Sick of Crawling Over Your Partner in Bed? This Van Builder Found a Solution.

One huge decision many Sprinter van owners face is this: sleep sideways or lengthwise? The argument for sideways is that you gain valuable space in the van, especially in the 144″ Sprinters. Sleeping sideways has a couple of problems. You have to cut large holes in the van’s rear panels and install flares, which can introduce leaks. You also have to crawl over your partner at night to pee, a precarious balancing act.

Aaron Pfadt, who founded Off Highway Van in Salt Lake City, puts it like this: “East/West sleeping was always a workaround. The van isn’t wide enough for most adults to fully stretch out, and whoever sleeps against the wall has to climb over their partner to get up. Moving to North/South solves both problems. You get full length, and each person has their own way in and out. Once we looked at the problem honestly, it wasn’t a hard call.”

So for 2027, his company did something I haven’t seen a builder do. It dropped the fiberglass flares that made those beds possible and built an expanding north/south bed in their place. At night, you have a large, comfortable bed and during the day, you push it back to enjoy room inside the van.

OHV asked me to take a look at the new lineup and at the Doc Holliday, the impressive family van that now seats up to eight.

The Expanding Bed that Killed Flares

Every 2027 Off Highway Van now comes with an expanding bed that runs the long way down the van, north/south. It’s longer than our sideways flare bed and wider than a queen, and nobody climbs over anybody.

The part that got my attention is how it stows. OHV says you don’t even need to take your sheets off to expand or stow the bed. Pull it out at night, push it back in the morning, bedding and all, and the back of the van is floor again.

I asked OHV how it actually works. The bed rides on a track system with sliding panels, and the mattress, which OHV designed with RoamRest, folds onto itself as the panels slide in, so the sheets stay where they are. There’s a short video of it on OHV’s YouTube that shows the whole thing in a few seconds.

Here’s Aaron on why that matters more than the inches: “The stowable bed is what makes the new Doc Holliday work. At night you get a larger sleeping area with easy access for two people. During the day it stows away, and the family gets the floor space back. We designed it around how people actually use the van all day long, not just the eight hours they’re asleep. That means more usable space without paying for a bigger van.”

Once the bed runs the long way, the flares have no job. OHV says it’s building every 2027 van on the standard Mercedes Sprinter 2500 body, no bump-outs. Reasons this makes a lot of sense: flares are two more holes cut in your van, two more places water can find, and a paint job to match.

I don’t regret our flares. We did the install ourselves in a Portland fall with shop lights running all night so the glue would cure, and they were leak-free from day one. But I get it. If I were paying someone else to build my van, I’d want fewer holes in it too. OHV lays the changes out in its own 2027 announcement.

Aaron is blunter about it than I am. “Removing something that doesn’t earn its place is some of the best engineering you can do,” he says.

This OHV Campervan Seats Eight and Sleeps the Family

The Doc Holliday is OHV’s family van, and the 2027 version seats up to eight people, every seat belted and legal for the highway: two up front, up to three captain’s chairs in the middle, and a three-person convertible bench seat behind them. You choose how many.

Two adults fill our van. The idea of six or eight people in a Sprinter sounded like a stunt to me until I looked at how OHV gets there.

Here’s how the sleeping works, straight from OHV. At night the expanding bed comes out over the top and sleeps two. The three-across seat below it folds flat into a second bed that’s slightly larger than a queen, which sleeps two or three more. That’s your five.

Families who want more add a rooftop tent, the pop-top you see in the photos, with its opening right behind the front seats; OHV says some owners even put sleeping mattresses over the front seats to make it a true eight-sleeper.

Do people really order eight seats? OHV says families do, all the time, on the 170. Seven is the most common count, with the convertible shower taking the eighth spot, and bigger families swap the shower for another chair.

For a lot of families, the Doc Holliday replaces the minivan: sports tournaments and school trips during the week, camping on the weekend. And the captain’s chairs are easily removable when it’s just the two of you heading off. The big three-across seat comes out too, though it takes two people to lift. The Doc Holliday page has the latest eight-seat build.

The Kitchen Might Be the Most Beautiful Part

I’ll say it: the kitchen is the part of this van I’d steal. The counters in this one are porcelain, dark and veined like stone, with a black sink and a tall black faucet, and there’s no cooktop sitting on top of them. The induction burners are underneath the counter. You set a pan on a mat and cook straight through the porcelain, OHV says, then lift the mat and it’s a counter again.

Below it are full-size aluminum drawers, a fridge drawer that pulls out beside the sink, and a redesigned utility box with 25% more water on board than last year’s van. OHV builds its furniture out of aluminum to keep the weight down, which was the thing I loved about them back in 2024.

We cook on a two-burner outside and an induction plate inside, with two pots, so a counter you can cook on and then wipe clean reads like a small miracle to me. The galley photos are on the Doc Holliday page, and the signature palettes show the finishes you can wrap it in.

As Owner, You Decide How Your Campervan Looks Inside

OHV sells three trims, Basecamp, Pro and Pro-X, and the thing I like is that the trim sheet isn’t a cage. Add what you want, take off what you’ll never use, and the price moves with you.

Decisions are constant and unrelenting in van life. We built ours ourselves, so we made every one of them, from the flooring to the window shades. For 2027 OHV added signature interior palettes designed by a professional interior designer, so you can start from a finished look instead of picking fabrics for a month. The palettes and the upgrade packages are on their site.

OHV’s Five-Year Warranty is an Amazing Part of the Package

We built our 2021 Sprinter ourselves, with no real workshop, while boondocking, with power tools and a trailer we towed everything out in. It was arduous. When something in a DIY van breaks, the warranty is whoever built it, and in our case that’s Tom.

OHV’s answer is a five-year factory warranty on everything it builds into the van, inside and out, fridge and cooktop included, with no mileage limit on the build, OHV says. The furniture and panels OHV makes in its own shop are covered for as long as you own the van.

I haven’t tested a claim and can’t tell you how one goes. I can tell you that five years of someone to call is the one thing I’d have wanted most in 2021.

Built in Salt Lake City

OHV has been building in Salt Lake City since 2016, when Aaron started the company. The process is simple: a call, a refundable deposit, a design session where you pick finishes and layout, the build, and a walkthrough the day you pick it up. It’s measured in weeks, not the years a DIY build can take. Their about page walks through it.

The Doc Holliday 170, which seats up to eight, starts at $214,990, Mercedes Sprinter chassis included. Options add to that, and OHV’s build gallery shows what real finished vans have cost, which I’d rather you see there than take from me.

These are not cheap vans. They’re not meant to be, and I’d rather tell you the real number than pretend. What you’re paying for is a van that’s finished the day you get it, seats your whole family legally, sleeps you the long way, and comes with someone to call for five years.

How to Get Started with Off Highway Van

The whole 2027 lineup is on Off Highway Van’s website, the Doc Holliday included, with photos of every build and the owner videos. If you’re ever passing through Salt Lake City, they’ll show you the shop.

So tell me: which way does your bed run, and who does the climbing?

Sources: facts and prices from Off Highway Van (Connor Thill, November 2026), checked against OHV’s 2027 announcement, warranty page, Doc Holliday page and about page. Our flare install: our 2021 Flarespace post. Prices checked November 2026.