Because You Can..

In-depth

6 Nov

You'd like to do a bit of touring around the country. You could follow the route most travelled and do it in a four wheel drive, hauling a caravan behind. But you just love trucks!

You come across an ex-garbage truck from Queanbeyan – a 1975 Kenworth cab over. You also find an old bus body. What to do?? We can only imagine the conversation held between Mike and Emily Scott at the time.

"Hey Em, what do you reckon to us buying that truck and that old bus and me welding the two together?"

"Whatever takes your fancy Mike. I mean, why would we go and buy an RV for probably half the price of what this will cost us when you can spend only God knows how long, doing a cut and shut on these."

So the Scott's went ahead and bought the two old retirees and Mike breathed new life into them - the result being TRUCK’NBUS, probably the world's most unique recreational vehicle.

"Originally the Kenny had a 555 Cummins engine but came without a motor," said Mike. "It was bogie drive. I took the bogie out of it and fitted a V8 Cat motor, Alison transmission, Rockwell transfer case and steer axle and a number four Eaton two speed down the back. It is a custom coach body. I chopped 9 feet off the back and married it up to the Kenworth. I cut the back wall out of the cab to allow a walk through."

**CAT power replaced the original Cummins**

An engineer by trade, Mike handled the considerable changes required himself. "There was a lot of fabrication involved. We had to lower the Kenworth a considerable amount to match up with the bus - a full ten inches in fact. The original front suspension went, replaced by airbags, along with 21/2 inch wide springs instead of the original 4 inch to create a softer ride. It is a very comfortable ride."

The Scott’s had a cabinetmaker do the fit out, and inside, as would be expected of a 15 ton RV, there is plenty of space to move around. It is an easy walk through from the cab of the Kenworth to the accommodation area.

"One of the great advantages of having an RV with a cab this wide is that if Emily cracks it with me while I'm driving, I'm too far away for her to hit me."

Since the Scott’s have had the truck it has been over to the West multiple times, through the red dirt and in plenty of rough country.

"She averages 41/2 kilometres to the litre. She can cruise at 130 km an hour. But of course we don't go over 100, at which speed she ticks over at about 2,200 rpm."

At the rear of the bus/truck is a full height reinforced door, hinged at the bottom. Folded down to the horizontal with its canvas walls, it creates another room over 15 feet long. Drop it down to the ground and becomes a ramp to drive the Scots four-wheel-drive Suzuki in, and under the bedroom.

TRUCK’NBUS is fully self-contained which is probably just as well as there would not be too many caravan/camping parks that would be overly happy about having 15 ton sitting on their grass. We suspect Mike and Emily don't impart that particular information to them.