On: Vanlife: Build your own van to live on the road

[rbritton]

I went a different route due to wanting to keep a home location.

We purchased a travel trailer (25’, 80 gallon fresh water capacity, 40 each gray/black) just in time for the 2017 eclipse, and I’ve since built it out to function as a mobile office for work as a remote developer. I have a reasonably high battery capacity, solar, a whole-trailer inverter, an entire LAN complete with wired network cabinet, and the capability to bridge onto a WiFi uplink, cellular, or satellite internet.

I’d estimate we live out of it a cumulative total of 2-3 months of the year, though I’d love to increase that.

[stevehawk → rbritton]

i'm curious to see how you make it double as an office. I have looked at a few trailers with the thoughts of ripping out a bank of couches I would never use (some trailers are set up like you're going to be entertaining a dozen people) and installing a desk, but haven't seen anyone do something like that. Usually, I just see photos of people sitting at the dining table which isn't really going to cut it for me.

[rbritton → stevehawk]

The wrap-around dinette in the back works for me, and I’ve put up a table outside during comfortable enough weather. I have my mini server plugged in inside my network cabinet, and I do not need more than a laptop screen for what I do, so I’m not really wanting for anything. The back is a huge picture window, so we choose parking locations with that in mind.

[fyfy18 → rbritton]

Do you have any pictures or plans of the layout? Most of the pictures I've seen of vans people have built barely have enough room for a kitchen.

[rbritton → fyfy18]

It’s one of these: http://outdoorsrvmfg.com/timber-ridge-25rds/

While the length is easily 50% longer than a van and can exclude you from some locations, I feel the increase in amenities better enables using it completely in the middle of nowhere. At maximum conservation, I believe we could go two weeks without needing to refill or empty anything.

This is my write-up of building out the network: https://ryanbritton.com/2018/02/working-remotely-in-the-true...

[driverdan → rbritton]

I tried using a NSM2 as a WiFi bridge but it was unreliable. It would constantly drop the connection and take forever to reconnect or require restarting. Have you had similar issues?

[rbritton → driverdan]

No, but I think that's more because I've never had a WiFi source that worked even half as good as cellular. Campground WiFi is pretty universally bad.

I do use a NSM2loco to bridge the cellular hotspot into the router internally, which is only a range of about a foot, and I've had no issues there.