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Don and Cary's 1973 05

This is a public forum. This forum will be a place to show your Project Eagle and updates on progress you have made. Please make one thread with your project and put all updates in the same thread. Sorry... Eagles only.
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luvrbus
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Posts: 2981
Joined: Mon Oct 13, 2008 12:50 pm
FMCA #: F262917
Bus Model: 05

Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by luvrbus »

Yep, Cary I kick myself all the time over that deal that was a good deal on that bus you got a good buy

Now is the time for you guys to make the Eagles rally in Branson Mo in Oct and meet the nicest Eagle owners on the plantet

Clifford
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Don and Cary
Posts: 101
Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2011 9:19 pm
Bus Model: 1973 Eagle 05

Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by Don and Cary »

Now for the interior.

After two months of doing nasty dirty mechanical work, Don let me do the inside. One of the biggest reason I really liked this coach was no oak. Hate oak. I refinish cabinets for a living and every one of them is oak. This is birch and some of the nicest matched wood I have seen. This cabinet guy was really good. They are all grain matched and color matched. Scribed to the ceiling without trim boards. When we saw the interior pictures we new this bus had good bones and had been done really well. We figured it had been maintained well also, but that's another posting. For anybody that had ever thought of refinishing their cabinets know this is a lot of work. It took me three weeks, every day, 8 hours a day to do these. And I do this every day. The old finish was really tired, yellowed, and there was a lot of water damage on the window trim. Since it doesn't leak we figured they left the windows open in the rain. More than once. They may not have driven this very far, but the partied hardy in it.

We had been collecting all the stuff we would need to build the Neoplan, but now it's all in the Eagle. The carpet and hardware worked out perfect. The carpet is covered up in the pictures under our "home protection" but a small piece can be seen up by the dash. We darkened the wood just a little to a nice reddish honey color, covered the plain plywood walls with wallcovering, and updated the hardware.

Now the pictures....

Salon looking forward, before..

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Salon looking forward, after..

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Salon looking to the rear, before..

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Salon looking to the rear, after..

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Bedroom, before..

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Bedroom, after..

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Bathroom, before..
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Bathroom, after..

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So, on to the next projects.

Don and Cary
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Don and Cary
Posts: 101
Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2011 9:19 pm
Bus Model: 1973 Eagle 05

Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by Don and Cary »

Clifford,

Did you say you have seen the bus? Was this the engine you took the picture of?

We figured the price of the bus. Then figured the price of the leveling, Webasto, tow hitch, generator and awnings we wanted for the Neoplan. We decided the bus was free.

Don and Cary
1973 05 Eagle
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luvrbus
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Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by luvrbus »

Yep it was at a friends shop he was doing some work on it then shortly after it came up for sale later and he told me about and I told the guy if it checked out I would buy it ,you got a buy I know what you paid lol the first thing I was going to do was pull the 8v71 I hate those things

It sure looks good now it wasn't very clean and dated when I saw it at the shop

Clifford
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Don and Cary
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Bus Model: 1973 Eagle 05

Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by Don and Cary »

What did they do to it? We have really thought about changing that engine out. It came home really nice. Seemed to have lots of power coming home, even over the Grape Vine. We didn't expect that. But then there isn't any altitude there. We thought we would really be unhappy with the power after the 4107 with the 6V92 turbo and big injectors. We will have to hit some mountains to know for sure.

When we saw the ad, it seemed to have really well done. It wasn't as clean as the pictures would lead you to believe, but they never look as good in person. The only thing the owner knew how to work was the ice machine and the tv. We knew then that we were on our own. We called John Edwards, the converter. He gave us more information than the owner did. It seems that this was being built for him and then these people talked him into selling it before he finished it. His wife still isn't happy about it. He said he would have bought it back if he had known it was for sale.

We are happy as punch with it. The trip home was flawless.

Don and Cary
1973 05 Eagle
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luvrbus
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Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by luvrbus »

It had a oil leak on the blower supply line nothing major
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Don and Cary
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Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2011 9:19 pm
Bus Model: 1973 Eagle 05

Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by Don and Cary »

Since we have that 8v92 turbo Neoplan engine, 35k miles, how hard would it be to do a swap? How much would something like that cost? Would you leave it DDEC or change it back? Is it worth the cost? Would getting a turbo on the 71 engine be worth the cost or would you just do a swap? What is the best way to go?

Don and Cary
1973 05 Eagle
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rusty
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FMCA #: F341087
Bus Model: 1972 05 completed 2003
1994 15/45 in progress
Location: Johnstown Co.

Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by rusty »

I know nothing about 2 strokes and I don't want to learn. When Don got sick and I went to AZ to bring his Eagle back to CO, I was very surprised with the power his 871 with a tubro had. I had driven that road with my 400 cummins and the 871 would take the hills almost as good as my bus. The one thing different was his temp would go up a lot more on the hills were mine would hardly change.

Wayne
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luvrbus
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Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by luvrbus »

Don, the 8v92 is a fairly easy swap from a 8v71 in a Eagle,the mitre box has to move back 3 inches parts from your 71 series will work on the 92 series changing air filters is a must and exhaust piping

If you don't want to raise the bed a front mount turbo is required all you need is the mount and some pipes you can use the the 71 manifolds by just flipping and removing the 90's on the ends

About the best you will get from turbo 71 with no type air cooler is going to be 350 to370 hp with 1100 ft lbs of torque and that is iffy

A de tuned 8v92 is going to be in the 400 hp range with 1200 lbs of torque and will get better fuel mileage than a bumped up 71 series 350 to 370 hp any day of the week

Is the 8v92 in the Neo a CA engine ?
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Don and Cary
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Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2011 9:19 pm
Bus Model: 1973 Eagle 05

Re: Don and Cary's 1973 05

Post by Don and Cary »

For those that have the "white knuckle" ride, here is what we have done. It drove so bad that Don said after we got home with it from Texas that if it didn't drive better than that it was going. A complete lane change on I 10 from a gust of wind was too much. It pogo hopped on every little bump. It would bounce the front end to the ground. It drove like a half ton pickup with a load of gravel. It felt like it was going to roll over to the right on left turns. The rear end cleared not much. But we loved it anyway so we bought it.

We knew for a fact, complete with receipts, that the complete suspension had been rebuilt with new torsilatics in 2002. Very few miles had been put on it since. It had sat for the last four. Even though it had jacks, the owner had never used them. It just sat on that suspension and sank. It hadn't been adjusted since the rebuild. We figured there couldn't be anything drastic wrong.

We think reindexing is beyond our ability, but something had to be done now. We started with leveling it. We found an abandoned scale in the neighborhood that made for a really level surface to measure on. Measurements showed the rear at 11 inches to the frame and the front at 13 inches to the frame. Following the directions on the site we raised the rear two inches. With the jacks we took all the tension off the suspension. Loosened the outside nut to the adjustment setting. Then came the cranking on the other nut. Cary held the wrench on the nut and Don shoved the wrench with his foot. He may never walk again, but it worked. Once one of the two on each side was done the other on that side moved easy. But this is all new parts. No rust. Any time the bolt didn't want to start moving we used a 12 ton jack against the handle to move the wrench. Slow but worked great. We spent about two hours on each side.

We then drove back to the old scale and measured again. This time the rear was 13 inches. Left front was 13 1/4 inches and the right from was 12 1/2 inches. Home we went to do the front.

The front is a lot harder. There isn't anyplace to get a good pull on the wrench. We raised the curb side 1/2 inch and lowered the driver side 1/4 inch. This was really slow. Done by putting the wrench on the bolt and turning it with that 12 ton jack. This amounted to 1/6 turn with each setting of the jack. Thank goodness we weren't moving it 2 inches. Took two afternoons sitting under the bus in the gravel setting that jack. But it worked.

We then put on new shocks. That was really easy once the bolts were loose. Used a big cheater bar and socket to knock them loose.

Now it measures 13 inches to the frame all the way around. It drives 100% better. It just sailed down the freeway. A one handed drive. Wind may always be something of a problem since it is so tall, but we are sure it is better than it was. We still plan on having the boogie indexed, but at least we will be able to make the trip. It must not be too far out since the boogies don't slide. We drove over some really nasty roads, Hwy 1 from Leggett to Fort Bragg, CA. Wouldn't recommend it to anyone faint of heart in a 40' bus with a toad. It didn't seem that bad in the 35' GM. 28 miles in 2 1/2 hours. And Don used to pull 65' mobile homes for a living.

Don and Cary
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