Slooowly trying to start my build of a T2 bus I have.
This bus used to belong to my granddad and has pretty significant meaning to me as I remember it from my childhood too. Actually I remember that the first car I wanted even before having a license was a T2 due to this one. Of course I could never afford one back then and it'd probably have made a horrible first car.
Granddad eventually drove it to Estonia where he had settled for retirement and used it for transporting guests from the harbour city Tallinn to his lodgings further in the countryside. The bus suffered some sort of engine failure there in the first decade of 2000's and was left into a shed to wait for repairs. Originally with T1 engine, the Estonian friends of my granddad managed to source a supposedly new T4 engine for it but the engine swap was never completed. The engine they found is some form of abomination from German military, it has EMF shielded wires and supposedly runs on 24V system. I wonder why that didn't work out.
Anyway, come year 2019 and granddad's health had started to fail. He wished for me to have the bus since he knew I had liked it, so we rented a trailer and a van for the rescue mission. And there it was. We talked a bit with granddad about how cool it'd be to have the original "hippie van" to run on modern green tech, but considered that unrealistic back then.
Granddad has since passed, and this silly pandemic has taken most of my energy and effort since I work in healthcare so I haven't had much to give for the bus. But now it's finally looking like I could have some time for this as well. When I first got the bus, the idea was simply to get it running "any means possible" so I put up project threads on Samba and whatnot, but the more I've read and the more I've learned about the reliability of the original T1, the challenges and the parts needed for the T4 conversion, especially with some weird 24V starters and alternators, the more it's started to seem like going electric isn't that unrealistic after all, and could even be much better option in a long run.
I've just put my motorbike on sale for financing this project, and I'm learning the ropes of EV conversion and the build I want to go with. I do have some experience playing around with older vehicles, but EV world is new to me. But hey, what's the fun if there's no new learning path to follow.
Bus itself is in a decent condition for one that's been sitting 10-ish years in a cold shed. No major rust, no missing pieces. Just two mouse nests.
I've cleaned it all and removed everything but dash. Trying to recruit some friend to help with dropping the engine out next. (Surprisingly difficult when all my friends seem to want nothing to do with heavy oily machinery but I'll manage.) I plan on selling the T4 afterwards. I also have the original T1 unit in pieces, which I plan to clean and keep as part of the bus's history, but doubtfully will even try to repair that.This needn't go fast nor be comfortable even, this needs to be reliable and have a decent range.
Regen is must, heaters are not. Right now I've been thinking of keeping the original transmission and going with AC-50 (51?) or Hyper9 depending on what I can source easily here in the North. I considered Tesla SDU as well, but to my eye it seemed like a more difficult option. If you're in differing opinion I'll gladly hear it! I have found a company in Finland dealing old Tesla battery units and am planning to contact them for pricing when I've some better plans sketched out. There is also a one resto/conversion shop in Finland if I run out of juice doing this on my own, but I'd rather at least try first. Oh also I'm infamously bad at updating forum threads but we'll see how this goes.
) conversions showing stuff like EV West AC-50 or Hyper9 so those just seemed like proven options with good chance of success and readily available adapter plates etc where needed. Haven't come across with many Leaf builds yet, but I'm looking.
Ah well...
