Van Do It Camper Is A Swiss Army Knife On Wheels

28 May, 2019 by Sebastian Santabarbara

When it comes to living the van life, there is no written rule as to how you build your travelling tiny home. Some people favour the tiny eco house, while others go for a no-holds-barred adventure bus. Whatever your design choice, one thing usually remains constant; when you’ve made your van, there’s no changing the interior. It’s tough luck if you suddenly decide that your monster camper should become a travelling Harry Potter House or your rolling log cabin should become a spacious gear haulier. When you nail it down, it usually stays that way. But what if you could buy a van where you could change the layout on a daily basis, reliving all those misspent years that you spent in front of the computer designing houses on The Sims. We have the answer, and the answer is Van Do It.

This article is sponsored by Four Wheel Campers. They were kind enough to invite us to Overland Expo which gave us the chance to produce this article for the Van Clan community. Check them out if you’re interested in the best pop up truck campers around.

We’re here at Overland Expo West with our sponsors Four Wheel Campers, checking out the amazing campervan conversions and off road trucks that have congregated here in Arizona. We’ve been hanging out with Van DO It, a camper conversion company based in Missouri that specialises in making the most modular tiny homes that we’ve ever seen on the road. We took a closer look at their ranger of Overland ‘DO’ vehicles, designed to get you off the couch and out into nature with all of your van life essentials in tow!

Plan To Van With ‘Van DO It’!

Van DO It team in the van with a small pup and some inflated SUP's

I don’t think that I’ve ever seen a van that is such a blank canvas before. Looking at the interior makes me feel a little bit like Bob Ross staring at his easel, wondering about all of the different possibilities that I can create just by moving my brush (or in this case by grabbing my gear and getting stuck in). The Van DO It range of campers are made for overlanding through the wilderness and built to tackle any terrain, and they do it in an intelligent way that really made sit up and start to take notice. If you’re looking for a conventional camper, then this isn’t it; it’s something far more exciting than that!

Let’s start with the outside first. Van DO It have really thought about the design of their campers both outside and in, and the exterior shows their commitment to helping you to reach those hard-to-find places that are the stuff of overlanding legend. Take the Rhino Line paint job, for instance, something that I have not seen on many Ford campers before now. It’s a durable outer coating that, unlike the bare painted metal that you might find on your run-of-the-mill Mercedes Sprinter conversions, has a rough texture that provides extra protection against scratches from flying stones and grime. If you’ve ever put sand in paint and made a picture then you’ll know the kind of feel I’m talking about, making this van a piece of art for any tactile-material lovers out there.

What’s Up Top?

On the top of the vehicle, you’ll see an array of items that have been custom made to provide you with the best off grid living experiences. Van DO It have included a pop top tent in their ‘DO’ range of vehicles, promoting the fact that an off grid adventure is way more fun when you bring your friends along. As the interior is designed more for storing gear rather than housing a party of thrill seekers, this extra sleeping quarters could also be where you sleep while out on the road, giving you even more space to fit your travel bikes, tent hammock, camera drones and more!

Van DO It include a nifty ARB awning in their builds to give shade and protection from the elements, which is a nice touch if you want to sit outside and watch the world go by but don’t want to bake under the glare of the desert sun. It also provides you with a covered outdoor area to keep your gear dry when changing your camper’s layout around (but we’ll come to that bit in a second).

The Custom made roof rack is made from the same aluminium extrusion that features heavily throughout the inside of the van, and give you the option of storing bulkier items like a surfboard, extra bikes and SUP’s etc on the top of the camper. This is where you’ll also find your 340 watts of solar, which should be more than enough to power all of your gear. There’s an LED light bar located at the very front of the roof rack too, which is perfect for spotting bears on the track in the middle of the night or lighting up the ground for an impromptu kick-about (with a football, not a bear).

Take Us Down Below

Van Do It know how to get their vehicles ready for road. This all terrain camper uses BF Goodrich tyres with those all-important ultra toil rims, making muddy surfaces feel like the smoothest stretch of asphalt. Dig a little deeper, and you’ll find that the DO range of campervans uses a Quigley 4×4 conversion, giving you a 2 inch suspension lift and an extra two inches from the tyres. That 4 inch lift is really going to make a difference when you’re bounding over grassy knolls and sandy dunes, and you’ll be glad that this Quigley bloke came along and souped up your camper!

This overlanding behemoth makes use of rugged Aluminess front and rear bumpers, which have multiple applications. As well as providing extra protection, there’s a little winch on the front bumper that you can use to tow your friends back onto the track, and a lock box on the rear which Van DO It have included as a place for you to quickly access any items that you use regularly. The lockbox is a nice touch for anyone conscious about both storage and extra security; Van DO It certainly know how to please their customers!

Are You Going To Tell Us About The Inside Of This Van Do It Camper Or What!

I’m just creating suspense, that’s all! The inside of the camper is where Van DO It really shine, which you might think is a strange statement about a van that looks so empty at first glance. Van DO It campers are, however, far from empty; they’re just waiting for you to put your stamp on them, and it couldn’t be simpler to do so!

We meant what we said about the ‘DO’ it range of campers being like the travelling in a van equivalent of a Swiss Army Knife (although I’m not sure that you could use this van to get stones out of a horses hoof like that strange attachment no-one really uses, but I could well be wrong). You can change the layout in this van as many times as you want, whenever you want, and at a moments notice. If you want to cram it full of gear and safely strap it all down, then you can remove the comfortable leather passenger seats altogether and create an open plan space like no other.

The Van DO It bed system is equally as flexible. If you’re housing bikes and boards inside your off grid home, then you can make use of the two flip down bunk beds on the side wall to maximise storage space. If you decide that you want more space halfway through your trip, then you can combine the bed modules and make a queen size bed platform or even install a mattress that lowers from the ceiling. Your seats can slot back in without any effort, as can kitchen pod modules and any other tiny house essentials that you require to make living off grid that little bit more luxurious

You’ve Got Our Attention…Tell Us More!

The most exciting bit is that you can not only add extra bits in or take them out as you please, but you can also change their placement in the camper too! Don’t like your fridge near the back of the van? Move it nearer to the door so that you can grab a beer while sitting outside. Don’t like your kitchen near the sliding door? Stick it at the back of the van so you can look out at the sunset while working magic with your top cooking accessories. The sky is the limit, and there are as many configurations and style as your imagination can conjure up!

Van DO It camper bare canvas

‘How is this witchcraft possible?’, I hear you cry. The floor of this Van DO It camper has a revolutionary Aluminium T Track built into it. It looks a little bit like The Grid from the Tron movies, except you won’t have to worry about little digital bikers flitting in and out of your fittings and fixtures. The easy to use screw-on bike mounts are a great example of how simple it is to mix up your living space at a moments notice, and boy can this thing hold gear! I’ve never seen a van look so full!

Van DO It full of gear, showing how much you can fit in the vehicle

Let’s Get Nerdy!

I really like getting to grips with van electrics, (the How To Build A Camper e-Book that I wrote has about 100 pages on the subject), and this next point that our resident Van DO It Van Guru Josh made really blew me away. (I would like to say that this is because I don’t get out much, but living in a van full-time kind of gives me no excuse!)

Van Do It use Deutsch connectors in their electrical system, making it super easy to see what connects to where by means of colour coded wires. Rather than using red for positive and black for negative, this colour coded system is a great way of finding and fixing problems with certain elements of your van without causing a colossal brain ache. If the light bar is acting up, head for the pink wire. If the fridge isn’t running properly, go the green wire and so on. The electrics tower itself is also a really neat feature, giving you instant access to all of your power essentials without having to scramble underneath your bed or removing hard-to-reach panels (I wish I had thought of this!).

Final Thoughts…

Van DO It Vans are very different from the kind of travelling affordable tiny homes that we usually cover on Van Clan, but it was a refreshing change to check out a van that is ready-made for the adventurous vandwellers amongst us who live for getting out on the trail. It’s also refreshing to see a company that give you the tools to create your own tiny home down to your specifications, and who understand that peoples needs change as they travel through the country and indeed travel through life (deep stuff right?).

All that’s left is to find out how much this camper costs. Van DO It price this 4×4 Transit at between $70’000-88’000 dollars, which in our opinion is a very reasonable price for a gnarly off grid conversion + the van itself. Van DO It also have financing and trade-in options on their website too, so there really is a payment plan for everyone. You can also rent a campervan from their website to try one out before you buy!

Thanks to our sponsors, Four Wheel Campers, for putting on such an amazing event. Look out for our full article on all of the campers at Overland Expo West coming very soon!