I get the question all the time… What is that antenna on the side of your van? I simply respond, “It’s the Ugly Van Free WiFi.”

What is Ugly Van Free WiFi? It was an idea from my buddy Ruben Ortega. When I worked for Business Works of Hawaii, Ruben came up with a great idea for their service technicians. At the time we did not have 3G sticks or Starbucks WiFi hotspots all over creation like we do now. He proposed the idea of installing a Clearwire modem inside the technician’s vehicle. This way the tech could fill out his online documentation and continue to his next service call without having to come back to the office. I thought his idea was brilliant! However, it was one of those many great ideas that just sounded cool but would take a lot of work, research and development so ovcourse we bagged it.

The Beginning…

I have a great friend Jim Moorman who has now retired from owning a local business called A-1 Auto Repair. When I started my company I was in debt, broke, jobless and somewhat hopeless. I was driving a 1987 Mazda 323 hatchback that was in horrible condition. I think I paid $100 bucks for it. It was ok at the time. One day when I came to Jim’s shop I saw an ugly van sitting in one of the stalls. I think I might have even made a comment about how ugly the van was. It was rusted and had aluminum tape around the front window to keep fromwater leaking in. It smelt like crap and had these cheesy hub caps. But for some reason when I saw it, I knew there was something special about it. It was almost like I was meeting an old friend or something. Not a big surprise as my first car was a 1984 Toyota Corolla.

Business had been picking up in the 1987 Mazda 323. I was buying cabling tools, computer parts and other tools of the trade. The Mazda just wasn’t cutting it in the space department. So I figured I would look for a van. I went to all the dealers and looked through the paper but I just couldn’t find the right vehicle for the kind of money I had.

Within 2 days from seeing that ugly van I got a call from Jim. He knew I was looking for a van. He said to me, “Still looking for a van?” I think I responded with some smart ass comment as usual with Jim. (He is older than Moses) After my BS he explained to me that he had a van in the shop that needed a home. I was thinking… All right! he has some really nice van for me! He said, “Yeah, the customer doesn’t want to pay their $250 repair bill. If you pay the work order you can have the van.” I was confused… What customer brings their van in for repair and gives it away? Come to find out the customer had owned the van forever. It was running like crap and he was tired of dumping money into it. From what Jim told me, the customer said he hoped the repairs would be so expensive it would give him an excuse to dispose of the van. When Jim worked on the van he realized it just needed a tune-up. Once A-1 tuned up the van it ran like a champ. The customer was bummed when he heard it was running fine and was only going to cost him $250. So he asked Jim if he wanted it. That’s when Jim called me.

When I came to the shop with my $250 in hand I was excited! I thought, ALLRIGHT! Where is this nice van? I walked in the shop and saw that ugly van still sitting there. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. This is the van for $250 bucks…

Strangely I fell in love with the van immediately. I always had a passion for cars and working on them. So I decided I would restore this wore out old dog.

Right after Ibought the van I got rear ended on the free way. The accident was bad enough that it cracked the frame. After the van was totaled I decided to buy it back from the insurance company and begin what I was set out to do… Restore it.

3 months of Grinding, Welding, Forming Sheet Medal and Bondoing. I finally had a restored frame and a new windshield bracket. (I had to cut the whole front of the van apart because of the rust.) We put a temporary windshield in the van and had it painted by some close friends. I got the rims from the junk yard and my buddy Tom cleaned them up. Jim had to custom install the A/C because we couldn’t find the right compressor for the old thing.

So when they say that you had blood sweat and tears from somthing hard. I can say I really did.

I will try and get back to the original reason for this page.

Like I said… When I started my company, I was jobless, broke in debt and hopeless. It was my friends and good people that helped me get my feet on the ground. After the restoration of the van I decided to push forward with the Mobile WiFi Ruben and I had talked about years before. Except I wasn’t going to do it for just me. I had decided to make the wireless internet public and free for everybody. After about a week and around $500 I had all the equipment to install the WiFi.

So do people actually use it?

Last year over 1,800 different people have used the UGLYVANFREEWIFI service. This year the numbers are even higher. If you are using it UGLYVANFREEWIFI or have used it before… Enjoy! It truly is 100% free.

How does it work?

Ugly Van Free WiFi is simple. I constructed a large wooden box that is bolted to the frame of the van in the cargo area. Inside the box is a battery isolator and a deep cycle battery. On top of the box is a 1200 watt 110 volt inverter. The deep cycle is connected to this inverter. The battery isolator is connected to both the deep cycle battery and the car battery. When the car is off the battery isolator cuts the connection between the deep cycle battery and the car battery. When I start the car, the isolator opens the circuit and charges both batteries. This way when the WiFi is running while the car is off it will not drain my main car battery. Finally, connected to the inverter is a clear wire modem and a “secret” router hooked up to the antenna on the side of the vehicle. It produces a signal for about 1 mile. On a full charge I can get 1 week out of the battery without charging.

I really hope you enjoyed reading about this special van. I know I enjoyed writing it. Amazing how things in our life that seem so meaningless at first find such a deep bond with our soul. Thank you again to all of my friends that helped make UGLYVANFREEWIFI Reality. Without all of you I could have never done it.

Aloha,

Jacob

DHCP = Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol