JamisJockey
member
dmf
I've seen a few of those in the backcountry out here. I'd love one myself.
I've seen a few of those in the backcountry out here. I'd love one myself.
Ultimate Bug out vehicle?
- Thread starter JamisJockey
- Start date
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entropy
Member
AAFV-7 Amtrac 
T.Stahl
Member
How about a Landrover Defender 110 station wagon or crew cab?
Oops, I forgot, it's not available in the US.
Oops, I forgot, it's not available in the US.
LandRover= expensive parts and hard to maintain!
Had a 95 Range Rover and took me a year to sell it.
"Damnation Alley" I LOVED that movie when i was a kid.
on air temps: Its almost always colder on a cot (above ground) than on the ground. The only time I can think when that might not be true is when the ground is still frozen or really cold and a warm front moves in. You better insulate the bed or use a couple sleeping pads to keep your truck bed warm.
Personally, our Xterra is our bug out vehicle for now, but I want an Airstream and something to tow it with in the future. Airstreams are coool.
Had a 95 Range Rover and took me a year to sell it.
"Damnation Alley" I LOVED that movie when i was a kid.
on air temps: Its almost always colder on a cot (above ground) than on the ground. The only time I can think when that might not be true is when the ground is still frozen or really cold and a warm front moves in. You better insulate the bed or use a couple sleeping pads to keep your truck bed warm.
Personally, our Xterra is our bug out vehicle for now, but I want an Airstream and something to tow it with in the future. Airstreams are coool.
wife has me looking at used one of these
says if we gotta go she aint riding packed up like the Clampetts.
http://www.fleetwoodrv.com/brandtomodel/floorplan.aspx?brand=providence&m=39C
says if we gotta go she aint riding packed up like the Clampetts.
http://www.fleetwoodrv.com/brandtomodel/floorplan.aspx?brand=providence&m=39C
Libertyteeth
Member
I've had my eye on one of these, especially in the small size. Anyone had any experience with them?
http://www.scamptrailers.com/
http://www.scamptrailers.com/
AStone
Member
I'm with JamisJockey re tents in the back of a truck. Hard, cold, colder. Been there, done that. Never again. Save your bucks: put the tent on the ground and get a good sleeping pad. Leave the back of the truck for spare gear.
Brat wrote:
Brat wrote:
I'm with you on the 250 power stroke. Extra tanks are appealing. Any suggestions for where to buy said larger tanks? (URL?)
buddy357
Member
Bigger tank for F250
Here: http://www.transferflow.com/html/ford_fuel_tank.html I hope to get one for mine when I get back from the deployment I am about to go on.
Here: http://www.transferflow.com/html/ford_fuel_tank.html I hope to get one for mine when I get back from the deployment I am about to go on.
rwc
Member
Bartholomew Roberts
Member
Yes, the Earth Roamer is a pretty neat concept. F450 with Powerstroke diesel that does either diesel or biodiesel. 59 gallons of diesel on-board and 11-13mpg gives you pretty good range. Camped out in Colorado winter, the stove and heater for the camper used only 2 gallons of diesel a week.
50 gallon water tank with built in filtration and chlorination. Solar panels for electricity. Able to travel the same trails they run the Baja 1000 on... it is basically a small portable house. All you need to add is food and guns and you would be pretty well prepared.
I also like how it gets enough electricty to run the fridge even when not in use, so you can store persihable food in the truck and just leave it there.
Too bad it costs more than a house.
50 gallon water tank with built in filtration and chlorination. Solar panels for electricity. Able to travel the same trails they run the Baja 1000 on... it is basically a small portable house. All you need to add is food and guns and you would be pretty well prepared.
I also like how it gets enough electricty to run the fridge even when not in use, so you can store persihable food in the truck and just leave it there.
Too bad it costs more than a house.
AStone
Member
Thanks for the tank info, Buddy. That looks pretty good. Now all I've got to do is decide if I want to spend $1000 (with installation, i'm sure) for 20 more gallons.
Best of luck on your deployment!
N~
Best of luck on your deployment!
N~
AStone
Member
Wow, at $150K, I won't be buying an EarthRoamer, but it IS an impressive design. After having owned an RV once (34' Alpenlite trailer), I'm now much more of a low-end kinda guy. I've outfitted a cargo trailer with all the ammenities of home that can function as a home when on the road, but at "home" (studio, warehouse, cabin, large yurt...) the gear can be rolled out of the trailer and used as home furnishings.
Having said that, if I had an extra $150K laying around, I'd look at one of these.
BR, do I understand you correctly that the stove & heater run off of the diesel itself? I read several of the reviews, but didn't find that one. Very cool.
And, as long as we're oogling vehicles that we can't afford, take a look at this puppy!
Having said that, if I had an extra $150K laying around, I'd look at one of these.
BR, do I understand you correctly that the stove & heater run off of the diesel itself? I read several of the reviews, but didn't find that one. Very cool.
And, as long as we're oogling vehicles that we can't afford, take a look at this puppy!
geekWithA.45
Moderator Emeritus
The UXL17HD looks like what happens when Ikea designers go mad and turn survivalist.
DelayedReaction
Member
- Joined
- May 18, 2004
- Messages
- 645
I think a lot of it depends on where you're going. If we're talking about something to get the hell out of the city/suburbia, then fuel efficiency and range would be more important than the ability to climb a mountain. If I could convert a Unimog to be more fuel efficient and boosted the gear ratio so it could run at highway speeds, I would definitely see that being an ideal bug out unit.
Two things to consider, first any vehicle you choose make sure it is EMP proof, the simplest way to Emp proof, is to buy something old enough so as to have carberator, points, coil, and condenser, Second if live by coast think about a boat, a trawler may not be quick but it has range and power, plus you can float 55- Gallon drums filled with fuel behind a boat.
atomchaser
Member
- Joined
- Jul 28, 2005
- Messages
- 407
NFL1990: Great idea! Probably the ultimate bugout is to go out to sea! Lots of open space out there.
Preacherman
Member
... unless you're trying to bug out from Hurricane Katrina, with 60ft. waves. Under those circumstances, your bug-out boat starts to look a leeeeetle bit flimsy...
Preacherman
Member
Now here's a bug-out vehicle I could enjoy - across Antarctica to the South Pole in 40 hours!
From the Times, London (http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,22750-1783741,00.html):
September 18, 2005
The monster in the deep freeze
A British team aims to reach the South Pole in record time using a gigantic truck. Jasper Gerard of The Sunday Times hitches a ride on a test run
The truck in trials in Iceland. The team hopes to reach the South Pole in 40 hours.
Forget Chelsea tractors, think combine harvesters. Built for passengers the size of Giant Haystacks on steroids, this six-wheel-drive 7.3 litre beast can pump out more power than Sizewell B. It is rumoured to reach 70mph if driven in anger.
But then this vehicle needs a bit of poke: for while most rugged off-roaders are rarely required to negotiate terrain more testing than traffic calming humps in Surbiton, this little baby is heading to Antarctica.
A six-strong British team aims to beat the 24-day record to be the fastest to reach the South Pole. It might seem a pretty pointless expedition, just bringing the ice caps some extra global warming and a foretaste of SUV traffic horror.
But who cares, it could be a lot of fun. If Captain Oates had this one-off hot rod on stilts waiting outside he might have been gone a very long time. In fact he and Scott of the Antarctic could have done Torvill and Dean impressions with handbrake turns on the ice.
To see what they missed, we took the £140,000 Ice Challenger for a blast round an army testing track in Surrey. The truck might be based, loosely, on a Ford Econoline, but the bark below is fiercer than Gordon Ramsay’s. All it needs is a few built-in machineguns and flames leaping out of the back and it would make a mighty cool conveyance for a rapper; against this a Hummer would look decidedly boy-bandish. “We couldn’t resist playing 50 Cent loud with the windows down when we collected it,” says Jason De Carteret, the expedition leader.
Having been subjected to a 2,000-hour modification programme in Iceland, it can power up ramps scarcely flatter than a brick wall and over assault courses with the nonchalant ease of a Michael Vaughan cover drive. “We got plenty of abuse coming down from Glasgow,” smiles De Carteret. “Range Rovers don’t even come up to the windows. Imagine turning up in this on the school run.” Hell, you could house a whole classroom in it.
As well as the team’s wheels, the truck will be its home for most of the 750-mile trip. The six friends will take turns to drive and only pitch their tent when exhaustion and cramp take hold. Their aim is to complete the journey in 40 hours this December, beating a record set in 1992 by Shinji Kazama, a mad-sounding Japanese man who went by motorbike trailed by a snowmobile. Sir Edmund Hillary took 82 days in 1958, but he had to make do with tractors, poor dear.
These guys prefer more kit, namely a turbocharged V8 diesel engine under the bonnet, 20 gears and 44in tyres. With solar panels on the roof, luggage, 1,100lb of spares — and fuel — the 21ft Ice Challenger will weigh more than 5 tons. The team will need every morsel of motorised muscle: Antarctica is unlikely to challenge Antibes as a summer hotspot, with temperatures routinely nudging -28C — they can dip to -90C — and breezes reaching 185 miles an hour. Touching the outside of the bus in such cold could leave hands welded to the metal.
Snow is likely to be knee deep so to aid progress tyres will be decompressed, but even so the team anticipates being able to travel only about half a mile an hour in places. Still, at least in Antarctica with nothing but a few dozy penguins as obstacles (unless you count the odd hill and hidden crevasse) there shouldn’t be too many traffic holdups even on makeshift roads.
“They don’t drive on the left or right, it is just straight down the middle,” says De Carteret, who runs an exploration business having already broken his share of pointless records, such as becoming “the first Briton to complete the world’s most northern dog-sled race, 300 miles north of the Arctic Circle”. He also skied to the South Pole last year.
“Shackleton,” chips in Andrew Moon, another of the team, “is his middle name.”
All of which begs one question: why? “Everything is so close and easy now,” says De Carteret. “There are so few wildernesses left. I suppose it is a desire to return to the pioneering age.” Indeed, with his lectures at the Royal Geographical Society and his quietly purposeful manner there is something eminently Victorian about this gent setting off in search of adventure. Even the flight over from Chile in a Russian transporter sounds high risk enough.
Once the team has landed on a blue ice runway it will have no backup, except satellite phones. “There are planes in the region but we would need to build a landing strip,” says De Carteret.
The biggest challenge, he says, will be extracting water from the ice. On skiing expeditions to the North and South Poles he says he has found this can take hours each day.
As well as being “too much like hard work”, skiing lacks the sheer thrill of all that power. As we set off down a long steep bank it feels much like being atop Blackpool’s giant rollercoaster, the Big One. As it roars down to the bottom, the photographer scarpers sharply.
Yet with De Carteret driving you feel eerily safe, even when he flies through puddles so deep all vision is lost in a wall of water. It may smack of rich boys with too much time on their hands, but Moon, a lawyer, insists the team members are “all gainfully employed”.
But, I ask between bumps, isn’t it a bit off, taking this messy polluter to burp out the black stuff over virgin snow? De Carteret points to Moon’s Aston Martin: “Its fuel consumption is probably not much worse than that, about 15 miles to the gallon.” As well as 580 litres in the tanks they will carry about 600 litres in drums inside the vehicle: this is certainly no Smart car.
Having burnt round a track and powered through a forest, we get lost — amid the grassy glades of Surrey. Oh well, better luck in the white infinity of Antarctica.
As I wave them off, Moon shouts: “We’ll send you a postcard.” And you sort of understand why they do it: it beats a shopping trip to Sainsbury’s in Surbiton.
From the Times, London (http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,22750-1783741,00.html):
September 18, 2005
The monster in the deep freeze
A British team aims to reach the South Pole in record time using a gigantic truck. Jasper Gerard of The Sunday Times hitches a ride on a test run
The truck in trials in Iceland. The team hopes to reach the South Pole in 40 hours.
Forget Chelsea tractors, think combine harvesters. Built for passengers the size of Giant Haystacks on steroids, this six-wheel-drive 7.3 litre beast can pump out more power than Sizewell B. It is rumoured to reach 70mph if driven in anger.
But then this vehicle needs a bit of poke: for while most rugged off-roaders are rarely required to negotiate terrain more testing than traffic calming humps in Surbiton, this little baby is heading to Antarctica.
A six-strong British team aims to beat the 24-day record to be the fastest to reach the South Pole. It might seem a pretty pointless expedition, just bringing the ice caps some extra global warming and a foretaste of SUV traffic horror.
But who cares, it could be a lot of fun. If Captain Oates had this one-off hot rod on stilts waiting outside he might have been gone a very long time. In fact he and Scott of the Antarctic could have done Torvill and Dean impressions with handbrake turns on the ice.
To see what they missed, we took the £140,000 Ice Challenger for a blast round an army testing track in Surrey. The truck might be based, loosely, on a Ford Econoline, but the bark below is fiercer than Gordon Ramsay’s. All it needs is a few built-in machineguns and flames leaping out of the back and it would make a mighty cool conveyance for a rapper; against this a Hummer would look decidedly boy-bandish. “We couldn’t resist playing 50 Cent loud with the windows down when we collected it,” says Jason De Carteret, the expedition leader.
Having been subjected to a 2,000-hour modification programme in Iceland, it can power up ramps scarcely flatter than a brick wall and over assault courses with the nonchalant ease of a Michael Vaughan cover drive. “We got plenty of abuse coming down from Glasgow,” smiles De Carteret. “Range Rovers don’t even come up to the windows. Imagine turning up in this on the school run.” Hell, you could house a whole classroom in it.
As well as the team’s wheels, the truck will be its home for most of the 750-mile trip. The six friends will take turns to drive and only pitch their tent when exhaustion and cramp take hold. Their aim is to complete the journey in 40 hours this December, beating a record set in 1992 by Shinji Kazama, a mad-sounding Japanese man who went by motorbike trailed by a snowmobile. Sir Edmund Hillary took 82 days in 1958, but he had to make do with tractors, poor dear.
These guys prefer more kit, namely a turbocharged V8 diesel engine under the bonnet, 20 gears and 44in tyres. With solar panels on the roof, luggage, 1,100lb of spares — and fuel — the 21ft Ice Challenger will weigh more than 5 tons. The team will need every morsel of motorised muscle: Antarctica is unlikely to challenge Antibes as a summer hotspot, with temperatures routinely nudging -28C — they can dip to -90C — and breezes reaching 185 miles an hour. Touching the outside of the bus in such cold could leave hands welded to the metal.
Snow is likely to be knee deep so to aid progress tyres will be decompressed, but even so the team anticipates being able to travel only about half a mile an hour in places. Still, at least in Antarctica with nothing but a few dozy penguins as obstacles (unless you count the odd hill and hidden crevasse) there shouldn’t be too many traffic holdups even on makeshift roads.
“They don’t drive on the left or right, it is just straight down the middle,” says De Carteret, who runs an exploration business having already broken his share of pointless records, such as becoming “the first Briton to complete the world’s most northern dog-sled race, 300 miles north of the Arctic Circle”. He also skied to the South Pole last year.
“Shackleton,” chips in Andrew Moon, another of the team, “is his middle name.”
All of which begs one question: why? “Everything is so close and easy now,” says De Carteret. “There are so few wildernesses left. I suppose it is a desire to return to the pioneering age.” Indeed, with his lectures at the Royal Geographical Society and his quietly purposeful manner there is something eminently Victorian about this gent setting off in search of adventure. Even the flight over from Chile in a Russian transporter sounds high risk enough.
Once the team has landed on a blue ice runway it will have no backup, except satellite phones. “There are planes in the region but we would need to build a landing strip,” says De Carteret.
The biggest challenge, he says, will be extracting water from the ice. On skiing expeditions to the North and South Poles he says he has found this can take hours each day.
As well as being “too much like hard work”, skiing lacks the sheer thrill of all that power. As we set off down a long steep bank it feels much like being atop Blackpool’s giant rollercoaster, the Big One. As it roars down to the bottom, the photographer scarpers sharply.
Yet with De Carteret driving you feel eerily safe, even when he flies through puddles so deep all vision is lost in a wall of water. It may smack of rich boys with too much time on their hands, but Moon, a lawyer, insists the team members are “all gainfully employed”.
But, I ask between bumps, isn’t it a bit off, taking this messy polluter to burp out the black stuff over virgin snow? De Carteret points to Moon’s Aston Martin: “Its fuel consumption is probably not much worse than that, about 15 miles to the gallon.” As well as 580 litres in the tanks they will carry about 600 litres in drums inside the vehicle: this is certainly no Smart car.
Having burnt round a track and powered through a forest, we get lost — amid the grassy glades of Surrey. Oh well, better luck in the white infinity of Antarctica.
As I wave them off, Moon shouts: “We’ll send you a postcard.” And you sort of understand why they do it: it beats a shopping trip to Sainsbury’s in Surbiton.
Bartholomew Roberts
Member
Yes, all the appliances run off either the solar/battery electric or the diesel. If you go to the "Mean and Green" section and then read all the links under the XV-LT section, it discusses fuel use for camping during a Colorado winter (kept the camper warm and did cooking for a week on less than 2 gallons of diesel).
They also mention that it is capable of hitting 96mph on the highway with the Powerstroke diesel. $150k is actually a price reduction, last time I looked at it about a week ago the price was $200k. Still not exactly in the average household budget though...
- Joined
- Dec 19, 2002
- Messages
- 22,505
T. Stahl - I once drove a jaguar to the local British Motors dealer and, knowing full well they weren't available, asked if I could trade the jag for a 110 Defender. Naturally the service guy told me that they only had the 90" Defender on hand. In disgust, I threw him the keys to the jag and told him to keep it and that I was tired of it.
Naturally, the jag wasn't mine and I drove it there for repairs and a call had been made informing them that I was enroute.
For bug out, I'd go with a WW II VW Schwimwagen. Light enough to be mandhandled, floats across water obstacles and climbs like a mule.
Naturally, the jag wasn't mine and I drove it there for repairs and a call had been made informing them that I was enroute.
For bug out, I'd go with a WW II VW Schwimwagen. Light enough to be mandhandled, floats across water obstacles and climbs like a mule.
karlsgunbunker
Member
Otherguy Overby
member
Diesel appliances
Yes there are diesel appliances, including refrigerators.
http://www.affordable-solar.com/servel-kerosene-refrigerators.html
They are a bit of PITA and require constant maintenance (wick trimming, soot removal & such)
A propane fridge is more convenient.
Yes there are diesel appliances, including refrigerators.
http://www.affordable-solar.com/servel-kerosene-refrigerators.html
They are a bit of PITA and require constant maintenance (wick trimming, soot removal & such)
A propane fridge is more convenient.
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