Out of Africa

**Bushdriver** · Mar 11, 2017, 02:30 AM

Good day to all the Good People

So glad I stumbled onto your site via Pinterest while searching for ideas on CNC Routers and Belt sanders. Just amazed at some of the superb workmanship out there. Thanks for sharing your inspirations with us.

Over the next few months I'll be building an off-road, go-anywhere, 4x4 Adventure truck. Mrs Bushdriver said I can as long as it has a bunch of home comforts and a touch of class.

Until we talk again. Do continue to....
....make crazy nice stuff!

Bushdriver

**Jon** · Mar 11, 2017, 10:15 AM

Hi Bushdriver - welcome to HomemadeTools.net

What are your plans for the 4x4? What chassis are you using?

**Bushdriver** · Mar 12, 2017, 03:56 PM

Thanks for the welcome.

The Bushdriver Truck is my Retirement Home.....
..... Mrs Bushdriver and I have spent a ton of time driving around Southern African bush in a variety of vehicles for forty odd years. Lots of camping, hunting and fishing. Now the older bones don't do too well bedding down on a blow-up mattress or a skinny foam camp bed. Not to talk of midnight showers and piddle parades in unfenced camp sites with prides of lions on the prowl. Not so brave or a little wiser with age. So after lots of research world wide we came to the conclusion that very few people have actually traveled in Africa where we have.... off the beaten track. Seriously rough terrain and little chance of someone coming through the bush to find you stuck in the mud/sand.

The adventure trucks out there are all either too big to actually drive down bush trails without a chainsaw and a bulldozer. The smaller trucks (Australians have the best designs for our use) have some great features but are all on the heavy side and or too wide and high. A couple of outfits in South Africa have built some sturdy units, but again too heavy and with very caravan like furnishings that don't take the hammering. So about six years ago we started designing and redesigning our truck.

We start with a Mitsubishi Fuso FG 136 SWA 4x4 Truck, do a bunch of major mods to the suspension and wheels, add a 200lt diesel tank and an aerospace materials box on the back that has all the home comforts Mrs Bushdriver needs (and I sure don't mind being comfortable!). We will be able to be completely off the grid for months at a time. Solar powered and minimal water use with most of it being recycled through a top end filtration system. We have set up to be as comfy living outside or in if the weather is too bad. The truck can fit inside a shipping container for trans-continental shipping.

As soon as the last of our patents are taken care of I'll start posting some pictures.

So what started out as a one-off truck has gained a bunch of serious interest from a variety of folks over here, adventurers like us, wildlife photographers, missionaries, geological surveyors and mining companies. That of course means all the Department of Transport documentation, approvals and licensing has had to be done as well. So to the Vehicle Import, Export and Builders qualification and permits. You don't want to get into the horrors of African bureaucracy.....

Until we talk again. Do continue to....
....do good things!

Bushdriver