- 56 minutes ago
A 6'7" builder turns a 2006 Thomas Saf-T-Liner into a full-time school bus camper without a complicated roof raise, using a smart 10-inch kitchen ceiling cutout to make the space work. Patrick Botticelli tours Dom’s DIY skoolie conversion in New Jersey, where the bus has become part tiny house on wheels, part mobile entertainment rig, with a Caterpillar C7 engine, Allison transmission, and a long list of practical upgrades.
Inside, the build mixes budget-friendly upcycled materials with serious off-grid systems: 480W of solar, a 3000W Victron inverter, 920Ah of batteries, Starlink, a diesel heater, mini-split AC, and a huge sound system with music-synced RGB lighting. Dom also repurposed IKEA cabinets, added custom storage, a queen-to-king style bed setup, outdoor shower, and plenty of clever details for festival trips, road travel, and everyday full-time skoolie living.
The result is a school bus camper conversion that shows how far smart planning and recycled materials can go, especially for tall travelers who need real headroom. It’s a detailed bus tour, tiny home build, and off-grid RV walkthrough all in one, with ideas for DIY camper van conversions, mobile living, and budget nomad setups.
Created for fans searching for school bus camper conversion, skoolie tour, DIY bus conversion, off-grid tiny house on wheels, and full-time bus life. Also great for viewers interested in raised roof alternatives, solar power RV builds, tiny home storage ideas, and practical DIY camper van tours.
Inside, the build mixes budget-friendly upcycled materials with serious off-grid systems: 480W of solar, a 3000W Victron inverter, 920Ah of batteries, Starlink, a diesel heater, mini-split AC, and a huge sound system with music-synced RGB lighting. Dom also repurposed IKEA cabinets, added custom storage, a queen-to-king style bed setup, outdoor shower, and plenty of clever details for festival trips, road travel, and everyday full-time skoolie living.
The result is a school bus camper conversion that shows how far smart planning and recycled materials can go, especially for tall travelers who need real headroom. It’s a detailed bus tour, tiny home build, and off-grid RV walkthrough all in one, with ideas for DIY camper van conversions, mobile living, and budget nomad setups.
Created for fans searching for school bus camper conversion, skoolie tour, DIY bus conversion, off-grid tiny house on wheels, and full-time bus life. Also great for viewers interested in raised roof alternatives, solar power RV builds, tiny home storage ideas, and practical DIY camper van tours.
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TravelTranscript
00:00I've been traveling around in it for about four months and I've stopped hitting my head because
00:03I know where everything's are now. It's not bad. Welcome back to the show. This is Patrick with
00:07New Jersey's Outdoor Adventures YouTube channel. Today I met up with Dom. Dom has a really cool
00:13DIY school bus camper conversion that he's actually living in full time right now. He's
00:18going to give us a full tour inside now and this thing is amazing. So join us. Hey Patrick,
00:25nice to meet you. I'm going to show you my custom school bus. So this is a 2006 Thomas
00:32safety liner. Didn't look into it much before I bought it and I got lucky and it's a Caterpillar
00:36C7 engine. It's an Allison transmission. Right in the front we got a custom door. I had no plans when
00:43I bought this bus of what I was going to do with it. There was a bunch of random ideas
00:48but I knew we
00:49were going to use it. I go to a lot of music festivals. We go on road trips, national parks.
00:53So it's kind of like an all-in-one plan. So with the door we just took the old school
00:58bus,
00:59removed the one side, bolted them together with a plate in the center. We just put some
01:05nice cedar wood on the inside or on the outside. The hardest part was definitely finding locks for
01:11the door. This is like a three inch thick door and it's nearly impossible to find. And meanwhile,
01:18probably for the first whole year and a half I was building this, it was completely unlocked and
01:22there was tools in it and the whole thing. And this I had the entire time. And probably like
01:29two weeks before I was moving around with it full time is when I figured out how to lock it.
01:36We got a blue paint job from Mako. I did all the sanding and body work and they only charged
01:44$3,000
01:45for the blue, the black over the windows and on the rails. And then they also did the roof white.
01:50And then we got spotlights up here. So both of these are giant purple LED spotlights. I changed
01:56all the indicator lights on the whole bus to purple lights as well. Got a nice little duck mascot.
02:05And if you know what this is, that's a sprout. If you don't know what that is, then you probably
02:08don't go to music festivals. This is the bathroom outside because we never use it. We got all the
02:14different gas cans for the diesel heater, the little tiny one to fill up the diesel heater because it's
02:20in a tight space. This is for the generator. We got propane because the generator can run on
02:24propane as well. I also use this to fill up the little camping propane tanks to use for cooking
02:30and little small heaters. Around the entire bus, we have LED rope lights that go to the music,
02:38all different colors, about 200 feet of lights around the entire bus. We got a Route 22 sign.
02:45So if you're from central Jersey, if you even think that exists, then you know where that is.
02:51We took out a lot of the windows. If I go back, I'd take them all out. We just riveted
02:56in some
02:57galvanized steel. It was very simple. I avoided it for a really long time and then I took half of
03:05them out. I should have took them all out. For the ones we did keep, I put a screen over.
03:11This does
03:12not let a lot of air pass through. This is specifically like a climate control screen. It's
03:18kind of what they use on like high rises, you know, the windows in like the city to really lock
03:24the temperature out. It made a big difference during the heat. We got the Starlink up top.
03:29We also got some snowboards for decoration. We got 480 watts of solar. We got hooks going down both
03:35sides of the bus to hang tapestries and, you know, bolt down some shade stuff if you have stuff big
03:40enough. The post up there, it's not complete yet, but that's supposed to be a roof deck that would go
03:46across both sides. We got our fresh water fill up right here, 75 gallons. We got these lights going
03:54around the whole bus. They're solar charged motion sensor lights. They have three different settings
03:59and even though they don't really do anything, it makes me feel safer when it's sitting somewhere that
04:05I'm not able to watch it. We've got an outdoor shower with hot water. Around the whole bus, we have
04:10four Bose boat speakers to listen to music outside. This is just the inlet for the diesel heater that's
04:18inside. And then we got the latest edition and my happiest one is the motorcycle holder. We just
04:29got a Kurt trailer hitch, the same one that Chuck Cassidy used, and pretty much this entire bus was
04:35built watching Chuck Cassidy videos. Holds a motorcycle no problem. We got a ladder, $100 off of Amazon
04:42to get up to the roof. We got two backup cameras. All of the tail lights and blinkers were changed
04:52out to
04:52LEDs. We put mirror tint on all of the windows on the back. And then obviously we got the name
05:02of the bus.
05:02How we came up with the bus, two years of building it, everybody asked me, what are you doing? The
05:08bus?
05:09Yep. And that's just the name, the big blue bus.
05:14Same thing on this side, covered up all the windows. We got 30 amps of power on this side.
05:24All these windows on the bottoms are all insulated and covered up. You can't see through the bottom,
05:28but the tops are open so we could access them. And then we also got a giant light bar that
05:36does
05:36all types of colors and obviously giant white light lights up this whole block, the whole parking lot
05:42with one light. And at nighttime with all these lights on, we also have underglow lights underneath.
05:50We redid the whole bottom. It was really, really rusty.
05:52So I spent about a month with the angle grinder and all types of chemicals. And it's not perfect, but
06:01we pretty much rehabbed the entire bus and we're going to go inside and check out the rest.
06:09So we've got a nice little Amazon bug screen, works perfectly to keep the door open, get some fresh,
06:16fresh air. Um, in the front we got, uh, we just covered this up, uh, put some insulation in the
06:24back.
06:24Uh, but we have all types of power, both AC and DC throughout the whole bus. We got the remotes
06:29to
06:30control all the lights on the outside. Uh, this is a camera system. I didn't put them on out outside,
06:35but we have, uh, we have four cameras around all sides. They record right here and they also record to
06:41a, uh,
06:42a disc. Um, and it can be hooked up to wifi. So if I leave it in a sketchy place,
06:46I can, uh, record
06:48that. Um, we also got a little ring camera over here. We haven't finished the front. Um, it's just
06:56going to be like this until next winter. Uh, we did switch out a bunch of the lights. So we
07:01have the
07:02spotlights we can turn them on and off. Um, we also have the backup camera right here. Uh, we got
07:07a
07:07little storage for shoes down here. Uh, very, very helpful. I wish I would have done a whole bunch
07:13more, more cubbies. Um, and then we come in here. Uh, so since you walk in, you got a whole
07:21lot of
07:21seating. Like I said, uh, wasn't designed to live in it. It was designed to kind of go to sporting
07:27events, tailgating, music festivals, road trips, um, where you're not just one or two people. Um, so
07:34on this side, we have, uh, the Ikea cabinets, super simple and they have every size. So it's very
07:40easy to find perfect fits for the random places that have. Um, we did a little art with, uh,
07:48so I guess fracking it's called, um, don't do it at home, very dangerous, but I think it looked good.
07:53Um, probably the hardest part of the whole build was figuring out how to build a shelf in here.
07:58There was a nice wire channel back there. Um, very proud of this. Um, down here, we got giant drawers,
08:07store all types of stuff, same thing over here. Uh, this also pulls out for some storage.
08:15Um, this also becomes a bed, so these will slide together and connect. It's basically a queen,
08:23almost king size bed. Um, the flooring and the ceiling, uh, was going to be very expensive and
08:29luckily enough the day that I was going to go buy a thousand dollars worth of wood for the ceiling.
08:35I came home and there was giant bundles of this flooring sitting in front of the house in the
08:41garbage, took them home, used them two or three days later. I was going to run out. There was another
08:46like eight or 10 bundles and we used them all for the ceiling, the floor. Um, we've got some extra
08:52storage back here, just reusing, you know, stuff from old cars. It's probably a net from my old,
08:56you know, Honda pilot. Uh, we've got storage underneath here as well. Uh, that's where we keep
09:01the generator, some extension cords. Um, as you can see, I'm pretty tall. I'm six, seven. So, uh,
09:09we were almost, I was almost done and I couldn't stand, you know, it was like, I did all this
09:14work.
09:14I'm not going to be able to stand here. I already had the skylight. So there's two little spots.
09:18Um, but I decided to just cut the ceiling out because it's, it's the only place I'm going to
09:24stand is here in the kitchen, kind of moving through everywhere else you're sitting, you're
09:28laying down. Um, it was very simple. There was already supports here. Just cut it out,
09:32raised it up maybe 10 inches. There's insulation on the outside of it, um, on the top. Um,
09:39very happy I did it. Um, so right here, we've got kind of like a workstation. Uh, both of these
09:43cubbies pass all the way through, um, really just electrical and stuff. You know, I've got an
09:49Xbox 360. Uh, we've got two monitors, uh, all the HDMI cables are run. Uh, we got the Starlink
09:56hooked up. I also have wired, uh, internet that comes in, but Starlink doesn't have a wire. Um,
10:03storage under here. This also helps for when I'm, you know, trying to use it. I really kind of,
10:10it's all type of wires right now, but, um, you can stand and work, you can lift it up
10:15and I can actually stand. Um, also helps for changing direction wherever everyone's sitting.
10:21Um, so under here, we got the 75 gallons of water. Um, we had a little cubbies here. That's pretty
10:30much
10:30all the unused, uh, building materials that we're still going to use eventually. And then over here,
10:36we kind of started to store the Starlink when it's not being used on the roof and whatever else.
10:42Um, kind of just put a bunch of hooks for, you know, the backpacks, keep everything organized.
10:48And under here, we have a subwoofer, uh, one of two. And the most important thing is we have, uh,
10:55these little leveling jacks to, uh, when we're parked for a long period of time, you know,
11:02you can jack them up on all four sides, balance out the bus. Um, if you've ever slept in a
11:06tilted
11:07vehicle, you know, how quickly the blood is going to rust your head. If you're facing the wrong way,
11:12how much your back is going to hurt when you wake up in the morning.
11:21So the windows, uh, first couple of festivals we went to, we didn't have the windows covered up and
11:28you could feel them just leaking. So I just put some, you know, foam board, foam board back there
11:33and the reflective insulation on the outside, just put a piece of wood, screwed it in. It was not hard
11:39at all. Um, did the ledges. So we kind of utilize them. Uh, if I could go back, I would
11:43do the ledges in
11:44certain spots, a little bigger. Cause when you go to put a fan in there, it doesn't really have
11:47enough space to hold it. Um, just kind of covering them up with nice wood, did a little
11:51wood burning. Um, so we have a ton of lights. Uh, these ones do all the different RGB's and they
11:59have the rims. Uh, they go to the music, you can program scenes and all that. Um, and then these
12:06ones have two settings that have the halo setting, nice light light, and then they have the regular.
12:11Um, so these windows are actually the exit windows, uh, one from the other side.
12:19And then I reclote, relocated the one to this side so that you kind of have this open area.
12:25If you ever wanted to use it to, you know, open a little coffee shop or any type of, uh,
12:32merchandising,
12:32selling anything at the beach, you'd be able to interact with people right here. Um, it's also great for
12:38air flow. Uh, this is one of the two air conditioners we got. This is just a portable
12:42window one. Um, surprisingly, uh, it doesn't use that much power. So same thing. We got the windows
12:48covered over here. Uh, we do have a kind of mini house fridge with the fridge on top, freezer on
12:55the
12:55bottom, uh, fit nearly perfect. None of this was designed or, uh, purchased before I had this space to
13:04work with. Uh, the Ikea cabinet couldn't imagine it fitting perfect, more perfect. Uh, barely even
13:09had to screw it in because it was locked in. Um, we did, uh, custom, custom butcher block tables,
13:15just used all the extra wood that I had from the framing and glued them together, sanded them down.
13:19I feel like they came out pretty good. Um, and you know, want to go with the black sink
13:28and then we kind of used, uh, some like wallpaper stuff to cover up some of the wood. So it
13:32didn't,
13:32you know, look, uh, too much like grandma's log cabin. Uh, it was getting, it was getting pretty
13:37brown towards the end. Um, and over here we have, uh, the full Victron electrical system. Uh,
13:44we have 3000 watt inverter, 920 amp hours of batteries, uh, DC to DC charger, the 30 amp, uh,
13:51shore power. Um, and we also used the blue sea systems fuse blocks. Um, if I could do this again,
13:58the main thing I would change is I would put these fuse panels somewhere quick and accessible. Um,
14:04it saves so much power if you just pop off a couple of breakers rather than letting the power run
14:09to all
14:10the place. It makes a huge difference if you're living in it full time or, you know, moving around
14:13in it a lot. Um, and then we just kind of built a little bit of storage, hold all the
14:19remotes and stuff.
14:19Um, we also have some fans in there. Um, I also installed some heating pads for the batteries.
14:28It was a nightmare trying to, uh, get them charged up in the winter because the voltage was too low
14:34to
14:34start the heater to, to cool them down. Uh, if you know, there's no shower or bathroom here. Um,
14:40but we do have hot water and, uh, the outside shower will work fine, but we are at Planet Fitness.
14:46You know, if you need a shower, you go to the bathroom, you go there. Um,
14:49if you're at a campsite, it's the same deal. Um, you don't want to deal with all that extra water.
14:53If you're showering two, three, four people for the weekend, you're going to use that camp shower
14:57wherever you can anyway. Um, but it's there for the future if we wanted to add it. Um,
15:02and we'd also have a water filter for fresh drinking water. Um, works great. Um, then up here,
15:09we're going to have, uh, kind of all the speakers. We got about, uh, 12 speakers and two subwoofers
15:16throughout the whole bus, um, four outdoor, the rest are indoor. Um, they're all stored in here.
15:22Just kind of built a little cubby to hold the star link. Uh, we also have a ton of, uh,
15:28aux cables
15:28and HDMI cables that run about a hundred feet to the front and we can run them outside of the
15:33bus
15:34when kind of hosting events, you know, TVs, speakers, you know, your tailgating, whatever
15:39you're doing, we have that ability to do that. Um, and then on this side, it's all powered by,
15:44um, just your regular car audio, uh, touch screen, but all of the, uh, amplifiers and speakers can be
15:52turned on and off, uh, separately so that we don't want subs. We don't want the front. We don't want
15:57the back safe power, uh, not being nuisance. Uh, we also have an aux that runs to this TV. So
16:03if
16:03you're watching TV, playing video games, it plays on the speakers as well. Um, and it definitely makes
16:08you feel like someone's outside the bus every time. Um, so we got a closet door, uh, that also
16:15luckily closes into a bedroom door. You can lock it from the inside, have some privacy, um, simple closet,
16:22uh, fit your clothes, got three cubbies to fit whatever shirts, shorts. Um, we have a little
16:29mini safe screwed into the wall in the back. Um, and there's another subwoofer down here,
16:35just some storage on top, some unfinished wires. Um, in the back, we do have just a fun little cubby
16:42for,
16:43you know, storing little things when all the extra wood, if you do this, if you've done a van or
16:48a
16:48school bus, you know the collection of wood that you contain afterwards. Um, so I don't know if we
16:54talked about it, but the diesel heaters down here, um, it's a very tight spot. That's why I had that
16:57second can. Um, but this just pops out, you fill it up. Um, and it also works as an exhaust
17:02fan, um,
17:03in the, uh, the summer and it's perfect for a temperature like this. It'll pass through some air
17:09rather than having to turn the AC on. Um, down here, we also have, uh, just a little skillet, uh,
17:17for cooking
17:17and, you know, a fold out table when you're outside. Um, so this would basically be the bedroom. Um,
17:26but we designed it for, you know, events and for people to, you know, use it and rent it. So,
17:32you know,
17:32this is kind of the party bus VIP setup. Uh, these all have wood and they connect in and then
17:38the
17:38cushions close down. And so basically a queen size bed, it's a little bit bigger. Um, there's storage
17:42underneath all of the cabinets, uh, easy access. We've got some doors here.
17:49Um, same thing on this side, very easy to lift up a massive amount of space. Um,
17:58got some more of the Ikea, uh, cabinets, 25, 30 bucks. Um, it's perfect for, you know, storage.
18:07Um, and then same thing with the lights back here, we got the halo and then the regular light. And
18:11these ones are the RGBs with, uh, the music response. Um, got a little Roku TV, uh,
18:20perfect for, you know, everything. Cause you don't even, you don't need to hook anything up to it.
18:25It has every app and everything on it. It's so simple. It doesn't use much power. Um,
18:31and then we got, uh, fans on both sides and these are also multicolored lights. You can change them
18:38to whatever settings you want. Uh, the sand, the fans are perfect for just a little bit of airflow.
18:44I sleep on, I sleep with them on most nights. Um, and the back, we got some big speakers. Uh,
18:50this is where I started. I didn't really know what I was doing. So I just built big giant speakers.
18:53I should have used it for storage, but they are loud and they are fun. Um, we kind of covered
18:58the
18:58windows up back here too. We just put some, uh, reflective insulation and the cork, uh, wrap right
19:04over top. Um, and then we got a 9,000 BTU mini split. Um, it's run down to the bottom,
19:11um, with, uh,
19:13the condenser and stuff down there. Uh, right here, we just kind of filled in a little night cabinet.
19:20Um, this is kind of just socks, underwear, and then got a little storage for shoes and stuff down there.
19:26It'll eventually probably be more tools. Um, and then we still have the back door that opens up.
19:33You can get onto the roof, get airflow. You're backed up in the right place when it's not a construction
19:38view. Uh, it's nice. It's a nice view. Well, Tom, I really appreciate the opportunity to showcase your
19:45build. I love the fact that there's a lot of repurposed materials in here and stuff that you're
19:51able to just buy for a home and adapt it to work inside of a school bus. And I've seen
19:57raised roof
19:58school bus before, which are pretty complex. You got to cut the body, lift the roof up. What you've
20:04done here is pretty spectacular. I'm five feet nine and there's like a full 14 inches above my head.
20:11At least I would guess here. You're six foot seven. A lot of people say, why'd you buy a school
20:16bus?
20:16You can't even stay. Oh, that was the number one thing. Yeah. You made it fully functional. This,
20:21this thing got to be what, 10 feet long? Yeah. And I've been traveling around in it for about four
20:25months and it's, I've, I've stopped hitting my head because I know where the things are now, but
20:30you know, like it's, it's not bad. Like this is where the only time you're standing, it's a little
20:35annoying duck real quick. But for the most part, I have room to put a shirt on. Um, I don't
20:39feel,
20:40you know, crushed. I like the, uh, the stainless steel top here you did for this countertop.
20:46That's a nice touch and you built it. Well, you, you bid on it. You want it, you built it.
20:52It's
20:52done. You're living in it. What's, what's the plan? What's the long-term plan? Uh, so the plan is
20:56really just to travel around with it in the summer, enjoy it. You know, there's some still a little,
21:00you know, fine things that need to be fixed up. So once I'm done fixing those up and it's really
21:04ready, um, I have a website that I'm, you know, allowing people to rent it. It's not going to be
21:09like a party bus. It's more of a, a drop-off rental, um, you know, destination, uh, tailgating,
21:15sporting events, weddings, block parties, uh, whatever you find a need for it is. Um, and,
21:23you know, it's a lot cheaper than you're going to find for, you know, tour buses and other things.
21:28And when you see it at night with all the lights on and the music, you'll understand the, uh,
21:34the vision behind it. Well, I really appreciate the opportunity. I'll drop that link in the
21:39description. So if you guys are curious to see what the rental program is about, you guys click
21:45over to his website. And then also I'm going to come back and get some B roll of it all
21:50lit up at
21:50night because you're going to be in town for just a little while. Yep. Well, awesome. This is Patrick
21:55from New Jersey's Outdoor Adventures YouTube channel. Thanks for joining us.
22:25Thanks for joining us.