2007 Progress
April
24,
2006:
After taking nearly a year off from the bus hobby, I started working with my bus again to finish fixing what happened to my bus after the paint had been done. One thing that happened was someone broke the rear window on the bus, which is going to be replaced soon, another thing that happened is the transmission shifter cable broke back awhile ago, to which I had been searching for a replacement cable. With no luck, I had been searching for the air solenoid shifting kit from an Allison VS2 type transmission, which I finally worked with since January 2007. The three main components of the VS2 shifter kit is the air switch (see first photo above), the air solenoid (see second photo above), and the shifter selector operated from the driver's area. The only source that I had found for the VS2 shifter kit was a parts supplier from the US at a cost of $200+ US for just the air solenoid alone, plus shipping and duty. Determined to find a cheaper way to do the project, I had discovered that you could retrofit a front door air solenoid and a pair of Skinner air switches. The photos above I had used for reference for the project, taken on More Better Buses #332.
April
27, 2007:
Today's project was to work on the newly acquired side destination sign that I had donated by Martin Parsons. This was the original side destination sign from one of the 15 1969 GM T6H4521's from Edmonton Transit (#11-25), so there could be a good possibility that this sign may have even been the one from my bus originally. I didn't have access to a pink side destination sign box yet, but I had one that was acquired from a Red Deer Transit MCI "Classic" that I used instead. The 4 photos above shows 22 with the newly installed side sign box and the updated front destination sign that I had installed last year.
April
29, 2007:
Another one of those "projects in the making" was the Motorola Micor radio that I was looking at installing last year. I found one on eBay and had it sitting around for a year before I decided that it was time to go install it on the bus. The two photos above shows the radio installed on the bus.
May
12-15, 2007:
As I was getting closer to completing the project, I had been getting excited that I was nearing the end of the project of the retrofit for the air solenoid shift kit I was working on. After spending numerous hours on installing the parts, modifying stuff, adding in electrical lines, adding air lines, etc., I finally was starting to see the results of the project. By the end of May 12th, I had the new air line ran down to the transmission area to supply the air to the two switches, installed a front door air solenoid (except the mounting bracket I made with a friend of mine), ran the air lines between the switches and the solenoid, and began the task of doing a wiring diagram. May 13th, I acquired the remaining air connectors and wires that I needed to work on the bus with, May 14th I ran the wiring for the air switches in the driver's area and prepared the rear junction box to run the last of the wiring. And finally on May 15th, I installed the mounting bracket for the solenoid, ran the wiring from the junction box to the switches, and mounted the air switches to the body. After testing the setup around the yard, I was very excited that I could run my bus again without running to the rear to shift the bus to change gears. The photos above shows from left to right: the new air line (red one) being ran from the main air supply to the transmission area, second photo shows the air switches being prepared for installation, and the third photo shows the front door air solenoid being prepared for installation too. Finally, the fourth photo shows my bus beside my 2007 Toyota Yaris I'm currently driving. The color of my car is appropriate I felt to the color of my bus. A big special thanks goes out to my friend Dwight Milton for helping me install the stuff on my bus for the air shifting kit and for the several hours that he helped me with the theory of installing the kit on my bus.
May
16, 2007:
The next step was to get the rear window installed on my bus, which I drove out to Airdrie to do this. Along the way, I had stopped along a gravel road to take a photo of my bus as we took my bus out to have the rear window installed. I'm hoping that my bus can be ready for mid next week as I'm still preparing for a charter that is going on next week.
This page last updated on May 21, 2007