Our Ambulance Conversion and Travels
Fix up your retired ambulance for RV fun or business use. Travel in style in your own custom conversion.
Build tips, Travel Tips, and information, Videos of our travels, and custom conversions we have done. Follow us and our experiences as we work and travel in our ambulance.
So We Got A Used Ambulance ...
The adventure begins .. In Jan 2021 We purchased a used Ford 2000 Ambulance and had it shipped to us. We found it for sale listed on the Facebook marketplace. A locksmith was using it as his work truck. I will start this by saying you should look at it in person first before buying one.
We looked at the photos online and talked with the seller and then paid and had it shipped to us. The shipping went great we got it in a few days. When it first arrived my first impression was wow this thing is large. Ours has a 14-foot box on the back and 8 feet wide and six feet tall inside in the back aluminum box.
It was covered with lettering and a logo from the locksmith and was very dirty outside and then inside it was even dirtier. It looked like he had never cleaned it. With him working as a locksmith it was all set up in the back for working and lots of key shavings and just dirt and grime on everything.
Overall we were not too happy with the shape it was in. This was going to take a lot of cleaning and work to get it in shape.
Why Did We Buy The Ambulance We Did?
I spent months looking at different vans, trucks, shuttle busses, and then ambulances to buy for our business. I joined Facebook groups on doing conversions and what I liked best was the ambulance. With all the outside storage, we could use it for our business and for use for travel storage.
A used decommissioned ambulance offers a lot over other vans, trucks, or a shuttle bus including.
- The back area box is all aluminum and built like a tank. much better than any other truck or van.
- Flat roof so easy to mount solar panels too.
- Double doors that open up wide in the back perfect for our business.
- Already built in side door with a window.
- Much larger than most vans. Our box is 14 feet long by 8 feet wide and six feet tall inside.
- Massive amount of wiring in them and outside lights.
- Ours included a working inverter that also trickle charges the house batteries when plugged into shore power.
- The inside has all-aluminum built-in cabinets and some drawers so a lot of storage space to start with.
- Ours is a year 2000 and has the great Ford 7.3 diesel motor.
- The last owner put in an all-new motor right from Ford. At the time we got it - it had around 43,000 miles on it and most all the motor parts were also replaced including a rebuilt transmission.
The ambulance the way it was when we get it - all lettered up.
Here it is after we took off all the lettering back view.
An inside view after removing the workbench that was being used for locksmith equipment.
What Was Wrong With The Ambulance We Got.
An ambulance by the time it has been retired has a lot of miles on it and has had a lot of use to it. What many people do not think about is the idal time an ambulance can have on it. They go on location and stay running waiting many times for a long time with the motor running. This will not show as miles on the motor but it is engine use.
Ours had around 250,000 miles on it of use time. But with the motor being replaced and other parts, we felt this would be a good one to fix up.
We were told upfront that the AC had locked up and was not working so we knew we had to get that fixed. Other than that the seller told us it was rock solid. I even talked with the mechanic that installed the new motor and did all the other work on it.
As with many things in life what you think you are going to get is not what it ends being. This was the case with our ambulance. Here are a few items we had to fix or are still working on to fix.
- From day one the driver's side back tire started splattering something. It turned out to be the break caliper is bad and leaking. So we replaced it and added on a new rotor, breaks, bearings, and brake line.
- On both sides, the rotors are rusted badly well all 4 sides are rusted so we are replacing all the rotors and breaks.
- When it rained the floor was all wet in the front cab. On the next rainy day, I went out and sat in the cab and found the place it was raining in. We think it is from the front of the box over the cab center white ambulance light. So I took it out and resealed it.
- We have a noise in the rear end we still do not know what is going with.
- Most All the box doors did not work right. The back doors we could not even open at first. I have them working now but they still need more work as they get jammed all the time and my wife can not pull them open.
- The side door was not working right and I worked on that making it work better but still not 100%.
- Some of the outside large compartment doors are off-center or they stick out some at the top or bottom I need to fix.
- It looks like it has a power steering leak as it is all wet with some fluid all over the wires and tubes all around the power steering. So this may need to be replaced.
- The AC air blower is only blowing out of the heater vent up on the dash. I have read this is a common problem on many ford vans so will be working to fix that.
- Then I climbed up and looked at the roof in Shock. Not sure what had happened to it at some point but the roof on the box upfront the roof rubber covering is cracked badly. Large cracks and coming off. I will have to pull it all off and sand down the roof and then add in a new roof coating around 1/4 thick.
- It also had a good-sized dent in the back corner of the box that was not shown in any of the photos. I have sanded it down and repainted it.
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Fix And Repair You Ambulance
See how we fixed the many problems we had with our ambulance watch videos and more on fixing different parts.
Do it yourself: New Breaks, Add on new rotors and calipers, New wheel bearings, fix other common problems, Auto body repair including painting, and more.