The entire interior skin is now completely covered in beetle-kill pine (floors, ceilings & walls) but there are still a whole bunch of gaping holes in the side of the bus where the windows are supposed to be. Well, we get to solve that problem today with the bus window installation!
The old windows were functional, at best. There are a ton of problems with them; they only open by swinging upward, they weigh a metric ton, they’re made of plastic, they’re cracked and degrading, and some of them have some very distasteful things carved into them. The new windows open easily, have screens, seal, are made of glass and are generally just a better window for a home.
While we are waiting for the windows to arrive, we prep the openings in the frame where our old windows once resided. In our wall installation post we show how we trimmed the pine to match the opening and then sanded them down to make them even and smooth. After that was complete we paint all the interior walls with AFM SafeCoat’s Natural paint. It’s organic and plant based so it’s one of the best choices for interior paint we could find! It takes a few coats, but that can be attributed to the fact that we did not use a primer over the raw wood first. We were using a flat finish, so we decided to just do a couple extra coats as the “primer” layer. It looks good once everything has had a couple of coats and has had some time to dry.
We unload the windows from the delivery truck and put them in the work shed so that they aren’t damaged while we install them one by one. The one thing I can’t stress enough is test fit things before you go throwing them in.
We start the actuall bus window installation process by test fitting the interior trim for fit. Since we put up the wall skin ourselves, we need to trim a few places that weren’t exactly dead on even. This causes binding when sliding things in place.
Once we test fit the frames, we add 3/8″ adhesive backed foam weather sealing tape supplied by the manufacturer around the entire perimeter of the window. This helps to ensure a tight seal against the frame and keep any water from coming in. Weather stripping in place we lift the window into the frame and once again check for placement and fit. Once we’re satisfied we can peel the backing off and stick the window in place. It is worth mentioning that you basically have one shot to get the window in place. If you have to pull it back out you’ll need to fix and/or reattach any weather stripping that was affected.
The bus window installation is no easy task and it’s certainly not one that you can tackle alone. This was the case for us as well. We want to give big thanks to Dwayne, Andrew, and Will for all their help getting the windows in.
Check out the video of the entire process below and let us know what you think. If you’d like to support the Wanderlust Bus journey, you find out how on our Patreon page. We’d love to have you as a patron and take you along for the ride with us!
