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My M109A3 RV Project Blog

yarry23

Member
61
2
8
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
Hello all,

I am relatively new to Steel Soldiers, and have only a month or so ago bought my first MV, an old 1965 M109A3 that lived out on Nellis Airforce Base all of its life. I am in the process of restoring it, and converting it into an offroad RV for my family. I plan on dragging their asses to Death Valley and beyond, and I can't wait!

So, I also decided I would try my hand at blogging. I've never done it before, but I love to write, so I figured I would give it a go. You can find my blog of my M109A3 construction/restoration here:

The Imperial Car Destroyer

It would be an honor if you guys swung on by and took a look. I will try to repost some stuff on here from time to time, but I am going to be focusing on keep the blog up to date first. Look forward to seeing you comments and ideas!

Thanks a ton Steel Soldiers, I couldn't do this this without you or the resources, community, and encouragement you provide!


~~yarry
 

Green_gator

New member
760
1
0
Location
Tampa, Fl
If you have rust along the bottom of the walls there is a good chance that the water intrusion came in along the seams on the roof. Take a ladder and climb on up and look for seams that are either open or areas rusted through. There are a couple of other 109 builds that have some good detail on sealing up the roof. Good luck and post pictures!
 

yarry23

Member
61
2
8
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
(repost of my initial blog post, for those that don't want to go offsite. Will try to do this with the b log posts as I write them...)

_______________________________________________________________

Hello everyone!

First off, let me welcome you to the Blog. I am relatively new to blogging, but not to the internet, nor reading blogs. I love to write, and I am excited about sharing my crazy passion for odd vehicles, more specifically my newest acquisition, a 1965 M109A3. In case you are wondering "what the **** is a M109A3?", allow me to elucidate you to the answer.

It is a giant, old army truck. A "light shop van", according to the military, who think "heavy" only counts for artillery and tanks. For some light reading, here is what our friends at Wikipedia have to say about it:

M35 2½ ton cargo truck - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

So, how does one go about purchasing something like an M109A3 you might ask yourself? Good question. The answer is, Government Liquidation. I started my dream of extreme off road vehicles some number of years ago, initially in love (still am really) with old Volvo Swedish military communications trucks from the 70s, specifically the Volvo C303. Beautiful van, but when I started trying to picture how I was going to cram my entire family (or my camping crew, The Gentlemen of the Expedition) I couldn't see how we were all going to fit.

It was on my most recent trip to Death Valley that the answer was provided to me. I was out with my Dad, and our friends Ed and Dan at the Racetrack Playa when we came across this amazingly cool old German military communications truck, fully kitted out as an overlander. We had a brief chance to speak with the owners, a totally cool pair of Germans who were travelling around the world in their vehicle. They had already been through Siberia, Europe, and had just shown up in the US recently (at the time). Their truck was beautiful. Here is a picture of their beauty. It was a Mercedes-Benz LA 911B.

So, I hunted around on the web for a while trying to find one once I got to civilization. It ends up, they are extremely hard to find, and most of them are in Europe. On top of that, the parts are going to be extremely scarce, and generally it was going to be a several year long search. Dismayed, I started to hunt around for other options. That's when I stumbled upon this guy:

MilitaryTrucks.ca - RV Project

I read through the whole thing, and decided this was it. I would buy an old U.S. Army truck, just like he did, and use that as the basis for my vehicle. Better yet, this amazing Canadian had already basically documented the steps I would need to do. So, taking his conversion as a template, I forged ahead.

Found the truck on Government Liquidation, currently living on Nellis Airforce Base. I posted my bid, and crossed my fingers. The gods were with me, and I won the bid without going into the poor house too considerably. The next bit was waiting for my Government background check to clear (took about five weeks), which spanned the holidays. My paperwork came back, and much to everyone's surprise, I was not indeed a terrorist. You can imagine my relief.

Next was getting the **** thing off the base. Being that I hadn't every actually seen the thing yet (yeah - I know, that was a little crazy too) and have never driven a vehicle of, shall we say, this caliber, I was a little hesitant to simply take a one way flight there and try to drive the thing back in the middle of winter. So, that being the case, I got a tip from some of the cool peeps at Steel Soldiers to try Hamner Towing, a towing and shipping company in Corona California that has been known to haul around large old military vehicles. After arranging with them, they did the pickup from the base, loaded the truck, and drove it out to Santa Cruz in two days.

A giant semi pulled down my residential street bearing my new vehicle, and a love was born. I still remember the first time I crawled into the cab and started her up, slowly backing her up and then pulling into my not-quite-large-enough driveway. I was terrified and exalted at the same time!

Introductions aside, welcome to the blog, and get ready to read about my progress through getting the thing restored and working. It's going to become the Family RV/Zombie Apocalypse Survival Vehicle, and it's going to be a fun ride, in every sense of the word!
 

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yarry23

Member
61
2
8
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
(Second blog post, reposted here. Formatting may be a little odd, since its a copy and paste job, but it should work, more or less... *grin*)

_______________________________________________________________

So, where to begin working on a 7-1/2 ton forty-seven year old military truck you may ask yourself? Well, at least that's what I asked myself when I awoke the next morning after it arrived at my house and realized it wasn't going anywhere without my help. The answer was actually quite simple.

You do whatever you have to do to make it legal first!

Everything else second. In that regard, I had to prove to the DMV (in other words The Man) that my vehicle was an RV. This is because if it's an RV, I don't need a new classification of license (Class C license are fine for motorhomes under 42' long), it won't be a commercial vehicle (and pay registration by the tonnage - which equated to a little more than an additional thousand dollars per registration!), and in general will avoid an entire boat load of potential legal entanglement. So, commercial bad, RV good. But what in the world makes a vehicle an RV? Ends up, there isn't a hard and fast definition according to the DMV. The DMV employee I spoke to said basically, "As long as it's not a sleeping bag thrown in the back of a pickup, and actually looks more permanent, it all good." I am, of course, paraphrasing, but that isn't far off.


The original interior, wooden planks and all!

So, I start by fixing up the interior of the van body, with the aim of getting a permanent bed bolted to the interior as quickly as possible. The interior had been painted a sloppy white sometime in the last twenty years, and had been 1960 lime green before then. God knows why the military chose some of the colors it did forty years ago, but I can tell you the original colors were truly hideous. It looks like some rushed recruits slapped some white paint on with brushes over the original paint scheme, and then proceeded to do their biznatch (like repairing jet parts) for the next twenty years or so. To say that everything was grimy, covered in dust, and banged up to **** didn't quite cover it. It was, however, a place to start.


Let the restoration begin!
So, after sweeping out the interior, I decided to take my new 25 gallon air compressor and air sander out for a spin. I basically attacked everything within sight in the van interior, floor, walls, doors, etc. I went through several sets of sand paper, and covered myself in layers or old dust and paint. My goal was not to sand it down to the metal or anything foolish like that, but just to get enough of the grime off that I could paint over it effectively. It took some time, as the interior dimensions are something like twelve feet by eight feet, but eventually I got enough done to proceed.


Nasty, nasty rust! Must eliminate!
The floors are made of wooden planks (like an old sailing ship!) with two metal sections that are literally the tops of the wheel wells over the rear eight wheels (four to the rear left, four to the rear right - gotta love three axle vehicles!). The interior walls are metal sheets riveted together, with a little lip at the bottom that bolts to the plank floor. It is here that I found my first signs or real corrosion and damage. Basically most of the metal had rusted to nothing in several of these places, and had to be dealt with. I was planning on putting in a new floor of 1/4" plywood and linoleum, but I knew I couldn't trap all of that rust under there and expect things to turn out well for me in the long run. Thus, it had to be dealt with.


Alchemists eat your heart out!
So, I knew I had to buy some gear to make the floors, but I also knew I had no vehicle besides my as-of-yet-not-registered army truck that was capable of carry back the three 8' by 4' sheets of 1/4" plywood I was going to buy. Realizing there was little other available options (outside of strapping the plywood on the roof of my mini or motorcycle) I girded my loins and took the truck out for its first real spin. I think I drove around the block a dozen times, ground the gears about twice that, and then eventually figured out that I was in Low Gear the entire time. Switching to High Gear, I confidently set out to Pro Build to buy my supplies. I made it there, didn't crush anyone in the process, and didn't get pulled over. I even made it back! In the end I purchased the plywood, some tubes of construction adhesive (to glue the floors down), a ton of deck screws, and some Loctite Extend Rust Neutralizer. This stuff is the bomb. Basically you paint it right on to the rust, and it magically transforms it into inert, paintable non-rust. It's like alchemist's gold in a bottle! A few coats of that, and then waiting for it to cure overnight, and the rust had been dealt with. I finished up by spray painting it and the tops of the metal wheel wells with rust resistant black automotive primer. The interior was now ready to have its new floor put in!


Goodbye nasty rust!
Next comes actually putting the plywood over this mess, bolting and gluing it to the floor, and then covering it with linoleum tiles. I took a ton more measurements, went and grabbed my folding table and skill saw, and got ready to do some cutting. I got lucky, and managed to rip all three pieces of plywood right (more or less) the first time. Apparently all those years helping my Dad build houses and what not on The Land paid off after all. *grin*

That done, I then started at the furthest point from the back entrance (so the part of the van body closest to the cabin in other words) and began putting down a pattern of construction adhesive. The stuff is pretty nasty, and you seriously don't want to get it on your skin. I only managed to step in it once during the project, so I consider that more or less a success. Floor as ready as it was going to be, I stepped out to get my cut piece of plywood.


ACME Brand Instant-Cement (Does not work on Road Runners)

The first piece of flooring went in like a charm, and I set about screwing it into place. Of course, as luck would have it, I got deck screws that were too long, and they went right through the plywood, right through the floor boards, and then thorugh the bottom of the metal van body! This was not what I wanted. Grumbling, I jumped back in the wife's car, rushed back down to the hardware store (knowing full well that no good project is complete without at least two trips to the store) and bought the right **** screws. Thus mollified, I returned home once more and screwed that sucker down. The next went in just as easily and I felt I was making some real progress! The third had some issues, as I hadn't noticed that the part of the van's interior walls had been slightly crumpled inwards, as if they had been kicked by a donkey/drunk GI/rogue airplane. The last piece had to be hammered into place, mashing up the very corner bits of the plywood, and taking my "I know what I am doing" feeling down a notch or two. Still, it was in, and all in all, looked pretty good. I may not get it right a 100% of the time, but ****, I figured it was good enough for Government work. ;)


Floors, beeeooootiful flooors!
Time to let the construction adhesive set and do its thang, and call it a very long pair of days. Next I will struggle with deciding whether or not to put in the linoleum or paint, until I realize I pretty much have to paint if I don't want paint covered linoleum. Even I can come to the right conclusion eventually, given enough time. Look forward to posting the next chapter soon. Hope you all enjoyed the further adventures of The Imperial Car Destroyer!
 

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Clay James

Member
524
4
18
Location
Reno/NV
Any evidence of rust on the steel sub floor? I found a patch that rusted through and had lots of rust flakes coming out so I decided to rip out the whole floor which turned out to be a good idea. The entire sub floor was rusted with piles of flaked off stuff all over the top. I filled about 3, 5 gallon containers with rust. It's also spot welded about every 1/2" around the entire thing. I'll detail it more on the thread on my 109 that I'll start soon.
 

yarry23

Member
61
2
8
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
No evidence of that, thank god. The vehicle lived out at Nellis Airforce Base for most of its life, so it should have been fairly dry out there.

Crawling under the vehicle, there is very little signs of rust, etc. Mostly layers upon layers of old paint and dust.

I would guess that moisture would build up in the vehicle (probably from a slow roof leak I will have to look into), condensate and then drip down the interior walls and pool against the little metal lip that bolts it to the floor.

Of course, that's just supposition, but since there is little rust elsewhere, I can't be TOO far off (I hope!).

Will try to get another blog post done tonight, covering painting the interior and getting the linoleum floors in and finished. Want to get caught up to where I am currently (electrical system) so that I don't forget any juicy, juicy details!

More soon!
 

yarry23

Member
61
2
8
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
Time for some paint!

Indigo Sol (left) and Mari-Lu (right)
Greetings once more! Well, with the rust in the van body (which the German speaking overlanders call a 'koffer' unless I am mistaken) and getting the new floor in, I figured it was high time for some new paint. I have a Benjamin-Moore color wheel, and have used the paint in the past, so that's where I started. I decided I wanted something on the lighter side of the color spectrum, as the van body didn't get a ton of light, and I didn't want it to feel dark and oppressive. After knocking a couple of ideas around, I decided on a light grey with a hint of blue in it, taking the suggestion from my awesome partner Cricket. Decision in hand, I headed down to my local paint store, and had them make up two gallons of the stuff for me. I had a pair of awesome helpers at this point, my youngest daughter Indigo Sol, and our neighbor Mari-Lu, as well as all of their girls/princesses. Yes, the Imperial Car Destroyer had a serious infestation of girly cuteness. Such is my life. ;)

Paint in hand, and back from the store, I prepped the interior of the van body and started masking off the windows, the data plates, switches, and so on. This was the boring, but amazingly essential part of painting. I had selected eggshell finish paint, as to avoid that glossy "bathroom" look, but still have something that wouldn't instantly pick up and retain any dust that flew by it, which I expect to be a lot in the lifetime of the vehicle. I purchased an HVLP (High Velocity Low Pressure) automotive paint gun from Harbor-Freight, and I was dying to try it out. Pulling out my trusty air compressor, I got the gear ready. Air tanks full, neighborhood alerted "that crazy guy" was at it again, I decided to do a final inspection of the vehicle before painting.


Walking back through the interior I noticed a few shelves I had missed mounted to the far wall (closest to the cabin and the front of the vehicle) that I had not removed. Sighing, I went and grabbed my screwdriver and proceeded to pry them loose from the wall. It looks like this vehicle had been outfitted for cold weather, and had a pair of multi-fuel diesel heaters mounted in them. That's right, a pair of them! Unfortunately, the heaters themselves were missing, but the mounts for them were present, along with the exterior breather tubes, and the electric box was wired up to support a pair of the units as well. There is even the external fuel pump mounted to the outside of the van body piped into the main fuel tank already. I plan on eventually tracking down one of these units and using it as my main source of heat, but they are hard to find. With luck I will find a lead on Steel Soldiers. I have saved all of the parts (of course), and hope to track down one of these heaters, hopefully used. I am still in the process of finding out, but I think I was lucky enough to stumble into a truck that has had the "arctic weather treatment" package upgrade performed on it. Don't quote me on the name though, I am still learning a lot about these old military trucks, much of it on the fly as I work on them!



Task performed, I noticed I had failed to leave a cut out for the actual door latches in my shiny new floor. In other words, I could not currently close my rear doors! Oops! And of course, I had just finished gluing it to the floor, and screwing it in place with roughly 1.2 million deck screws. Thinking fast, I grabbed my Dremmel and a few cutting wheels, and corrected the problem. Over corrected in fact. Oh well, at least the doors could close now, and such is the nature of projects sometimes. Since I was there, I went and did some touch up sanding, hitting the sections of the wall that were previously covered by the diesel heater shelves and so on. This time for sure, I was ready to paint!


Ember helps with the last of the masking!
Windows covered in old magazine print (pages from one of those annoying free catalogs that seem to plague modern existence, the paper spam of a bygone age), walls sanded, outlets and switches masked off (mostly), it was time to begin. My oldest daughter Ember showed up to help with the final prep work, which was greatly appreciated. Clearing out all of the tools, the rolls of masking tape, and the children and lingering princesses, I fired up the air compressor and got to work. Now, some things you should know. First - I have never done this before. Second - I really need to get a dedicated outlet, preferably in 220V and exterior mounted on a dedicated high amperage fuse. Third - I have a mild form of insanity that causes me to buy old military trucks and not take no for answer. Add all of these together, and you have an air compressor that runs great until it hits its desired pressure load, turns off automatically, and then when it tries to turn back on, trips the circuit breaker and just sits there. It meant I had to try and constantly run the air gun, trying to keep the tank under load so that it wouldn't turn off and then try to start up again, and die. Plus side, I worked non-stop for hours and got the sucker done. Down side, way frustrating. I am going to call an electrician friend of mine and have him get that dedicated outlet done, I swear, but that wouldn't happen today, so there was nothing to it.


First coat is on, beginning of the second day of painting...


Finally, the ceiling is done!
It took until hours after nightfall, but I got the deed done. As you can see in the images, more than one coat was going to be needed. I pushed on, rinsed out the HVLP paint gun, and buttoned up the truck for the night. The shower that night felt like paradise. New day, new coat of paint, and I got back to it. It should be mentioned that I spent some time that morning trying to fiddle with the various adjustments on the paint gun, attempting to get exactly the right mixture of air, paint, spray width, and pattern. I used a few card board boxes as test surfaces to paint on, since I couldn't really tell what was going on when I sprayed the walls proper. Firing up the air compressor once more (Ah, Sunday mornings wouldn't be the same without their dulcet tones), cranking up the small speakers playing Pandora from my phone, I worked my way through the second coat. The second coat seemed to go on much faster, but as usual, the ceiling seemed to take forever. Maybe it's just that you have to do the whole thing holding the paint gun over your head most of the time, or the fact that there aren't any windows to break up the space (and thus reduce the total area you need to paint), but the ceiling was a chore.

Now, something I should have mentioned before that is just too cool for words. This truck came with its own mascot. Not like some weird high-school dude wearing some plush velveteen suit or anything, but an actual painted by her original crew mascot stenciled on the inside of the van body door. It depicts, humorously with a violent macho angle to it, a muscle bound bunny rabbit flexing for us, wearing a military helmet of some sort, with, and I **** you not, the words "BAD ASS" custom stenciled below it. This, pretty much, was so bad ass it had to be saved. Not only saved, but revered and enshrined. Thus I made sure not to accidentally spray paint over it or anything stupid like that. It is my plan to buy a crazy metal frame and bolt it to the door over the muscle bound long ear. We decided his name was "Babs", which stands for Bad Ass Bunny Specialist, if you must know.


All hail BABS, Official Mascot of the Imperial Car Destroyer!
Well, I had intended to get to laying down the linoleum this post, but it looks like I waxed poetic for too long covering the paint job. Oh well, more for next time! Stay tuned for our next exciting episode, where in we discover we have not completely glued our new floor to the metal deck plates (the tops of the rear wheel guards), we look at a couple more ugly worts pertaining to the floor, and then we say "**** it" and cover the whole thing in linoleum anyway and make it look beautiful.
 

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yarry23

Member
61
2
8
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
@Danger Ranger:

LOL! Awesome, no I did not know that, although in retrospect it should have been patently obvious! Thanks for the clarification. Now I am going to have to come up with a new name and acronym for him!

Much appreciated. *grin*

Will try to get another post out tonight, getting through the rest of the floor and the prep work for the electrical. Then I will be almost caught up to present. Looking forward to the weekend when I can really work on her again.

Thanks again for your support guys!

~~yarry
 

yarry23

Member
61
2
8
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
New Floor, and a Bunk Bed!

Greetings and Salutations loyal citizens of the Empire!


Last time I left us at a freshly painted interior to the koffer (van body), and ready to put in the linoleum. So, that's exactly where I will pick up once more. However first I needed to attend to one small detail before I got down to the business of making the floor look pretty. That was the minor issue that the 1/4" plywood I had purchased as the base of the floor was coming up in a few places. Two to be specific. Directly over the rear set of wheels the floor was a metal plate, basically the top part of the wheel well. I had tried to put down enough construction adhesive that I had hoped it would glue it into place, but it was sadly not to be the case. Thus, I had to come up with a solution - and fast - before I made the problem much, much harder to deal with.


Bolt securing the floor
After some consideration, I decided to keep it simple. I drilled a couple of small pilot holes through the plywood floor, and through the steel wheel well beneath it. I then went to the hardware store (I am getting to know them all by name at this point, and I am developing likes and dislikes for the various hardware stores in town) and picked up a few bolts of the appropriate length, a few rattle proof nuts, and some Locktite. Grabbing the Makita cordless drill, the problem was dealt with rapidly, not counting the rapid trip to to the store. That problem dealt with, I was finally able to move on with the floor.


Drop line in place, first tile down
I had bought the linoleum from Home Depot, whom I know I am supposed to despise, living in Santa Cruz and all, but the truth of the matter is they have a knowledgeable helpful staff, are laid out in a logical manner, and have a great selection. So there, I said it. Anyways, I decided to buy the "top shelf" linoleum at just under a dollar a tile (which are one square foot). With the interior space being basically 8' X 12', that meant I had 96 sqr/ft worth of tiles to buy. Erring on the side of caution, I bought about 106 tiles, and called it a day. I also picked up a blue drop line so that I could stand a remote chance to making the thing vaguely square. Another thing of note. Large stacks of linoleum tiles are surprisingly heavy! I had somehow convinced myself that since they weren't the "real thing", they would be somehow lighter and flimsier. Not so!


Traffic Master, mastering your traffic
since 1901
The actual laying of the linoleum tiles is very rewarding. You get the joy of laying down tile, without all of that annoying grout, tile saws, and so on. You also get to feel like a little kid playing with over sized stickers, as you peel off the wax paper backs and hold a one square foot sticker in your hands. And hey, who doesn't like stickers? I also learned that placing your very first tile is probably the most important aspect of the entire job (outside of laying the drop line perhaps). I did a pretty good job lining it up, and didn't think much of it at the time. I was probably within 99% of getting it exactly right. However, that 1% over twelve feet of tile can add up. Not much, but it does. Another thing of note is the decision on how to lay out your tile. After consulting with Cricket, I followed the general convention of starting with the first tile right dead center of the room, and working out from there. Yes, I would have to cut "tile" on both sides of the room now, but those areas would be hidden under tables, lockers, bathrooms, and so on. So, after a lot of setup, the actual tile laying went really fast. I was assisted by my ninja daughter Indigo, and things went pretty fast. It was still dark by the time we finished, but only just. At the end of the day, I had about a 1/2" drift over the 12' length of the koffer. I was cutting tiles for 3.25" on one side, and 3.75" on the other. Not so bad, and as I mentioned, all of this will most likely be hidden under desks and bunk beds and what not.


Indigo Ninja approves of this floor!


After the floor was in, I went inside to spend some time with the family, then collapse for a while. In the morning I woke up refreshed and revitalized, ready for more action. Cricket showed up with a bunk bed from Ikea - the same one my inspirational Canadian used in his build - as well as the 'under bed'. Bright shiny new day, we got down to opening up the massive cardboard boxes, reading the wordless Ikea instructions, and then putting the thing together with the provided generic Ikea Allen wrenches. Things went pretty well, with Cricket's help (officially in charge of the Procurement Department from now on), as it required having someone hold parts of the thing while it got screwed together. All in all, it went together without much fuss. At this point in our lives, we had both put together plenty of Ikea furniture, and after a while, they all start to look the same. After an hour or so, we had the bunk bed built, but not bolted in.




Well, that about sums it up for that weekend. Mission accomplished. Floor was down - the bed was made, and the back was generally coming together. Next week I would face my first real challenge. A challenge that could kill the project before it even really get off the ground. A challenge so deadly most everyone has a horror story of their own to share.

The DMV.

That's right, I still had to get legal. At this point in the timeline of the vehicle, I had already been to the DMV twice, but this third and final trip would be the deal breaker. Is it an RV (Motor Home), or is a commercial vehicle? You decide. I wish. I will give you a full run down on the "Imperial Entanglements" of the legal system and how it relates to purchasing old military vehicles next week. I can give you a sneak spoiler though - it all works out eventually - otherwise I most likely wouldn't writing this blog. My body would be found hanging from inside the van body. ;) I leave you with this moment of domestic bliss, as I, your fearless Captain of the Imperial Car Destroyer and the Head of Procurement share a moment in the midst of building Das Bed.


The Captain of the Imperial Car Destroyer
and the Head of Procurement sharing a moment
 

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yarry23

Member
61
2
8
Location
Santa Cruz, CA
Let there be light!

Now that the interior of the van body was starting to take shape, it was time to figure out how the **** the thing was wired. I knew the batteries were good, because I had already started the beast up on more than one occasion, and had that memorable inaugural drive down to ProBuild in order to buy the plywood for the floor. Still, I hadn't quite figured out how all of the various fuse boxes, relays and circuit breakers in the back had been wired together, and to say the least, I was a little bit daunted. So, time to call in some heavy duty reinforcements.

I called upon my friend Joe.


Grand Master Joe, 5th Dan Black Belt in Eletra-jitsu

Now, a little background on Joe. I work with him, and he has been an Electrical Engineer since you could get degrees in such things. I would not be surprised if he and Tesla wouldn't have gotten along quite well in fact. He is the kind of guy who has a collection of old oscilloscopes because its fun. In other words, he is just the sort of bad ass electrical genius the Bad Ass M109A3 needed in a bad way. And yes, I just used the word bad three times in one sentence, all the while conveying the meaning of awesome.

We started by reading all of the various labels, wiring diagrams, and other informational plaques bolted to the various boxes that comprised the electrical system.We then proceeded to pull out our trusty volt meter and open up all of boxes one by one, flipping switches and checking continuity and presence of power. It should be noted we weren't plugged into shore power or anything at this point, as he hadn't discovered where that was yet, and really only had access to the vehicles onboard 24V battery system. After a little bit of trial and terror, we figured out most of it. Perhaps even all of it.


It brakes down like this: All power to the van body is controlled by a giant knife switch that selects between using the vehicles onboard 24V power, or in its other selection it will run off of conventional 115V shore power (plugged into an external power source, such as a building, a portable generator, and so on). Set to 24V, we got current running through the thing, so we knew it to be live, but we couldn't for the life of us figure out how to turn on the **** lights. After screwing around with the various circuit breakers (which I will get to in a second), I finally noticed a light switch on the other side of the van body's interior up at head height above the door that read "Light Switches". Flipping that one to the "On" position (with the knife switch set to 24V, and the circuit breaker for the lights set to ON) the lights came on. Success! I know it may not sound like much upon reading it, but I can tell you that I was pretty well stoked at the time. ****, I still am.


Lights! First time seeing the 24V lights work...

Still heady with our success, we moved on. Shore power. Walking around the exterior of the vehicle, we identified what we believed to be the original external shore power receptacle. It is this great big honking thing hanging off the top right front of the van body, not so coincidentally right on the other side of the electrical control boxes. It was impressive, heavy duty, and way over the top. I did some quick online searches to figure out just where I could buy a plug to go into it and build the appropriate cable that would be needed. Ends up it is an Arktite connector, rated to survive in biological war zones, hazardous wastes sites, and basically the End of Days. It also cost roughly $400 to $700 for a used one, if you were lucky enough to find one. So, screw that, we would need an alternate method of supplying power. Once again going back to my favorite Canadian's M109A3 conversion web site, I saw that he ran into the same issue. Joe has owned boats throughout a great majority of his life, and simply suggested we go down to West Marine and wire the sucker up with an off the shelf receptacle for shore power. I said "**** yes" and we both jumped in the car.


Barely owned the vehicle for a month
or two, and already putting holes in it!
So, a quick stop by West Marine, and then a follow up trip to Home Despot and we had everything we needed to get going on adding our own shore power receptacle up and running. I had purchased a boat shore power receptacle, an insulated rubber booty, a 30amp plug connector, a traditional heavy-duty three prong plug, and 50' of heavy duty thick gauge wire. I also picked up some water proof cable conduit, a mounting box, and a cut out saw as well. Laden with hardware, we returned to the project. First order of business was cut out the hole that the shore power receptacle would live in. I selected a place just above the right front reflector on the van body. This would put it a few feet below the knife switch on the inside, and still be generally convenient to access and plug in from the outside. I drilled the pilot hole, and then got down to the serious business of putting gaping holes in the side of my newly acquired old military truck.


A man, and his cable...
I managed to get the hole cut out without horribly destroying either the truck, the drill, or myself, so I considered it a grand success. We made sure the shore power receptacle fit (it did) and made an appropriate (smaller) sized hole in the far wall leading into the van interior. After this it was time to make the cable. We started by stripping the ends of one side, exposing the three wires contained within, and then wiring them into the big 30amp plug. Working on electrical this large is a joy, because you have actual wires the size you can hold onto, instead of teeny, tiny little wires that want to bend at a moments notice. That wired up, we added the weather proof bootie to it and ran into a snag. The cheaper 30amp plug I had bought at Home Despot didn't quite fit inside the bootie. After screwing around with it for a little while, we decided to punt, deal with it later, and move on. We added the generic 3 prong male plug to the other end and presto, we had our cable!


Completed outside shore power receptacle


It aint pretty, but it works!
We were running out of daylight at this point, and didn't have all of the necessary goods to finish the project right, but we decided to push forward and at least get it wired up in a temporary fashion so that we might see if shore power worked at all, then come back in the near future and ruggedize it and do a more permanent mounting job. So, with that in mind, we screwed in the outside shore power receptacle in with not-quite-right screws, fed the wires through the other side, and wired them up in a temporary manner to the knife switch's 115V side of things. And by we I mean Joe. Not that I didn't stand by and soak up as much knowledge as possible, hand him wrenches, fetch him beer, and what not, but I was no dummy, I also gave the Master room to work. We forewent the junction box, the cable conduit, and just got the **** thing wired up. It wasn't pretty, but it was only going to stay this way for a few days until we did it right. What was pretty was plugging it into the house on the other side of things, throwing that big 'ole knife switch, and having lights, glorious 115V lights switch on in the back of the van body!

Hooked up to shore power externally, with the knife switch set to its 115V position, and all of the circuit breakers set to the ON position, I am happy to report that the lights work, the power strips on both the right and left sides work, the black out bulb works, and even the blower/fan near the door works! I was overjoyed. I had set my expectations for the day to be investigation only, with the stretch goal of coming up with a solid plan of what to do next. Instead I stood in the back of my vehicle, cackling madly under beautiful 115V lights, listening to the horrid whine of my blower wheezing away. I was ecstatic to say the least! Once again, my thanks have to go out to Joe for making this happen. In him I have found a fellow old truck nut, diesel officianado, and electrical genius. Having him on the team just made this project a lot more doable, and I can't thank him enough for it (although I may try). I also have to thank my tireless helper, Indigo, and her princesses that were always there for us when we needed some perspective and a break from things.


Indigo, Joe and two princesses enjoy the new lights of the truck!


I promised to cover the legal aspects of getting this vehicle registered and legal with The Man, but it looks like I have ran out of space in this post, so it will have to be next week. For all of you who have harbored secret desires to buy old military vehicles that weigh thousands upon thousands of pounds, read on to see what getting it legal with The Man entails. Until then, enjoy!
 

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