B190 Enthusiasts

Hello Everyone,

We are the proud owners of a 1993 B190.

I want to start by thanking all of you for your wonderful discussions and suggestions. I have already learned a lot and I hope to be able to share my experiences back with all of you.

Over the next few months we will be making some interior changes and hopefully outfitting our rig, which we named "Big Ben", to allow us to take extended trips.

Our plan is to document and share pictures and videos as we do each project. We are no experts so any constructive comments or advice will always be welcome.

So far we have done the following:

- Full tune up
- Fluid flush
- New Belts
- New brakes (rotors / bearings / fluid flush)
- Added a wireless back up camera (wireless that is mounted to the hitch)

We also upgraded the suspension at a local shop in El Cajon, CA. They did a 6" lift and fully upgraded the suspension including custom leaf springs. The difference was unbelievable and immediately felt. Here is a link to the video that the shop did: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0ggxG8MBWQ

One of the other visual improvements that we did was to replace the old headlights and grill with new OEM lights and LED bulbs. It makes the whole van look new! And it was so inexpensive. Here is a link with an example of pricing: https://www.carparts.com/headlight/repl ... year]=1993

I do have a question for folks. The previous owner used the van very rarely. It only has 52K miles. And when we purchased it we wanted to cycle / clean the fresh water tank. In an effort to sanitize it we added an appropriate amount of iodine solution (what is commonly used in the restaurant / brewing industry to clean water lines) so far I have dumped the fresh water tank several times but I am still getting a little residue (slight discoloration / iodine smell in the sink faucet and shower. I imagine I just need to flush the fresh water tank a few more times until I am satisfied with it. My question is what is your advice for sanitizing the water tank in the future and how often do you do it? Any best practices?

Cheers

Thornstreet

I have a "new" 93 as well. That awesome lift has me thinking... hard. Headed out on the road for the next couple months, then hiking AT next summer... maybe a trip to Weldtec is in order next fall! <G> Great looking camper!

Looks good!

Usually bleach is the recommended sanitizer for the water system. You mix up a certain concentration then dump it into the tank. Something like a quarter cup of bleach for every 16 gallons in the water system, so I'd say no more than half a cup of bleach for the B190's system. Mix it with water then dump it into the tank and run it through all of the lines.

That said, I've never done it either on my B190 or on my trailer. I don't know if it actually accomplishes anything or not - it's one of those things that seems like it should work, but I've never seen anyone actually do a study proving it works (or is necessary in the first place).

good looking vehicle.
weldtec does awesome work.
Can you share what the suspension modifications cost?

Thanks for the recommendation about the water tank Skater.

Blair - Weldtec did a great job. I ended up doing the 6" Baja Grocery Getter Kit with custom leaf springs, a Fox steering stabilizer, wheel spacers, and then updated the front sway bar. I also had Weldtec do all of the work. I want to say that it was around $6K out the door.

TS,
Very nice.
I am going to have them do a lift on my Roadtrek.

Yeah it rides so much better. Before they get started they weigh the rig and you have the option of selecting How many leaf springs or set a different way what capacity in terms of weight you want to have. I wanted to be able to carry a couple of dirt bikes on the hitch. So I had them give me the capacity to carry that weight. I also wanted to be sure that if all of my tanks were fully loaded and I had all the normal stuff we travel with loaded I wanted to make sure that the back of the van did not sag. So far I am more than pleased with the way it turned out.It really rides so much better. It is almost counterintuitive in my thinking I was worried it was going to be so top-heavy. But these guys know what they’re doing with all of the suspension upgrades it just feels so planted.