Wow. The seats are a pain in the ass to get out of the bus. Ask any skoolie fanatic.
I bought my bus two months ago. I have removed all of the seats with the help of my family and fiancé. I think for my mum, sister and my sister’s two eldest sons it was a particularly great experience when we spent hours working on the bus. Mum hung out and did whatever I asked her to. My awesome sister got all gross on her hands and knees in the bus to remove bolts (and bled in the bus making her a part of the bus forever). My nephews got damp and gross and cold laying under the bus undoing nuts (and giving me some unforgettable times). And my fiancé has been there to make sure I don’t make a big uh-oh (more later). Basically my family was the greatest and helped to make a humongous dent in removing the old seats from the bus.
As it stands now, I have spent the last few times in the bus taking out the seats that could not be loosened by hand sort of on my own. I had to use at first a lot of elbow grease, and more recently, an angle grinder. If you have never used an angle grinder you cannot get how crazy scary it is. I have used several power tools in my life, but none as absolutely terrifying as an angle grinder. It cuts through metal and in the course of that, it throws tons of sparks.

I had a scare a while ago that really drove home for me that I was actually doing some serious work with power tools. I was alone in the bus, angle grinding a bolt. I paused to let the angle grinder cool and sat looking toward the rear of the bus, relaxing. As I took a deep breath, I smelled something strange. I looked toward the front of the bus and there was a lot of smoke. Like an amount of smoke that would scare anyone. I don’t think that I am generally very good under pressure, but this time I was.
The 37 year old insulation on the inside of the engine firewall was smoking after being lit by a spark. I was lucky to still be wearing my leather work gloves. To my own surprise I acted without thinking and immediately pulled out the part of insulation that was smoking and stood on it to put it out (it sort of stuck to my shoes).
After that, I decided I would not use the angle grinder again without another person present to look for sparks that caught. So since then I have not done much because my decision unfortunately coincided with my better half getting a new job. I am grateful for her job because the financial relief has been such a boon for her, but damn it is in the way of my bus project.