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E-150 Off-Grid Power Upgrade Tour | Van Builder HQ is live!
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May 3, 2025
E-150 Off-Grid Power Upgrade Tour | Van Builder HQ is live!
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0:00
but I'll have to do that later all
0:04
right we have uh been working on or I've
0:07
been working on a project for uh a lady
0:12
that has this custom Econoline
0:16
150 so let me wrap you around the van if
0:18
you've not seen this van
0:21
before so I had this in the shop about a
0:23
month ago but this is
0:28
a here we go
0:32
so this is a
0:33
2000
0:36
E150 that's been
0:38
customized by a company called Custom
0:40
Creations so it has a fiberglass top on
0:43
it AC
0:45
unit we're going to get to the engine
0:47
here in a second but I just wanted to go
0:49
through the van and just show you
0:53
um what what everything looks like
1:01
because I'm done with the the
1:03
upgrades um so right now what I'm doing
1:07
making sure I have the key so I don't
1:10
lose
1:10
it uh so this is the back in the 2000s I
1:16
guess this is the company that did the
1:18
van
1:20
E150 uh this lady she's a banjo
1:24
player she got some B bumper stickers
1:27
here but um let show you what I
1:31
[Applause]
1:32
did so before I show you what we
1:37
did she had this uh lead acid battery
1:40
from the original owner that was
1:42
powering everything and it was in this
1:45
plastic box and it had all kinds of like
1:51
uh wild stuff like this
1:54
Plumbing
1:57
plastic uh
1:59
stuff like that and
2:02
then where did I
2:06
lay there was an inverter to or I had
2:08
like a a lot of this type of
2:11
wood like this stapled wood
2:15
structure with like a latch to hold the
2:17
bed
2:19
down anyway then had like a little tiny
2:23
inverter
2:26
um so what I did was I gutted all that
2:30
out underneath the bed here so this is
2:32
the final project if you guys are
2:34
wondering what it looks
2:36
like hey Scott welcome to the
2:39
channel uh I redid the uh latch now
2:43
nothing on this van is square so if
2:45
you're looking at my
2:47
install my stuff is like laser square
2:49
and so had to do a little bit of an
2:51
offset and I found this uh latch really
2:55
I really like so she originally came to
2:58
me because she couldn't lift the bed set
3:00
up because the uh there's some gas
3:03
shocks in there that
3:05
failed and then also she couldn't get
3:08
into her passenger door here so this
3:12
handle and all the hardware on the
3:13
inside had broke and Fallen apart so she
3:16
was having to go inside open the door
3:19
then go outside the van and get back
3:21
into the
3:28
van so I replaced the shocks and
3:32
then day's going pretty good um and then
3:36
so those are the two shocks so this is
3:38
the bed system that somebody put in here
3:42
I don't hate it I I like this little
3:45
angle iron with the two shocks to kind
3:47
of help assist it I think it's really
3:49
simple you can actually find these
3:50
Replacements on Amazon there's hundreds
3:53
of them with these brackets so thought
3:57
that was pretty cool
3:59
and uh so there was a stick right here
4:02
this was the main way of propping the
4:06
bed up for I don't know how
4:09
long and so what I did
4:12
was it needed to be simple but uh strong
4:15
at the same time I wasn't going to do
4:17
anything fancy uh like 8020 or metal
4:20
related so have this really strong piece
4:23
of uh this is from an IKEA bed slat it's
4:27
extremely rigid um and you want
4:31
something thin so it doesn't bow so I
4:34
cut it made a little rest like a
4:36
kickstand for it and so it's just super
4:39
simple you just lift this
4:42
up and
4:44
then I made little like two lines right
4:47
there so that all she's got to do is
4:49
just put it in between there and you can
4:51
see it's just simple it just the most
4:54
simple thing that you could ask
4:57
for I cleaned all this stuff up
5:00
there's a was a bunch of holes in the
5:03
van and um you'll have to check out the
5:05
live stream to see what's underneath
5:07
this because uh this is finished now I
5:11
don't want to open it back
5:12
up uh but essentially what we did is we
5:15
went with a Le time battery Believe It
5:17
or Not uh will PR's DIY solar YouTube
5:21
channel recommended this one because it
5:23
actually has uh low temperature
5:26
protection it's 230 amp
5:28
hours and
5:30
and
5:32
uh yep that's the
5:35
battery um inside this box that battery
5:39
is coupled
5:40
with um a 2000 wat pure S Wave inverter
5:45
from Renegy and um it also has a DC todc
5:50
charger built in it as
5:52
well uh I'm sorry 2000 watt pure Sun
5:55
wave Renegy inverter charger
5:59
combo DC todc mppt solar charge
6:02
controller over here and then we've got
6:06
uh a blue C systems 300 amp disconnect
6:09
battery disconnect we're charging right
6:12
now off of shore power so that plug is
6:15
plugged in the side of the
6:16
van and we're almost topped
6:19
up um we got about almost 70 amps charge
6:23
rate right now which is
6:26
awesome um looks like we got about seven
6:28
more minutes and until this thing's
6:30
topped off pretty cool I still got the
6:32
plastic on here the protective thing
6:34
I'll get i'll let her take that off um
6:37
and then this is the inverter controller
6:39
now you may ask why did this not go
6:43
inside the van to where she can use it
6:45
from
6:45
there well uh there's
6:49
no there's nowhere in this van to mount
6:53
anything I know that sounds crazy but uh
6:57
there's just
7:00
I would have to build something to mount
7:01
it and that really wasn't in the scope
7:03
of the project
7:05
so the way that she's going to use this
7:07
is she's going to get ready for her trip
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she's going to turn this thing on it
7:11
runs her uh a 110 volt
7:15
fridge that's on the
7:18
inside and she just wants to be able to
7:21
run that fridge continuously so with 230
7:23
amp hours we should be able to get about
7:26
a week run
7:27
time with that fridge
7:30
um depending on the temperature that
7:32
will fluctuate greatly
7:35
however she wants the van turned on the
7:38
fridge to run she's going to be using
7:42
Shore power every time that she gets to
7:43
a campsite so we're always going to be
7:45
connected to power I also gave her a
7:47
brand new uh
7:49
furion 30 amp box cuz what what she had
7:53
before was uh I I didn't think it was
7:56
safe um I mean it was just falling apart
8:00
so I added that to
8:03
there
8:05
um then she's got a converter so that
8:08
she's going to household power so she
8:11
can go
8:13
into a campground but at the same time
8:16
she can
8:18
uh plug into household power obviously
8:21
I've got it plugged in household power
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okay this is the point of the live
8:24
stream all
8:25
right all that stuff is simple make the
8:29
refriger run off the
8:31
inverter have the AC
8:34
run there was already these Outlets
8:37
wired here and another Outlet wired
8:41
right back there as you can see this is
8:42
what uh ran the
8:45
fridge okay this is what got me for a
8:49
second there's this random switch in the
8:52
van
8:54
and I couldn't find to where it went to
8:56
anything and I was like man what is this
8:58
switch and and uh so I just disconnected
9:00
it and just went about my business come
9:03
to find out this switch actually
9:06
controls not only the voltage sents for
9:09
the AC so when I unplugged this the AC
9:13
didn't work so that was a rabbit hole I
9:15
went down but not only that check this
9:17
out this is the master
9:20
switch it's got two on positions in the
9:24
middle it will
9:27
allow this thing to
9:34
run if you push it down it will still
9:37
allow this to run but guess what it does
9:39
this is what turns on the whole
9:43
entire
9:44
Custom Creations part of the van which
9:48
includes the reading
9:50
lights mood lights and TV
9:54
VCR I couldn't I couldn't find that
9:57
anywhere but now check this out
9:59
the mood lights are working again so she
10:03
has not been able to have this
10:05
work and so those work the upper lights
10:10
work the AC now still
10:19
operates and the TV works now so yeah
10:25
finally found out what this thing does
10:27
unfortunately this next position
10:31
up uh I have no idea what that is um
10:36
there's no other wires that I
10:37
disconnected to make that a thing or not
10:41
a thing
10:44
so yeah that is uh the only mystery okay
10:49
so let's hop out to the front of the
10:52
van and show you what we
10:55
disconnected so she got she has her
10:58
battery here
11:00
um so what we disconnected for her was
11:04
this right here so this is a
11:06
solenoid activated uh battery combiner
11:10
so basically what it does is I've
11:13
completely disconnected it
11:16
because this wire went here and then
11:18
that went to the back of the van but now
11:20
we have DC to DC so this is completely
11:23
unwired and it's just wired here to the
11:26
battery terminal and then I just fully
11:28
charged the battery
11:30
cleaned all the terminals up she's good
11:32
to
11:33
go um I'll actually put this nut back on
11:37
here not that she's going to use this in
11:39
the future but you never
11:43
know this wire goes to this and I have
11:49
no I think this is an ignition 12vt
11:53
sense this wiring harness from Ford um
11:57
since everything's disconnected I'm not
11:58
really worried about it so that's just
12:01
going to stay happy like it is it's not
12:03
messing anything up all the voltages
12:06
have been
12:07
checked
12:09
so this now goes to the back of the
12:17
van and uh Powers the DC todc charger
12:22
that's underneath here and then we've
12:25
got the big guy right here um I don't
12:28
know if you can
12:30
see um in there uh also we've got a
12:34
terminal
12:36
fuse and we've got this right here this
12:41
is the
12:42
fused line for that switch so I put a
12:45
7.5 amp fuse in here it had a 15 amp
12:49
but um I just have 7.5 in the shop uh
12:53
I'll get an extra 15 later to in case
12:55
there's any issues but I've been working
12:57
this and I don't have any nuisance
13:01
um fuse
13:03
felling so this is for that AC and
13:07
interior light mood light stuff like
13:09
that
13:10
TV this wire down here is the 12vt sense
13:14
for the
13:17
um shunt the Renegy shunt and then we
13:20
got a 300 amp terminal fuse which I
13:23
recommend everybody puts on their
13:25
batteries they're expensive but you
13:27
can't always rely on the
13:31
um BMS inside the battery
13:34
to work for
13:36
you all right good news is uh we've got
13:41
our battery
13:43
monitor all good to go so what you want
13:46
to do is you don't want to fully charge
13:48
the battery before you set everything up
13:51
it's good for the battery shunt to see
13:54
that it can go from a certain voltage to
13:56
Upper voltage because now what it's
13:57
doing is we're kind of quote unquote
14:01
like top balancing right now which
14:03
pretty much means we're at the top we're
14:05
getting ready to be close to the top of
14:07
our charge here in just a little bit but
14:09
what's nice is if the battery meter if
14:13
the voltage meter
14:15
um sorry if the battery
14:18
monitor hits
14:20
100 that's good because now what's
14:23
happening is this we're going to finish
14:24
charging so basically think of it as
14:27
like a a level indicat where you hit the
14:30
level and then the water is filling
14:32
above it so as long as it's above it
14:34
it's always going to be at 100 and then
14:36
all of a sudden it'll see when it tops
14:39
off it that the true 100% charge and
14:43
then after that once we pull from it
14:45
it'll have a more accurate uh reading
14:49
cuz it says 100% now but it's probably
14:51
at like 90% or something like
14:54
that
14:56
um and then what I need to do is is go
15:00
in
15:02
um I have to figure out how to I need to
15:05
change this to 280 amp
15:09
hours um Bluey systems disconnect switch
15:12
I really like it you can flush mount it
15:15
you can outside mount it or you can
15:17
recess it like I did because this door
15:21
our clearances are really
15:24
tight so as you can
15:27
see we are super tight but trust me it
15:31
is not touching it's like qu of an inch
15:35
from touching this this button is like
15:38
quarter of an inch from
15:40
that um and then same here with this
15:45
latch that was super
15:48
close so you can
15:51
see it's just this is a foam foam pad so
15:55
I mean we were right at the limit there
16:01
but let's end up over here this is uh
16:04
the final thing that we I
16:06
rewired and then this is a progressive
16:10
Dynamics uh AC
16:13
controller for the 110volt power the
16:16
first was a 30 amp breaker that supplies
16:19
power to the rest of the breakers and
16:22
then here in here we're going to turn
16:24
these
16:26
on those are our two Outlets so our
16:30
first outlet and then the second one is
16:32
the fridge outlet and then this third
16:34
one is
16:36
the rooftop
16:39
AC if we wanted to use this as a 12volt
16:42
system there is a way to wire this to
16:45
where it converts the 110 into 12 but
16:49
that's very inefficient so since we only
16:52
have two circuits I just directly wir
16:55
them to the positive terminal battery
16:56
and fuse them appropriately
17:00
and yeah so if you guys want to know
17:03
this is the company if you want just a
17:05
simple straight Ford kind of old school
17:09
RV power converter Progressive Dynamics
17:13
and this is the pd41
17:15
35k I don't use this one in my builds
17:17
this is the one that came with her vanam
17:20
um I use the blue SE systems um although
17:24
I do because the blue SE systems is
17:25
super
17:26
tiny however this thing was so easy to
17:31
connect and get breakers for
17:34
that I may change my mind so might
17:38
change the
17:40
mind um if you're wondering also why
17:42
there's so many weird screws at
17:44
different places
17:46
uh this is solid halfin Birch uh Baltic
17:50
Birch it's very dense um I'm using Craig
17:53
screws here to basically make up the
17:56
structure of this box
18:00
um so it doesn't have any joints or
18:01
anything like that the only one at the
18:02
bottom is like uh something to support
18:04
it um basically for this bed thing but
18:07
this thing is super super strong you
18:10
could sit on it if you want to but it's
18:12
not really designed um it's was also not
18:16
in the scope of the project but I just I
18:18
have to have things look nice if they
18:20
come out of the
18:22
shop and so I decided to upholster it
18:25
and make this box um I've gotten really
18:27
quick at making this so 33 panels cut
18:30
and upholster it only probably took me
18:32
just a few hours but
18:36
uh we did have to trim a little bit of
18:38
this
18:39
off um other than that this is a very
18:43
simple build um this I didn't get into
18:47
this this is some
18:49
weird part of the heating
18:52
system uh we might add address that
18:56
later the main thing for her was
18:59
the shocks she couldn't get to her stuff
19:01
this thing was too heavy that stupid
19:03
pole was not here to hold it up it there
19:06
was all kinds of wood in here so it was
19:09
just really hard for her
19:11
to uh get stuff in and out of the van so
19:14
for
19:15
example they had this it was like
19:19
this so it was I I don't know
19:24
it's I don't know why so took that out
19:27
it's nice and clean
19:31
inside the van is nice and
19:32
[Music]
19:34
clean there's a bunch of these holes so
19:37
I sealed all these holes up there's a
19:39
huge plastic pipe in here cut through
19:41
the floor so I uh used some uh expanding
19:45
foam to seal
19:47
that um oh what is
19:50
this there's all kinds of stuff I'm okay
19:53
never
19:54
mind I'm looking for a white wire
19:58
there's a white wire that goes to that
20:01
switch and I still have not been able to
20:03
find it that
20:05
switch
20:07
so anyway when she's done loading up she
20:10
can just take
20:11
this pop it down bring the bed
20:18
down that secures the
20:27
bed still charging strong 69 amps doing
20:39
great all
20:42
right and now we can uh turn the fridge
20:45
on let's we'll let that
20:48
run and I think that is it for today all
20:52
right guys if you like this video if it
20:53
was helpful comment below like it
20:56
subscribe to the channel if you like
20:58
this type of content content um I go
21:00
live so this is the live studio setup
21:03
here in the shop um there's about
21:06
a five or six part series on this actual
21:09
install of this power system so go back
21:12
watch that it's on a live stream and uh
21:15
that's going to do it for this one hope
21:17
you guys enjoyed and uh I'll see you
21:19
guys in the next oh yeah yeah two things
21:23
I've got a free DIY vanu cheat sheet
21:25
it's got three years worth of Amazon
21:26
Parts on it if you guys are wanting to
21:29
jump start your van conversion if you
21:31
want to just see what list of parts I
21:33
use in the shop the DIY vble cheat sheet
21:35
it's completely free all you got to do
21:37
is put your email address in it'll send
21:39
it right to your inbox it's basically an
21:41
Excel sheet that I put together
21:43
something I reference in the shop when
21:44
I'm ordering parts but it's got over 250
21:47
items it might be helpful to use so if
21:49
you want to check it out go to vuer
21:51
hq.com Link in description below DIY van
21:55
build cheat sheet it's completely free I
21:58
do have a product for sale it is the DIY
22:01
van build blueprint course so I put
22:04
together a DIY van building course that
22:07
you guys can purchase today um link is
22:10
in the description below and it takes
22:12
you through the whole process uh how to
22:14
buy a new van a used van um low medium
22:17
high roof four-wheel drive all-wheel
22:19
drive differences I walk you through uh
22:22
layout design we go through power system
22:24
offgrid power system design then we also
22:27
go into a bunch of other stuff there's
22:28
an exclusive video on how to buy a used
22:31
van and what to look for that's not
22:33
available anywhere in the internet um
22:35
but it's in that course if you guys want
22:36
to check it out and then uh yeah check
22:41
it out there's a little preview on the
22:42
website van Builder hq.com then click on
22:47
course all right that's going to do it
22:49
for today thanks so much for watching
22:51
and uh look forward to seeing you guys
22:53
in the next video or live stream see you
22:55
later
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