Conversion Interiors Have No Parts Catalogue and That Changes Everything

A production motorhome has a parts book. A converted vehicle does not.

That single fact drives almost everything about how conversion work has to be handled, and it is the thing most shops underestimate.

The spectrum

Factory Class B. A Winnebago Travato or Revel has a parts book from Winnebago for the conversion and one from RAM or Mercedes for the vehicle. Two catalogues, both real. This is the easy end.

Professional conversion, established builder. Storyteller, Airstream Interstate and similar. Usually some documentation, usually some parts support, frequently a build sheet. Manageable.

Professional conversion, small builder or older. Possibly documentation, possibly a builder who no longer exists. Getting a replacement component may mean fabrication.

Owner build. No documentation, no catalogue, no builder to call, and construction decisions that exist only in one person's memory. This is the majority of what comes through on ProMaster platforms specifically.

High end coach conversion. A Prevost with a Marathon, Liberty, Featherlite or Millennium interior. Bespoke at a level where the interior can be worth more than a complete mainstream motorhome, with stone, veneer, custom upholstery and one off cabinetry throughout.

The repair approach is broadly the same across the spectrum. The stakes differ enormously.

Why documentation before removal is the job

Because if you do not create the reference, it does not exist.

On a structural repair to a converted van, the conversion has to come out to reach the structure. Cabinetry, insulation, wall panels, wiring runs, plumbing, lithium batteries, solar wiring, water systems.

Then it has to go back, in the correct order, with the correct routing, connected correctly. If nobody photographed it and itemised it, that reassembly is guesswork.

On our jobs the sequence is: photograph everything from multiple angles, itemise every removable component with its location, record wiring and plumbing routing specifically, label and bag fasteners with their component, and photograph again at each stage of removal.

That is hours of work producing no visible progress, and it is the difference between a conversion that goes back correctly and one that comes back with a rattle and a circuit that does not work.

What fabrication actually means

When a component is damaged and unavailable, it gets made.

Cabinetry and panels. Built to match, in the same materials where obtainable and matched where not. Finish matching on a veneer or a specialist laminate is skilled work and it is the part that decides whether the repair is visible.

Fiberglass sections. Moulded in house from the surviving side of the vehicle or from a donor pattern. Same process we use on discontinued RV caps.

Aluminum panels. Formed here.

Countertops and surfaces. Matched or replaced as a run so the join does not show. Countertop repair and replacement runs $500 to $8,500 at 4 to 35 labor hours.

Upholstery. Matched or replaced as a set for the same reason. Upholstery repair and replacement runs $400 to $12,000.

The general figure for interior build out and refit is $8,500 to $60,000 and up at 60 to 350 labor hours. On a high end coach conversion interior, higher, because the materials and the finish standard are different.

Lithium and solar systems

Worth a specific note because they are now standard on conversions and they change the handling.

A lithium bank has to be isolated, documented and handled properly, not just disconnected. Solar wiring routing needs recording because it is frequently threaded through structure in ways that are not obvious. Battery monitoring, inverter and charge controller configuration all need noting, because a system that comes back wired correctly but configured differently does not behave the same.

Electrical work is at our posted $260 per hour rate. Inverter and converter work runs $500 to $8,500 and battery and charging system work $350 to $12,000.

Why some shops turn these away

Because the labor is unpredictable and the liability is real.

A shop quoting a structural repair on a converted van is quoting an unknown quantity of removal and reassembly work on a build it has never seen, with a customer whose emotional and financial investment in the interior is substantial.

That is a genuinely harder job to price than a cargo van, and turning it down is a defensible business decision rather than incompetence.

We take them, we price the documentation and R and I explicitly as hours rather than absorbing it, and we tell owners up front that on an owner build the reassembly reference is something we are creating rather than following.

The advice for anyone with a conversion

Photograph your own build now, before anything happens to it.

Wiring runs before the panels went on. Plumbing routing. What is behind each panel. Where the batteries connect and how the solar is configured. Fastener types.

It costs an afternoon and it will save thousands if the vehicle is ever damaged. Almost nobody does it, and every shop that works on conversions wishes they would.