips on what tends to wear out—that’s key. That said, a clean vehicle can still be well-maintained underneath. You’ll have to see it in person—700,000 km is a lot, but it might also be nothing depending on the vehicle, its upkeep, and how it’s been used.

The bodywork isn’t a big deal (right, AMAsxmx? 😉), you can tinker with that! But suspension, gearbox, axle shafts… you’ll need BIG wrenches and strong arms 🤪 😏, or you’ll end up with sore toes😕😄😄😄

Me, I hand-crank my Panhard engine, lift C25s with a hoist, and even with a coach or a tow truck—I don’t touch ‘em🏴‍☠️😄

Well, when he does the mine inspection, he checks every bus from A to Z, right?😕

😉You submit it to the DRIRE at the end after the VERITAS (or other approved) inspection

😉😉hi fr159 20,000 € for your bus doesn’t seem excessive to me—you’ve got to compare it with the RVs dealers offer (same number of seats, same range, same equipment…). With 20,000 €, well, you’re not getting anything great. But you? You get exactly what you want, how you want it, and on top of that, you get the huge satisfaction of saying, "I built this myself!" and I know how to do it!😛😛😛 Even if you make a profit when you resell it, spread over the number of hours you’ve spent in it, the margin can’t be that big!!!!😊 And hey, there’s no shame in earning money from your work😛😛😛.

Otherwise, would anyone here have enough know-how to put together a comparison of the different used coaches on the market so everyone can get an idea of which bus they’d need based on their project? Maybe a topic for your weekend brainstorming sessions with the motorhome bus community, PATRICK 26???🙂 CHEERS TO ALL cyril0603

Are there any sites where you can find coach ratings?😕

I can't find any online—if anyone knows a site, thanks!😎

😉 I still don't have the universal decoder volume 38 for your messages—I don’t understand everything!

Hi there,

Sorry, Patrick.

But if you have a D license, you automatically have a C license with the following restrictions: C limited to 19T or tractor + trailer 12.5T.

If you remember, that was the discussion at Gabby’s—with our license, we can carry 26T of living people in an extended coach with a D license, but only 19T of dead weight with a C license.

Cheers.

Uh, there's some confusion here 🤪

You no longer go to the mines for the annual inspection but to a private center (Dekra, Autosur, etc.)—that’s the mandatory annual roadworthiness test (CT).

The DRIRE is for APPROVING a conversion.

Back when the annual CT was done by the DRIRE, it was the same deal: they didn’t mix up the files, even if the inspector could be the same person.

At the DRIRE, they’ll ask for your CT, but they’ll ONLY check what’s related to the conversion. For example, in my case, they didn’t touch the water tap—that was Veritas’ job, and they didn’t do it because it was the DRIRE’s responsibility 😄. The moral of the story? Don’t bother connecting the taps 😄😄😄. No, don’t do that—I’m kidding 😏

TRUE and FALSE, it depends on when you got your license,

it’s true right now,

but it’s false if you got your D license in the military and never validated the equivalence because it’s no longer possible,

go back to the first few pages and find Spoutnic’s posts—he was driving a VASP coach with only a D license, no equivalence, and just a worthless piece of paper from his préfecture. The coach has been for sale since (related or not???) I told him in a PM that if he ever ran into a cop who knew the rules—especially since I think he was a DJ at raves—well, that’s a license violation. 🏴‍☠️