Planning

4 Best School Bus Toy Hauler Conversion Ideas

When building a school bus conversion to travel, it might be a good idea to build a school bus toy hauler conversion to bring some toys along with to enjoy the time off-road. Some of the toy hauler school bus conversions allow to bring an on-road motorcycle or even a car along with, providing a second form of transportation when parking the skoolie.

In this guide, we go through four of the best toy hauler school bus conversion ideas for inspiration for how to bring along some toys for fun or a second form of transportation when traveling in a skoolie.

School Bus Toy Hauler Ideas

skoolie motorcycle mounting platform deck

Sarah and I have been talking about traveling West off-grid for a while now and we wanted to make sure we have an alternate way to get to a nearby town to grab a few things without having to drive the skoolie all of the time. This got us to search through the Classifieds to look at school bus toy hauler ideas so I could bring my motorcycle or some bikes with us.

After searching through all of the ideas, we found some really cool bus toy hauler ideas to bring bikes, a motorcycle, or even a car with you on the road. These include:

  1. School Bus Car Hauler Conversion
  2. Wheel Chair Lift Interior Bus Toy Hauler
  3. Rear Deck School Bus Toy Hauler
  4. Rear Hitch Bus Toy Hauler

Each one of these ideas would be for different purposes and require different school bus sizes, along with different space requirements consumed for hauling toys. Let’s dive into each one a bit more.

School Bus Car Hauler Conversion

Building a school bus car hauler conversion is the most involved bus toy hauler idea, but it does give the flexibility of being able to haul a car, a UTV, ATVs, dirt bikes, or really anything else that would fit on the platform and keep the bus under the weight limitations.

This will most likely require a full-size school bus that is modified by cutting the rear of the buss off and moving the back of the bus up to cover the opening, leaving the exposed frame and chassis at the rear of the bus. A custom flat-bed school bus car hauler platform would then need to be mounted onto the chassis.

Wheel Chair Lift Interior Bus Toy Hauler

If you are looking to have a “garage” type area inside the skoolie where you can store bikes, a moped, or even a motorcycle then you might want to consider getting a bus with a wheelchair lift in the back. Our mid-size skoolie had a wheelchair lift in the exact spot as the short bus toy hauler conversion featured below which would have been perfect for this idea (20 x 20 hindsight). This way you can use the wheelchair lift to lift the bikes, mopeds, or motorcycles into the back garage area of the bus.

The bus featured below is a short bus toy hauler with the entire bus mainly used for hauling toys around, aside from a fold-down couch area and some seats toward the front. To do this idea and still have a normal skoolie conversion, we would recommend going with a mid-size or a full-size bus, so you have enough room for all the other amenities.

Rear Deck School Bus Toy Hauler

The rear deck school bus toy hauler idea is the most common motorcycle mounting idea we have seen on school bus conversions. This is because this method creates a rear deck to hang out on while being one of the best bus toy hauling ideas that can be implemented even after the entire school bus conversion is complete.

To create this rear deck toy hauler platform on a bus, the process goes something like this:

  1. Remove the rear bumper
  2. Extend the two center frame rails of the bus with beams bolted and welded extended out beyond the rear of the bus
  3. Mount the bumper to the end of the extended frame rails
  4. Finish off by covering the sides and top of the deck with sheet metal, diamond plate, or decking materials

The most common method to mount a motorcycle or moped is using Unistrut rails and mounts that can be adjusted to where the straps need to go for whatever you are mounting to the platform. Custom ramps should then be created to get heavier two-wheeled vehicles up onto the platform.

Rear Hitch Bus Toy Hauler

school bus conversion rear motorcycle hitch hauler

The last bus toy hauler idea is a simple way to bring bikes, a moped, or a motorcycle by mounting a hitch onto the school bus conversion. This can either custom build or purchase a hitch hauler for what you are looking to bring along.

The benefits of this method are that this can be added at any point during or after the skoolie build. This is also the only toy hauler idea that is not permanent.

The downsides of this method are that a hitch hauler may limit what you can bring with you. This method also does not add the benefit of having a rear deck to use when parked. Finally, a hitch hauler can make it difficult to access anything that may be accessed by using the rear exit door of the skoolie.

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