First of all, sorry for my english, but I think and hope you understand, if not just ask and I'll try again 
I think it's time to write a little about my 1999 Toyota HiAce 4wd camper van. I bought it february 2007 as 3 seated delivery van, the reason I bought it was to get something more comfy than my old corolla and a tent.
Well as you understand I live in Norway and we have som rules like, offroading forbidden, exept on special offroad fields, the biggest field I know about here in Norway is about 4 square km. In winter times if a road is completely hidden in snow it's not legal to drive there, no road = offroad.
And I'm happy whit it! Yeah actually, because i like to park my van beside bad roads an take a hike or mountain bike trip and lissen to the nature, not machines. Yeah I could like some bigger offroad parks, but hey I live in a small country, we are about 4,5 - 5 million peoples up her in north.
Offcourse I like offroading, we have a lot of trees up her so taking my daily
driver out on bad *** offroading is a bad idea anyway.
For real offroad driving I got myself a trail rig with 35", lockers, rollcage ++
Ohh back to my van, It have a full time 4wd system that works incredible on snowy, slippery roads (yup we got snow her also) I use to have a suzuki, a landcruiser and a chevrolet blazer, but this van is better them all of them when it comes to road manner on slippery roads.
The transfer is a a onespeed unit, I have missed to low range one time when I should pull up our boat, smelled a little clutch but everything workout great.
That's one of the reason I have a warn winch (portable)
This van is pretty low under, that's one thing I'm not so happy with, For now I lifted it approxly 1" an d with 215/65-16 tires (195/70-15 original) I will like to put on even bigger but like I begin, we have som rules... like max tires circumference is 5% bigger than original tires... well 215/65-16 is 4.8% bigger.
every second year our cars must on a goverment check, if tires is to big you gotta fix it before the car is road legal again. Well that is not a big problem, the problem is insurers. If a should crash and hurt somebody thay will tell me that because my tires is to big, a have bad steering and bad breaks so my car is dangerous to drive, it's my fault and I will have to pay the people I hurt many million dollars, well at least in worst cinareo.
So for now I stay with my tiny tires..
So yeah I bought this as an emty box, I would like to build AND register it ac a RV cause then I could remove the wall betwine the cargo area and driver area, and as a positiv thing my insurenses got half as expensive :Wow1:
Then there is some rules again... First, registred seating can not be more than sleeping spaces, and one bed must be atleast 180cm x 50cm, so my van is legally build for 3 people, yes I could maybe got a couple more beds if I had a pop top, but poptop, in norway?? nope not with my use of the van.
When I build it i really like that I could at least got 3 people in it, well now we are in 2009, I have almost never used the last seat and since all transport seat are in front of my van there is no trespass to the rear, I have to go out of my van to get back... Yeah I would like to go rear to my camper area whitout going out.
Second.. The goverment told my I must have: A kitchen (with place to cut bread?) I must have at least 3 beds in rear since I would like t have 3 transportation seat, but I also needed some seats and a dinner table in rear, and a closet, to my clotches!
Yepp, I made it, but since I feel I needed some space to put my food also there was simpely no chance to made a trespass from front to rear.
I also have 2x 75Ah camping batteries in rear, 5 gallon water tank and 5 gallon grey watertank. A porta potti and a refrigriator.
Next step is more charging (maybe a solar panel) and more camper batteries (I like it quiet when I park so no honda generator here)
The roof box used to hold my camping table and chairs, but now I have it under the rear bench so I'll guess the roof box goes, I would like a roof rack intead so I could get a place to my canoe also.
Other thing?? Well the van have a eberspacher heating system that burns diesel from the original fuel tank.
It have a camping light (21watt for now but LED is on way) over right back door.
A 12-230volt inverter sits behind left back door together with water tanks, batteries, tv antenna amplifier, the webasto and of course a battery charger (230volt)
On the roof there is a work light (reverse) light that's very useful on dark nights.
Almost forget, the powerplant: A 2.4 liters turbo diesel engine, with incredible 90 hp! It's pretty slow but gets the job done (and it's one of the best engines toyota have ever made!)
Some pictures of my van.
I think it's time to write a little about my 1999 Toyota HiAce 4wd camper van. I bought it february 2007 as 3 seated delivery van, the reason I bought it was to get something more comfy than my old corolla and a tent.
Well as you understand I live in Norway and we have som rules like, offroading forbidden, exept on special offroad fields, the biggest field I know about here in Norway is about 4 square km. In winter times if a road is completely hidden in snow it's not legal to drive there, no road = offroad.
And I'm happy whit it! Yeah actually, because i like to park my van beside bad roads an take a hike or mountain bike trip and lissen to the nature, not machines. Yeah I could like some bigger offroad parks, but hey I live in a small country, we are about 4,5 - 5 million peoples up her in north.
Offcourse I like offroading, we have a lot of trees up her so taking my daily
driver out on bad *** offroading is a bad idea anyway.
For real offroad driving I got myself a trail rig with 35", lockers, rollcage ++
Ohh back to my van, It have a full time 4wd system that works incredible on snowy, slippery roads (yup we got snow her also) I use to have a suzuki, a landcruiser and a chevrolet blazer, but this van is better them all of them when it comes to road manner on slippery roads.
The transfer is a a onespeed unit, I have missed to low range one time when I should pull up our boat, smelled a little clutch but everything workout great.
That's one of the reason I have a warn winch (portable)
This van is pretty low under, that's one thing I'm not so happy with, For now I lifted it approxly 1" an d with 215/65-16 tires (195/70-15 original) I will like to put on even bigger but like I begin, we have som rules... like max tires circumference is 5% bigger than original tires... well 215/65-16 is 4.8% bigger.
every second year our cars must on a goverment check, if tires is to big you gotta fix it before the car is road legal again. Well that is not a big problem, the problem is insurers. If a should crash and hurt somebody thay will tell me that because my tires is to big, a have bad steering and bad breaks so my car is dangerous to drive, it's my fault and I will have to pay the people I hurt many million dollars, well at least in worst cinareo.
So for now I stay with my tiny tires..
So yeah I bought this as an emty box, I would like to build AND register it ac a RV cause then I could remove the wall betwine the cargo area and driver area, and as a positiv thing my insurenses got half as expensive :Wow1:
Then there is some rules again... First, registred seating can not be more than sleeping spaces, and one bed must be atleast 180cm x 50cm, so my van is legally build for 3 people, yes I could maybe got a couple more beds if I had a pop top, but poptop, in norway?? nope not with my use of the van.
When I build it i really like that I could at least got 3 people in it, well now we are in 2009, I have almost never used the last seat and since all transport seat are in front of my van there is no trespass to the rear, I have to go out of my van to get back... Yeah I would like to go rear to my camper area whitout going out.
Second.. The goverment told my I must have: A kitchen (with place to cut bread?) I must have at least 3 beds in rear since I would like t have 3 transportation seat, but I also needed some seats and a dinner table in rear, and a closet, to my clotches!
Yepp, I made it, but since I feel I needed some space to put my food also there was simpely no chance to made a trespass from front to rear.
I also have 2x 75Ah camping batteries in rear, 5 gallon water tank and 5 gallon grey watertank. A porta potti and a refrigriator.
Next step is more charging (maybe a solar panel) and more camper batteries (I like it quiet when I park so no honda generator here)
The roof box used to hold my camping table and chairs, but now I have it under the rear bench so I'll guess the roof box goes, I would like a roof rack intead so I could get a place to my canoe also.
Other thing?? Well the van have a eberspacher heating system that burns diesel from the original fuel tank.
It have a camping light (21watt for now but LED is on way) over right back door.
A 12-230volt inverter sits behind left back door together with water tanks, batteries, tv antenna amplifier, the webasto and of course a battery charger (230volt)
On the roof there is a work light (reverse) light that's very useful on dark nights.
Almost forget, the powerplant: A 2.4 liters turbo diesel engine, with incredible 90 hp! It's pretty slow but gets the job done (and it's one of the best engines toyota have ever made!)
Some pictures of my van.
