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Our rolling home
1. Volvo truck chassis
Picture of the "birth"
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Total vehicle technical data:
Vehicle: Volvo FM300 Engine: 6 cyl. with 9400ccm and 1400 Nm Power: 300PS / 220kW Wheelbase: 4.000mm 4-wheel drive can be electrically added Differental: electric 100% lockable 6-speed automatic shift gearbox webpage: www.volvotrucks.de |
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Adream has become reallity, Our "rolling home" can devellop.
Producer of cabine
Company: Langer&Bock in Göppingen
webpage: www.langerundbock.com
Base vehicle Volvo FM300:
Why have we decided for the Volvo?
Of all the leading manufacturers, we have submitted bids (MAN, Mercedes).
The best package Volvo has offered us with the most competent advice.
On the following things we have valued:
Automatic transmission: here, Volvo has an excellent price / performance ratio.
frame length: possible to choose any length at Volvo and therefore ideal to adjust to the required cabine length..
Driver cabine: spacious and comfortable. In the Volvo, we immediately felt home.
Engine power and torque: Volvo has a 9 liter engine with a very high torque. This is reflected in a completely relaxed driving with a lot of power reserves.
Engine brake: "Volvo engine brake - VEB" with extremely high brake performance. This means that we hardly need the wheel brakes. This leads extremely low brake wear.
In addition, the chassis for very high loads. It is designed for 26 to. payload. This offers the desired long life and offers enough security in severe terrain.
Additional the requirement of global services. Here too Volvo is very well positioned.
2. The Cabine
All roads are good roads
We more or less had already decided on a standard motorhome off the shelve when we saw in Bad Kissingen at the fair "Allrad" an expedition motorhome on a 4 wheel truck chassis with a beautiful cabine. We were enthusiastic and changed our plans. A robust 4 wheel drive vehicle with a spacious comfortable cabine represented exactly our dream of freedom and independence. So the planning started from scratch again.
The following pre-condition were set:
- Comfortable spacious bed
- enough living space for days with bad weather
- no gas on board
- enough capacity of petrol, water, electricity to be able to live few weeks in the outback
- no need for external electricity
kitchen and door to bathroom
All the ideas has been put into reality perfectly . With being a little caucious with the fresh water we can be self-sufficient 3-4 weeks. And the solar cell capacity and the battery capacity is so efficient that we since we use the car practically didn´t need an external electricity. If it rains of course a longer period it will be a little bit different, however, for it the diesel generator is on board. Beside the well dimensioned technology the interiour design has become very homy. The appealing furniture construction contributes to it as well as the very nice colours. Special highlight is the flooring. We have installed under-floor heating and have used a granite ground. The granite itself is only 3 mm thick and stuck on 7 mm of aluminium plate. Thereby he is very light. Tabletop and kitchen plate are also of granite. Beside the nice colours the granite is extremely hygienic and easy to clean. We feel "really home" with the vehicle.
3. The important technical details:
TTQV Navigation on board
1. Tanks:
- Fresh water: 500 Ltr.
- Waste water: 370 Ltr.
- Toilette tank: 150 Ltr.
2. electrical system:
- Batteries: 6x 220 Ah
- Solar: 6x 120 watts
- diesel generator: 4 kW (make: FischerPanda
- 24VDC/230VAC Inverter: 4,000 watts
- 230 / 110 battery chargers VAC
- air-conditioning of Truma
- heating: 2x diesel heating 5 kW of Ebersbächer
3. kitchen:
- 4 plate induction cooker (extremely recommendable)
- microwave / grill oven
4. bathroom unit:
The space for it is used optimally by the arrangement in front crosswise and use of the passageway to the driver`s cab as a shower and at the same time a spacious nice bath is created. Left side of the shower is the washing area and on the right side the firmly built-in toilet.
Construction period 1/2 year
Data to the cabin:
Wall thickness and roof thickness 60mm
base plate thickness: 80mm
Isolation values (W / square metre x K) 0.44
Thickness external GfK - layer 3mm
Dimension Cabin:
lengths: 5,600mm
widths; 2,400mm
height: 2,200mm
Summary:
Interiour design
We are very satisfied with the vehicle Volvo.
We would built the vehicle a second time with the same design and the same features.
We can also strongly recommend the company Langer&Bock in Göppingen as builder of special expedition vehicles.
4. GPS equipment:
Volvo cockpit with navigation gear
We have decided to use the Touratech TTQV navigation software. This system is extremly versatile and on the other hand very simple to use (the right thing for people like me - knowing not much in computers). It contents a very comprehensive and state of art planning of the journey before hand on the computer and has fully convinced us on the navigation performance.
The main advantage is the independence of any map system. So can be used:
Navigation maps from NAVTECH
Topo 50 maps any make
Even scanned paper maps with degree of longitude and latitude
Garmin maps
And many more
Furthermore it is possible to plot the driven tour and to load it back to the maps
A further highlight is to plan hiking tours, paddling tours or bicycle and motor bike tours on detaillied maps (e.g. Topo 50) and to load the route into a Gramin or Magallan or PDA device.
Alone the planning in the evening before starting is a pleasure.
"Offroad PC" from Swiss military with monitor for drivers cabin
The company Trophy-Tec (a true navigation specialist) has various hardware systems in his program and has helped us with great competence. We have decided on a „offroad suitable“ PC which we can use for navigation as well as for other functions. Digital fotography as well as Internet conections are possible. In the living cabin we use a standard Eizo display.
Easy planning of tours or tracking of tours
A very robust and to a great extend glare-free display is mounted in the driver cabin. The view of the map is brilliant like a paper map but with the great advantage of the zooming feature. Today we could not imaging to travel without this navigation system. It is ease and fun. Not only the driver but also the co-driver can focus on the traffic and can nicely enjoy the enviroment. Without stress and the typical controversies to find the spots - who is responsible for what - which fault was it - we all know this little dramas
5. Interesting Equipment:
Freedom of Movement
A 15 ton truck as a motorhome is justified if you imagine that we want to live in it for years. And still we speak only of approx. 14 sqm living space. But the disadvantage of such a big vehicle is the accessibility of narrow town centers or tiny roads.
Therefor we decided to have four more progressive movement means on board
We started with a foldable mountain bike from "Montague" and a bike (Honda 125cc Enduro). Unforunately we had to realise that the frequent folding wasn´t good for the bicycle and the handling of the bike (took much too long to operate the lift) was too difficult. So we used the bike not too often.
Now we have replaced both with:
Riese und Müller Delite 250HT
Riese und Müller pedelec: 250HT Delite:
We decided on 2 Riese und Müller pedelecs. It is a fully suspended 16 gear bike with electro direct drive. it is good for distances of 50km to 100km depending on the power support we choose. We mounted it on the original bike lift at the back of the vehicle. But now enclosed with an aluminium box.
We will report more about as soon we have the first toru experiences.
Here the homepage of Riese und Müller:
On water:
Another dream while travelling is to explore lakes, rivers and the seashore. Originally we had an inflatable rubber boat with 5 HP outborder. But the handling
of the motor was to complicated and often motoring was not allowed. Additionally we had to carry petrol.
By chance we discovered a new drive system for inflatable kayaks. It has a so called „penquin“ drive. Very efficient and quite fast. Developped in California. Driven by feet. We have much more
power in our feets than in our arms.
With this drive it is possible to do much longer distances (30 - 40 km a day easily). And two persons can paddle parallel with own frequency and power.
And only littel stowing space required. We are very happy with this device.
Our Grill for outdoor (and indoor):
We use since quite some time this Grill from South-Africa. It is called COBB and in our eyes the best grill we ever experienced. Small, effective and very easy to use.
We use it as often we can. We just love it.
For more informations please read the homepage at the Internet:
Druckversion
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