Here’s Why The Rare Mauck MSV 1120S Is The Supercar Of Buses

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Dear readers, I have a confession to make. Even though I own a GM RTS bus, I’ve hardly cracked into my obsession with buses. I still have to get a GM New Look and I’ve more than once dreamed about owning the Flxible Clipper from the movie ‘RV.’ But I think I found the holy grail of buses and if you have enough cash, you can put in a bid to own it. Up for grabs at Bring a Trailer is a 1998 Mauck MSV 1120S, a super rare 1 of 100 bus, limousine, and motorhome sort of thing featuring towering windows and dihedral-hinged front doors. I’ve never wanted $30,000 more than I do right now.

The Mauck MSV 1120S also has a really special place in my heart. On October 28, 2020, an article about another Mauck MSV 1120S was my very first piece for Jalopnik. Writing about that bus kickstarted an adventure and an incredible journey that I’m still enjoying today. Yep, I’ve been writing about buses and campers from the very start! Even now, approaching three years into this, a Mauck MSV 1120S is sort of my white whale. I’ve never even seen one in real life, let alone driven one. And if today’s Bring a Trailer auction is any indication, it might be a while before I could seriously chase one down to add to my fleet. A lot of that has to do with the fact that just 100 of them are out there, so it’s rarer than many high-dollar supercars.

Mauck Special Vehicles

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (1)

Defining exactly what a Mauck MSV 1120S is can be pretty difficult. It’s better equipped than a limo, but it’s also not quite a full motorhome or a bus, either. This vehicle sort of sits in its own gray area between different types of vehicles. As the Los Angeles Times writes, the Mauck MSV was the creation of Andrew Mauck, a self-taught engineer and car racer. Prior to starting Mauck Special Vehicles in 1996, Mauck designed and built fire engines. In a quote given to the LA Times, even Mauck notes that his creation straddles different kinds of vehicles at once, from the LA Times:

Mauck, of Columbus, Ohio, is projecting into the next millennium with a limousine-cum-condominium that he, reaching far with mixed icons, sees as “transportation combining the luxury and image of a Lear Jet with the aura and feel of a Ferrari.”

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (6)

As Curbside Classic writes, Mauck first came up with this idea in the early 1990s after noticing that there really wasn’t a great way to carry around a bunch of corporate executives at once. Executives often got carted around in vehicles like the Lincoln Town Car, but those could carry only so many C-suite guys. If you wanted to carry a bunch of company employees with you, choices were largely limited to converted vans or other large vehicles. The MSV 1120S was designed as a solution to this problem by being able to carry 8 to 10 businesspeople in style.

For a price of around $150,000 to $200,000 or more, Mauck, through a partnership with Columbus, Ohio-based Custom Coach Corporation, was willing to build you an MSV 1120S into whatever you wanted it to be. By the time the LA Times wrote that article in 1997, eight MSVs were built and had gone on to serve a wide variety of roles:

Three have gone to nursing homes. Another has been shipped to Brunei and, of course, the royal family. The Columbus Zoo has bought an MSV and equipped it with cages for hauling animals to television appearances.

Mauck sees it as a movie director’s command post while on location. Maybe a racing team headquarters. Or a mobile newsroom with computer, sleeping, eating and photo facilities for newspaper teams covering breaking stories.

Basically, the Mauck MSV 1120S was built to be whatever the customer had in mind. Most Maucks were built into luxury limos and RVs. The company attracted some celebrity attention, too, and notable Mauck owners have been boxer George Foreman, singer Alan Jackson, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, and NFL commentator John Madden. One MSV even appeared in Robin Williams movie Bicentennial Man as a delivery vehicle. Fitting, considering how futuristic the Mauck MSV 1120S looks.

The Mauck MSV 1120S

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (2)

What makes these bus RV things so special is their unique design. This isn’t your typical RV or bus design, and certainly nothing like any other limousine. Custom Coach Corporation, a once prominent company offering conversions of commercial buses, constructed the Mauck MSV 1120S by hand, reportedly taking around 600 hours to complete each example.

The bus rides on a bespoke carbon steel spaceframe and the body consists of 37 custom fiberglass panels bracketed 13 laminated safety glass windows. Apparently, there are 20 panes of glass in total in this nearly 7-ton rig. Completed buses were 25 feet long, around 8 feet tall, 96 inches wide, and rode on an airbag suspension. Around 68 examples of the MSV 1120S came equipped with a tag axle.

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (5)

When in operation, the tag axle drops down from its hidden area and provides additional load support for the vehicle, saving wear on suspension components. Such axles also provide better highway stability, especially in windy conditions.

Inside, each Mauck MSV 1120S is configured to the buyer’s tastes. I’ve seen a number of these for sale since first writing about one, and no two MSV 1120S seem to have the same interior.

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (11)

That said, not everything is bespoke. The Mauck MSV 1120S is a parts bin special worthy of a Parts Bin Puzzle entry. Its headlights come from a Ford Aeromax, its taillights were nabbed from a Jeep Grand Cherokee, and its fog lights came from none other than the Dodge Viper. Even the windshield wipers come from a parts bin, those came from the Toyota Previa.

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (4)

The Mauck MSV 1120S was available with a couple of powertrain choices. Buyers opting for a gas engine got a General Motors 454 cubic-inch Vortec V8 backed by a 4L80E. That’s situated in the rear in a T-drive configuration and delivers power to the wheels through a Ford nine-inch differential.

Those looking for diesel power found a Cummins 5.9-liter straight-six and an Allison automatic back there. Opting for the GM powertrain also meant getting a GM instrument cluster.

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (3)

If you’re curious, the 1120S name does have some meaning. The 1 is the model number, 12 represents the vehicle’s wheelbase in feet, and the final number denoted option packages. It’s unclear what the S was supposed to mean.

This Bus

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M

This 1998 Mauck MSV 1120S is currently on the Bring a Trailer auction block in Cleveland, Ohio with five days to go in its auction. Bidding is currently at $32,000, or a fraction of what its original owner paid. The Mauck is currently owned by the Western Reserve Historical Society and the seller’s employer, the Crawford Auto-Aviation Museum of the Western Reserve Historical Society, feels the Mauck is ready to find a new home.

This one appears to present in excellent condition with its black paint still shining. I love the 16-inch MHT tri-spoke wheels. Everything looks cooler with three-spoke wheels! The seller notes that this one comes with the GM gas engine powertrain and the aforementioned tag axle. It also has a four-wheel disc brake system also sourced from GM.

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (9)

The Mauck MSV 1120S up for grabs here is a true museum piece with just 7,000 miles on its odometer. At least to my eyes, it’s a perfect example of one of the weirdest buses (or limo, or RV) to exist. If you take a look at the interior pictures, you’ll see what I mean when I say it’s not exactly a bus, limo, or RV.

The listing states that this Mauck has wood paneling, plaid accent upholstery, carpet, and 6 feet, 5 inches of headroom. Sharp eyes will spot some comfy chairs plus a couple of benches. You’ll also find a low floor, window shades, residential electrical outlets, telephones, and a wet bar in there. Right, so that’s more than just a regular bus and more than a limo. However, it doesn’t have a kitchen, proper beds, or a bathroom of any kind…so it’s not really an RV either. Or at least, it wouldn’t be a good motorhome.

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (10)

Still, I don’t care if the Mauck MSV has an identity crisis going on, I adore these things. Again, what other buses have gullwing doors?

Mauck Also Tried Its Hands At A Transit Bus

2001 Advanced Bus Designs Tsv 30
Seller

In 1998 after slow sales, Mauck Special Vehicles was sold to a group of investors, who renamed the company Advanced Bus Industries. Those investors saw a greater future for the MSV 1120S than being just a super expensive limo bus. ABI saw the basic MSV design as being great for a transit bus. Thus, ABI made some changes to the design and developed the MSV into the TSV 25 and a longer 30-foot unit called the TSV 30. These midsize transit buses looked just like the luxury RVs from before, but they were now configured to carry a couple of dozen passengers.

The biggest change to the TSV models was under the fiberglass. Partnering up with the Lincoln Electric Company, ABI changed out the carbon steel spaceframe for one made entirely out of stainless steel. This made the new TSVs far more corrosion-resistant but required the development of a new welding process that reduced spatter and distortion.

Success Mauck Special Vehicles Advanced Bus Industries Llc
Lincoln Electric Company

Unfortunately, it was found that the transit bus versions of the MSV weren’t really fit for the abuses of mass transportation. The Pennsylvania Transportation Institute tested the ABI TSV buses for durability. During the tests, the test bus suffered from a lower control arm fracture and a fractured wheel knuckle on a different wheel. Those were just the worst failures.

PennState College Of Engineering has an entire library of bus torture tests and they’re all a fantastic read if you have the time.

2001 Abi Tsv 30 Interior
Seller

In the real world, just five cities opted to buy just a handful of ABI TSVs, and one of them was hometown Columbus. ABI found out the hard way that the midsize bus market was hot with tons of competition. As Curbside Classic notes, operators found out that turning a limo RV thing into a transit bus may result in unintended results. Columbus reportedly had to constantly replace shattered windshields and apparently, most of the TSV units were retired after just five years. Typical transit buses see service lives far longer than that. My own RTS bus served Texas A&M University for a whole 20 years.

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Bring a Trailer Seller

Some of these MSV/TSV units have been overhauled over the years. One particularly expensive example (above) saw an MSV get headlights from a Ram truck and a supercharged 8.1-liter V8 crate engine shoved in the back. That MSV apparently cost $800,000 to modernize.

As for Andy Mauck, his latest designs are less ambitious but still sort of oddball luxury custom coaches riding on Mercedes-Benz Sprinter cutaway-chassis vans. These are called the Mauck 2. As I said before, between 1996 and 1999, just 100 examples of the MSV 1120S were built. The ABI TSV was marketed until 2002, but it’s unclear how many of those were built.

1998 Mauck Msv 112s 1998 Mauck M (7)

No matter how you slice it, this 1998 Mauck MSV 1120S is a fascinating and incredibly rare piece of transit, RV, and I suppose limo history. Sadly, this wonderful creation will remain a white whale for me. But if you have the lettuce, $32,000 would net you this near-perfect example from Bring a Trailer.

(Photos: Bring a Trailer seller, unless otherwise noted.)

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22 thoughts on “Here’s Why The Rare Mauck MSV 1120S Is The Supercar Of Buses

  1. Very cool looking.

    But, I’m sorry, that interior, ug. It looks like a Star Trek shuttle on the outside, and grandma’s living room on the inside. If I had the time and money, I’d buy it and redo the interior to match the exterior (not black, just clean modern looking).

  2. I’ve found a new use for my hypothetical time machine: going back and making sure the phrase “limousine-cum-condominium” never got written. Eugh.

  3. The testing is pretty intensive. The failures of the front control arm & rear spindle both resulted in ‘partial wheel detachment’ (!). There was also noted an instance of an airbag being rubbed through, and a couple of broken mounting bolts on shocks. All this under 10k miles.

    The unit tested was, as you noted, a transit bus. Had a top speed of 50mph. Probably you would want a different version with gearing allowing more highway-friendly speeds for a RV build.

    Thanks for the link to the testing data. It was a fun nerd-out.

  4. It’s an interesting looking rig but probably overkill for most advertised roles. The Old GMC motorhome chassis with modernized drive train would have done a lot of this cheaper since GM sold an empty windowless shell that was used for shuttle busses and various specialty vehicles.

  5. Well IMHO this rig looks identical on the outside to a 70s FMC RV that was restored by counts customs for his van. Interesting side note billion dollar corporations don’t allow their top management to all fly together so maybe bus together is still a nono. Even so how often would it be needed? I feel this is an attempt to make 1 vehicle fit into too many garages. Of course now 2ndary city public transport seldom has buses that have 25 riders it could have worked. But for my money that customized GMC Rv from RV is my ideal RV.

  6. I can already see the (bus) wheels turning in your head Mercedes… but I assure you, even though these had really cool specs/features but they are basically paper weights at this point.

    The manufacturer is long-gone, and these did NOT hold up well in the field, at least not well in the public transit market.

    Here is a link to how they did during the Altoona bus test, the pdf shows all the failures:
    https://www.altoonabustest.psu.edu/bus-details.aspx?BN=2015

    1. Worked with Bradley years ago, he is good people. I really would like to do an autopian gtg there as the museum has some remarkable pieces. I’m sure we could get the VIP tour and have a great time. Don’t know how many people we have in the Detroit SE headquarters except for me though. If anyone is interested hop on the discord and say something or reply here.

  7. If I had the time and money…..But the Autopian staff need to get their collective brains together and buy one and make this the official Autopian party bus!

  8. Yes, I rode on those transit buses while going to school in Tallahassee. Always wanted to get one in surplus and build out a motorhome, but the more I read on them the worse an idea that became (due to their robustness, or lack thereof).

  9. I always thought those brush like things on trucks look stupid. Useful for knocking down spray from a wet road, but stupid looking. If you’re putting something useful but stupid on your vehicle, lean into it. Go with the leather tassles from the Harley catalogue.

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