He Built a Luxury Campervan for $8,000? IT HAS EVERYTHING!

I started out in pop-up campers and travel trailers and then as I got older we're like, okay We're going to here to there. Let's not make a big deal about this So let's just set this van up so we can go here and go there and then with my background of countertops and remodeling kind of Fused everything together. This is Patrick with New Jersey's outdoor adventures youtube channel on today's show I meet up with Dwayne. Dwayne has a really cool DIY Ram ProMaster 159 This thing sleeps three seats three has a shower toilet kitchen and a bed in the back And he did it all for eight grand today. He's going to give us a tour inside and out. So join us Hey Patrick, I want to thank you for having me on outdoor adventures I've been watching these videos starting this build. I used other people's ideas kind of worked it into my own mix of me being a flooring guy slash stone fabricator we wanted a a nice size shower With a good sleeping area really comfortable sleeping area and be able to cook and um, just have the things to get from point a to point b and not really live in it, but Travel and get to family members houses So that was our main focus on it and I didn't want to go too big We kind of stayed with the 159 inch wheel base I upgraded the wheels to aluminum Kind of gave it a little I wanted to stay kind of stealth a little bit like give it, you know a little bit not the Uh camper look, you know, that's why I went with this gray. Well, you'll see later in the video. I went with a blue eddy. Uh, uh power system, but this is my I get 1300 watts when I I plug in so if i'm at a family member's house I'll plug this in and i'll get 1300 watts going into my blue eddy uh you know, yeah This is the bed area so You know, you'll see probably I saw actually on most of the other videos. Yeah, this is important to have You know a small area to get ventilation and to look out. Uh, so That was that was like one of the first things I did was really the windows and the placement of the the shower And I kind of worked off that uh so here's kind of like my um my garage area Uh, we Put our electric bikes in there and uh, this is my 20 gallons Water tank it's built around the wheelbase so it It's custom fit in there. I have a small 12 volt system that goes to the blue eddy So the only thing i'm running my 12 volt off of is my my puck lights my ceiling fan And my igniting area for my my suburban hot water heater which runs continuous hot water Perfectly with the propane. So i'm not drawing down my my blue eddy system Uh, which is 3000 watts. So like I have not had an issue that thing will run and when i'm traveling It powers up 300 watts as i'm driving. So like I really have not this whole trip has been no power issues Uh, you know, I wanted to leave this I wanted to leave this wide open under here so What I did with the bed I put uh angle steel on the frame of the truck I doubled up furniture grade three quarter inch plywood Uh liquid nailed them and shot them together stained them. And so really they're like small joists Like as you would see in a house and I kind of use these boards here to just kind of interlock stuff together, but The mattress this was the mattress and the shower were the two things that were super important This mattress is like sleeping in your own bedroom It's 12 inches thick memory memory foam mattress uh Here's the It's just it's amazing It's a full it's 55 By 75 me and my wife can both fit in there perfectly We sleep fine So, yeah me Me being a flooring guy I use this lock. This is meant. This is a a synthetic kind of breathable material slash, uh Like flooring and and so it's really like you could really clean it and wipe it down and that's really that's my access panel Also and a headboard so like we can sit back here and watch tv uh I framed everything you I used ceramic coated, uh lvt With framing and insulation behind it Here's my dometic air conditioner Uh, I can run it as a nightlight With a fan or I can run my ac Which all goes down back all is powered back to my blue eddy here which I've seen on other videos people using blue eddy uh And it has a 30 amp plug and a 12 volt output I can hook it up I can hook it up on my phone so when i'm driving I can actually see my power and I know a lot of people get crazy with these power systems, but This is like I ran all my wiring to this area and went to the blue eddy and like I pretty much can take this out of my out of here and use it in my house. It's been great Uh, you know, I went on the flooring I did, you know, most people you'll see Uh, you know, they'll they'll frame it with three quarter inch uh framing With uh insulation board then half inch plywood then lvt Uh flooring so that was really my start. That was one of the first things I did So I did go with dometic ac unit that was rated. It's rated 230 volts I have it going to a transformer to bump it up and actually i'm using 750 watts uh, which is not draining my power, but it's kind of underpowering the the dometic but It's cooling my van perfectly fine. It's not over cooling it. So it's really uh, you know, I went with a typical roof fan I didn't really go with the max air fan. I kind of just went with a your standard fan and it's perfectly fine I mean I get good ventilation with the the two windows and and uh The dometic has a fan also built into it. So uh Yeah, so then um So from that point, yeah, I guess I would go into my shower Uh, which was it was just 32 inches by 24 deep So, uh have that running to my gray water tank Which uh, I have hanging on it. So this is 10 gallons and there's so really it's just gray water so I can just I don't I I don't really the the uh, Toilet area is nature's head. So really this is just gray water Okay, so patrick now, let me let me take you inside. Um this uh this is our area where If we're pulled over and we're taking a break. This is where me and my wife will sit. Um I just went with um, this is called thinscape. So it's made by wilson art and this is uh, really thin and strong So I have that as my tabletop and it doubles as My son, so my son's a little older. He he's a little big You know probably most people wouldn't have a kid so large maybe but like so So I take this out and we have a platform that goes across and we have a mattress so he's not with us on most trips, but uh, it works like he can sleep there for the four hours that we're on a trip and we're we're kind of resting for a while and we continue on and then throughout the day, he'll just hop back there and Sleep but in the evening me and my if we're pulled over Me and my wife are back here and my son will stretch out here and he can pretty much uh stretch out there and I put I went with um you know this outlet that has a night light with the usb so like he can be doing his uh, his laptop work, uh while we're driving and um this was hard to find I found this like small Chair, it's 27 It's 27 inches by 26 So I wanted I wanted to have like a feeling of kind of like at home the the first Chair, I made I made it at a three quarter inch furniture grade and it kind of looked too industrial and homemade So I came up with this and it's super comfy uh And then you know These platforms, you know, you see them a lot in videos. So I kind of I know people put um, You know storage and stuff inside these and you know, I just wanted it So when I turn around my feet can touch the ground I didn't want to have my feet hanging so That was uh important uh You know, then we're pulled over what these are pretty inexpensive I think I paid like 34 bucks for this little blind and you know at night we just roll it down and going into the ceiling area, uh, you know, I insulated everything uh All this wiring there's nothing wire nutted. Everything's crimped and and as one for the wiring So, you know on most of these vans traveling, uh with the vibrations of the the truck moving You you'll you can't twisty tie stuff. It all has to be crimped together. So, um, I went with uh, A thin luan paneling painted black and then I cut down these strips to kind of hide uh having to well having to to cut up two things like my my my shower area This this ceiling is locking in my a lot of my shower because I have my shower supported behind this But also my ceiling goes up to these Half inch quartz panels. So really I made these at my shop Uh, it's half inch thick I did two mitered cuts here that are three inches One side acts as a space saver And it kind of thickens it makes it look symmetrical here this side is a Is also comes in three inches, but this is my inside cavity for my wiring and my plumbing so that that really uh Worked out good uh This here is a 32 inches by 24 uh when it's time to take a shower, we just pull the the nature's head toilet out and um I slide it right back here and Uh, it's plenty of room we got the uh retractable you see these a lot and these are space savers these retractable shower doors uh So we don't have a huge amount of storage here because we're really we we put our suitcases in the back and we travel so I mean you probably could get into more shelving and cabinet space up here in the future. But for now You know, we just have our blankets. Uh And a few bathroom bags and really we got two or three small suitcases. We have plenty of room back here and uh You know that leads into the kitchen area. Um, so really, um, you know, we added this Uh extension which I got ideas from other people on and um This is also thinscape Uh wilsonart it's composite material really strong Uh, so that's another kind of countertop material that was like accessible to me for cooking we went with this electric cooktop It's 110. It goes directly to our blue eddy uh, we used a 12 inch by 14 a little stainless steel, you know, I feel like People get really big with these sinks and I was thinking, you know, i'm not I'm traveling. So like this is just something to rinse off a dish. So we kind of stayed small on that We we don't need huge You know, we're not living in it. But at the same time it's plenty of space some people use this size in their house And you know really I kept it simple down here I went with I see a lot of people do these differently in different ways, but I really just did the gray water with my two uh Clean water and I ran it to the bottled water dispenser, uh, which is 110 volt uh, and it pumps the water right to my faucet and so I kind of keep it, you know, because we don't we don't really use this that much so it was You know just to rinse off dishes and fill up maybe the coffee maker because it is bottled water It's coming out of this. So when you get these cabinets, they're either 21 or 24 depth I brought it in just a little bit to 19 so I did have to modify these drawers a little but um You know everything you know by inches, you know because really when you get into these these van areas inches are super important, but um really, um yeah, just kind of like we got our three drawers for our space and we have some uh a bin down here underneath the refrigerator for for stuff and uh This is a 12 volt or 110 Ever chill and it's been working fine. I actually since i've left chicago, uh, this thing's been running the whole time uh Yeah, you know like up here. Um like I said, you know, we have their We're not living in it. So like we just have a few things that we need for coffee and bread and jam and make some hard-boiled eggs and you know, it's just a regular, uh, 12 by 30 cabinet dwayne. Thank you very much for taking the time today to give a tour of this awesome van creation. I'm fascinated That you did all this for like eight grand. Yeah, think about it. You got a fan you got air conditioner You got two windows. You got the nautilus door. Yeah, the induction cooktop sink faucet blue eddie DC to dc charger off to alternate when you're driving. Yeah, you got a lot of like hard components in here Obviously your labor spray, yeah But you did a great job and you could accommodate three people which is really good Yeah, my big costs were you know air condition your power system Uh other than that, um, you know, my nature's head toilet was uh expensive but after those three things, you know, you could You could find these things on auction sites like store return sites and some of the stuff that were you know, I can get into that later, but uh a lot of the stuff I found on store returns sites, but uh, you know and The lvt was a good money saver this is a ceramic coat, it's not the cheaper stuff, but whenever I needed to To to make something look finished and I framed behind it. It was good for me Really, you know, you can clean it wipe it and it's like it almost acts as like insulation also Yeah, you're pretty genius in how you save space in this I mean it's just the shower Wall and then you got the the planks here on the side instead of framing it out You're wasting two inches here two inches there. Yeah, you really maximize the space inside of this I was yeah. Yeah, this is awesome. And you have like a youtube channel. You did some of your build on there Maybe that's something we want to put a link in the description. Yeah ang remodels I'm watching another one of your videos and i'm like, wait a second. I'm going to new jersey Like I wonder if patrick would have time for me and man. I really I was shocked I was like, well, do you have time to see my van and patrick's like yeah, sure I got that and I was like You said you live not that far from here and I was just like I appreciate it and you know I'm, glad we can connect my viewers love the diy budget build. Yeah Yeah, anytime there's an opportunity to showcase one that inspires others to yeah build something like it and hit the road and have a good Old time I make sure I have them on the channel. Oh, that's awesome Patrick with new jersey's outdoor adventures youtube channel. Thanks for joining us Thanks