How We Converted Our Van Into a Camper and Our Home on Wheels (w/ Photos)

Firstly, we (or I, at least) enjoyed this process immensely. Secondly, it was a LOT of work. The whole process proved to be far more challenging for us than we could have anticipated. But as a craftsman, I found it to be extremely rewarding as well. I also enjoyed learning about so many different things along the way.

Getting Started

The process began with a whole bunch of research, and I mean A BUNCH. We watched many YouTube videos and read a lot of articles online about how to get this done. I still find it incredible the extent of information there is available out there for something like this. We were very grateful there was, otherwise we would have been quite lost.

Purchasing a Van

Before we could get started on the conversion, we would have to buy a van…obviously. For this we turned to the local dealerships in Columbus, Ohio area. We stumbled upon what we felt like was a great deal for our needs, a 2021 Ram ProMaster with around 40,000 miles. We left the dealership with a van and a whole bunch of excitement and nerves.

Removing Subfloor, Cleaning and Painting the Floor

The van came with a preinstalled subfloor material that was a pain to remove. Glue was used generously to attach it to the van. Kendra had the unenviable job of scraping the glue residue off the floor while I had the fun job of putting a nice coat of new paint on the floor to protect any raw steel from rusting.

Cutting the Holes in Our New Van

You are familiar with the old adage, measure twice, cut once - well that wasn’t going to be good enough for this phase of the build. I made marks where I was going to cut the windows, then made sure it was correct, then I checked again, then again, and once more. Once I was feeling totally confident, I went ahead and cut into the van with a jigsaw praying that my cuts were accurate.

Window Installation

The results were quite nice. We were feeling excited about the additional natural light and airflow that these windows were going to bring to our space.

Solar Panels and Ceiling Fan

Our power will primarily come from solar energy. We tried to fit as much solar on the roof as we could, that left us installing three 200-watt solar panels. To finish off the roof work, we also installed a ceiling fan. This is a classic piece in the camper van community. Everyone raves about these MaxxAir fans. It will be our primary source of temperature control during the warmest days, since we will not be installing air conditioning.

Gray Water Tank

A less sexy part of the van build was installing the gray water tank underneath the van. We got a custom molded tank that was specifically designed for the Ram ProMaster. This made installation much simpler as it came with brackets that had predrilled holes to fit the threads underneath the van. The custom molding also allowed the tank to be much larger at 26 gallons, while giving us as much clearance as we could get.

The Floor Beneath the Floor (aka The Subfloor)

We started with some wood pieces to raise the subfloor off the van a bit. This would give us some space to put some insulation under the subfloor, which would be the next step. Then we cut the plywood to shape and glued and screwed it down. While this is not especially exciting, it was nice to have a better platform to work from!

Sheep-ifying the Walls

Huh? Sheep-ifying? I said what I said. Sheep-ifying. We covered every square inch of the walls in sheep’s wool insulation. Why sheep’s wool? Well, I’m glad you asked. Sheep’s wool is water-resistant, great at insulating from the outside weather, excellent for dampening sound, and much more eco-friendly and less messy than the foam alternatives. Shout out to the incredible sister of ours, Rylee for the help on this phase of the build.

Running Wires for the Electrical Devices and Installing Felt on the Ceiling

When running electrical wiring for both 12V DC and 120V AC, things get a little complicated. This step required extensive research and planning. We planned out where all of the devices would go, then ran wires to that area of the van through the wool and through some of the columns built into the van’s body. In this step we also installed a 30 Amp shore power inlet that would allow us to plug in at RV sites to charge up our batteries and power our appliances. The felt is simply something pretty to see between the cracks of the ceiling boards that we would be installing later.

Installing Wall Panels and Door Paneling

To install panels in the openings that existed in the doors (where we installed sheep’s wool insulation), we had to make sure each hole was filled with a rivet nut, this is a piece that accepts the threads of a bolt (you can see Kendra installing the rivet nuts below). The small pieces were quite fun to make as they were interesting shapes. I simply took the pieces that were there (they were ugly) and clamped them to a piece of plywood, then I took my router with a template bit and ran it along the old piece to essentially copy the shape to a prettier piece of plywood.

The Ceiling 😍

This is what we get the most compliments on, for good reason I might add. We both love the way this turned out! A special shoutout to the parents, Keith and Shannon for helping us get all of these pieces clear coated.

Partition Wall Separating the Cab From the Living Space

This was something that seems to be less common in Camper Van builds. Most people would choose to leave the main area open to the cab to maximize the amount of space you have. While that makes perfect sense, we felt like we would value the privacy and the hominess (if that is a word) of a blocked off space. It would also improve insulation from sound and from the heat that often radiates off of the front glass of the van. This wall proved to be extremely difficult and time consuming for us. The shape of the wall was challenging to get since the only straight line we had to go off of was the floor. I made a few templates and refined the shape as much as I could before cutting the actual wall. Then it came time to felt the cab side of it. Because the spray adhesive did not hold especially well for the felt, we decided to try to build a frame and staple the felt to the frame, then attach that frame to the partition wall. It was quite a process. In the end, many hours later, we were thrilled with the results!

Flooring

Installing the floor planks had to be one of the more satisfying steps in the van build. It was a very quick and simple step that made a big difference in the way things were looking.

The Electrical System

This was a huge undertaking for us. I did a ton of research to best understand how everything works and the limitations of the devices. We also had to decide on the actual products and the brands of each product. We needed to estimate how much electricity we would use and what size battery bank we would need. And even after all of that research we didn’t really have it figured out... As you might be able to spot in later pictures, we needed to add another product here that we did not initially plan on having. It was very exciting though when we were successfully harvesting energy from the sun to power our van’s electrical devices. A huge thanks goes out to our electrician brother, Justin for putting in quite some time and effort into helping us get this up and running.

The Plumbing System

Pretty simple project here, especially coming off of the electrical project. I had a lot of fun building both the box that the electrical devices get attached to and the box holding the fresh water tank. They both took some design work and planning ahead to get the right size and functionality for our needs. The fresh water tank is 30 gallons.

Garage Wall, Garage Cabinet, and the Bed Structure

The back of a camper van under the bed is often affectionately called the garage. That is what we are creating here by separating the front of the living space from the back where we lie our heads at night. We built a cabinet into the separating wall so that we can have a bit more storage that would be easily accessible from the front part of the van. We fit a full size mattress in the space.

Pantry Cabinet and Dining Benches

Cabinetry! This was easily my favorite part of the build. I thrive when I am doing detail-oriented woodworking. Each cabinet was meticulously designed, cut, assembled, sanded, painted and clear coated. The pantry and the benches would supply us with a lot of much needed storage space.

Upper Cabinets and Kitchen Cabinet

More cabinetry! This was so much fun, but boy did it take time. Thankfully at this point in the build I was able to cut back on the time I was working on web design projects, allowing me to make a lot of progress relatively quickly. This was my first time making custom cabinetry, and I’d like to think I did pretty well. Though I’m sure some of the true cabinetry experts out there might disagree. We were very happy with the way things turned out, especially that beautiful “dirty martini” paint color on the kitchen cabinet alongside the gold hardware 🤤.

Table (and Guest Room?)

One of the major goals when deciding on a floor plan way back at the beginning of this project was to maximize the amount of table space we would have. We are both going to be working on the road and we will both be using computer monitors at times. It ended up being a bit tighter than we would have liked, but it works alright. The table can even be converted into a guest bed! Fun!

Miniature Shower, Leather Bench, and Bathroom

This was my first shower build as well. I know I did some things in some unconventional ways to get this thing built, but I believe it will hold up just fine. One of the downsides to the layout we chose for our build is that the van’s exhaust is just below the shower, making it necessary for us to install the plumbing above the floor. I am 6 foot tall and have to crouch to avoid hitting the ceiling. Not ideal. But now that we have had the chance to try it out, it isn’t so bad. The shower converts into a beautiful leather bench when it is stowed away. It also houses our portable composting toilet.

Conclusion

Building a camper van was one of the most rewarding processes that I have ever gone through. We knew it was going to be a lot of work and a lot of learning, but we could not have predicted just how much it would be. We spent pretty well all of our free time working on the van for about 7 1/2 months, granted we were working full time for the majority of that time, so we didn’t have a ton of free time in the beginning. Nevertheless, it was a huge project to tackle.

There are a number of things we would do differently if we were ever to do this again, but overall, we are very happy with our new home. We are so excited for the many adventures and memories that we will make in the van!

Stay tuned to see some of the final images of the van after we moved in.

P.S. The van's name is Gus.