Preparing & Designing The Ark

Our awesome blue bird bus named "The Ark"  Services we Offer

This very dependable bus is 39'6" in length. It has a Cummings turbo charged diesel 5.9 engine and an Alison automatic transmission. It averages 10-14 miles per gallon. It has under belly storage, and is built like a tank. It is extremely capable of fulfilling whatever desires you have in an RV/ bug out vehicle. We use implement (tractor) paint with added hardener, which has been holding up great. On this side of the bus you can notice the wood stove pipe, the water heater door painted to match water tank filling point along with a pressurized water hook up point. also the 2 belly cargo boxes, the black and grey water tanks behind them. Behind the rear wheels is a large propane tank, the diesel fueling point and an 50 gal accessory tank for gasoline for the generator with an electric fuel pump which can be used to fill other things such as chain saws and motorcycle's

Master bedroom

A great view of the master bedroom looking forward to the front of the bus. Resting on the comfortable full size queen bed you can notice the shelves on the left for books and folded clothes. The A/C of which half of it blows into the master bedroom all night keeping you nice and cool while you sleep, while the other half blows toward the 4 bunks. The smaller shelves on the right are used for organizing shoes and provide a nice cubby to empty your pockets at night. Next to that there is a large closet for hanging your clothes which will accept full length dresses keeping them clean and wrinkle free. And last but not least don't forget the locking bedroom door for some privacy.

Single seat

This seat sits in front of the wood stove. Before the wood stove was there it used to be another dinette and bed or a sofa. The table top doubled as an counter top to extend the sink counter, great for large piles of dishes. Now this expandable counter top is going to be used as a cutting board also that rest nicely in the sink basin covering the sink making extra counter space there when it is in place. This is my son’s favorite place to ride in his car seat when we travel. All the kitchen seats have seat belts.

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Kitchen dinette which turns into a full size bed, with large storage area underneath the seats

The BIG garage

 

This has been wonderful. Its 6'6" deep and 8' wide and can hold an enormous amount of totes and stuff. My plan is to add another very large fresh water tank inside of this heated area. It has great access from the rear door and from the front of the master bed room through a sliding door

The back door

This is the second exit in the bus. Which is great to have in an emergency? Also it gives you a peek at the large storage bay underneath the bed. another thing I like about this door being right by my bed is I have fast access to combat the "enemies" whatever they may be, outside in the middle of the night. or to just enjoy a shot of cool fresh air while you’re sleeping.

Overhead cabinets in master bedroom

This picture shows the large cabinets over the bed in the master bedroom. they were built to be as large as they can without you hitting your head at night while lying down and sitting up. They will hold a large amount of essential items you will need while living or bugging out in the bus. And like everything else on the bus they have been made bomb proof out of solid hickory and Baltic birch plywood. Also it provided a great spot for 2 reading lights.

Storage bays

These bays are tough and large; they come with a rubber floor and 2 heavy duty doors with locks. The red 7 drawer tool chest is permanently mounted and will not fall out or slide around and provides quick and easy access to your tools. A 5 gallon bucket fits perfectly in side and 2 of them fit nicely behind the tool box utilizing all available space. A great place for the sewage hose with built in divider. I am able to keep allot of firewood on hand and it can be piled 2 stacks deep once again utilizing all available space. As you can see the uses for these boxes are endless. There is a matching pair on the other side of the bus. The boxes have rubber gaskets to keep out dirt and dust while traveling.

Master bed and the nursery

Roomy enough here for a full size queen mattress and a toddler size mattress also, with space in between them. If you did not need the nursery this area could be used for a dresser drawers or storage or you could flip the mattress sideways to have extra room in the front of the bed room for something else. Also you could have made the closet that much bigger. But we enjoy the cross breeze provided by the opposing windows

Bunk beds and master bedroom door

These bunk beds are full length at 6'3" the will sleep adults, or in our experience 2 or 3 happy kids and a dog. They also are built out of solid hickory and Baltic birch plywood and will easily hold even the largest of men. They have a lovely book shelf at the head which you will NOT hit your head on, with a reading light. And a larger shelf at the foot which will hold a weeks’ worth of folded clothes and shoes for the occupant. The shelves all have a 2 inch lip on them so things like iPods won’t fall off. Speaking of iPods, each bunk has its own 110a/c and 12 volt power supply, to keep the kids charged up. There is a rail along the top of each bunk that is for a track to hold a privacy curtain, which we are debating to install, on our bus. Underneath the 2 bottom bunks is storage, which we use for food, blankets and the power inverter. It’s hard to see in the picture but the foot shelf can be used for a ladder to get to the top bunk, and has been designed for and tested by a 250 lb man.

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bunk beds with a shot of the forward sliding door to the garage

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Washing machine

This spot is ready to receive the full size front loading washing machine. After which an upper cabinet will be built in place hiding the back wall and providing more storage. There is a pedestal built to raise the machine and also house the heater core and 2 powerful fans which heats the rear of the bus while driving.

The fridge is a 7cuft deep freezer converted to a refrigerator. It uses very little electricity because of the efficient design of the chest you do not lose your cold air when you open the door. This is very important when living of grid, on solar power your fridge will be cold indefinitely long after everyone else has run out of propane. We built dividers to help organize it.

Looking from inside the bathroom  

The bathroom is 36x60 

The Pantry. If you’re going to live in a bus in a bug out situation or boon docking for long periods of time, you are going to need to store and have access to allot of food. This pantry will help in that area and it will make accessing the food easy. As you can see there is plenty of room in there and it’s built strong so go ahead and load it up. In the future there is going to be a spice rack on the inside of the door, which will hold a large amount of spices. After some quick math it looks like you can hold 162 cans of food on the middle shelf alone! And don't forget you still have all those cabinets up front, under the bunk beds, the 3 dinette seats, 10 large full extension drawers, and the large garage. That should last you awhile

 Super strong drawers with full extension drawer glides. Ready to hold allot of weight, or be used as a ladder for little boys

Here is the link for the stove we installed.

It works awesome heating the entire bus with ease, so far the coldest night was 9 degrees . There is also plans for a coil of copper mounted on the tile wall to be used as a way to heat water. 

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