Most of what we build starts life as a step van. This one did not. Tacos del Sur in Aurora, Colorado came to us with a box truck: a 2019 Ford E350 with a 16ft box body, bought off a fleet with a little over a hundred thousand miles on it.
That changes the job more than people expect. A step van is a steel shell you can walk through from the driver’s seat. A box truck is a cab and a separate box bolted behind it. There is no way through, the walls are fiberglass skinned plywood rather than steel, and the back is a roll up shutter. Every one of those has to be dealt with before a single piece of cooking equipment goes in.
Walkthrough video
Why a box truck, and what it costs you
The case for a box truck is simple. Used fleet box trucks are plentiful, they are cheap to buy compared with a step van, and a 16ft box gives you a square, full height room with no wheel wells to build around. For a taco concept, where the line is long and flat, that square room is a real advantage.
The price you pay is in the body. The box on this truck is FRP, which is plywood with a fiberglass reinforced skin. It is light and it is fine for carrying pallets, but it was never designed to hold a 294 pound griddle, a hood and a refrigerated base. You cannot hang weight from the skin. So before anything else, the inside of the box gets its own framing, and the equipment is fixed to that framing rather than to the walls.
The other thing a box truck gives you is a separate cab. There is no pass through, so the kitchen is a sealed room with one way in. On this truck that door is at the back.
The shutter came out and an RV door went in
A box truck arrives with a roll up rear shutter. It is fine for a delivery route and it is useless on a food truck. It does not seal, it lets in dust and cold, and a health inspector will not accept it as the entry to a kitchen. So the shutter came out, the opening was framed in, and a proper RV door with a screen went in its place.
That door is now the only way into the kitchen, and it matters that it seals. Aurora gets real winters. A kitchen with a draughty back wall costs you in heating, in condensation on the stainless and in customers who can feel it at the window.
The griddle line
A taco truck lives or dies on its flat top. This one is built around an Atosa ATMG-48, a 48 inch countertop griddle with four burners at 30,000 BTU each, 120,000 BTU in total, on a three quarter inch polished steel plate. That thickness is the point. A thick plate holds its temperature when a whole order of cold meat goes down at once, which is exactly what happens at 12:15 on a Friday.
Next to it is an Atosa ACHP-2-LP, a 12 inch two burner hotplate at 64,000 BTU, for beans, rice and salsa roja that need a pot rather than a plate.
Both sit on an Atosa MGF8452GR refrigerated chef base with an extended top. The top is sixty and a half inches of reinforced stainless. Forty eight inches of griddle plus twelve inches of hotplate is sixty inches, so the whole hot line fits on one base with the cold drawers directly underneath. The cook turns from the plate to a drawer of prepped protein without taking a step.
Opposite and along the line:
- An Atosa MSF8302GR 48 inch sandwich and salad prep table, 13.4 cubic feet, holding twelve sixth size pans across the top. On a taco truck those pans are onion, cilantro, salsas, limes and every other topping, all at the cook’s hand.
- An Eagle Group HT3 three pan propane steam table, 10,500 BTU, with an eight inch cutting board along the front, for holding the meats that do not come straight off the griddle.
- An Atosa MBF8519GR reach in refrigerator, 8.3 cubic feet. It is the low height model made for trucks.
A hood with room to change your mind
Over the line is an 8ft hood with a 1,650 CFM exhaust fan on the roof and ANSUL wet chemical fire suppression, installed by certified installers, with Class K and ABC extinguishers inside.
The hood is longer than the equipment strictly needs today. It runs out over the steam table as well as the griddle and hotplate. That is deliberate. A steam table does not need to be under a hood, but if the owners ever swap it for a second griddle or a fryer, the hood is already there and so is the suppression coverage. Extending a hood later means new ductwork, a new suppression design and a new fire inspection. Building a couple of extra feet on day one costs a fraction of that.
On the airflow, the model mechanical code sets exhaust minimums by linear foot of hood according to how hard the equipment works. At the light duty rate of 200 CFM per foot an 8ft hood needs 1,600 CFM, and this fan is rated 1,650. Listed hoods are often certified to their own figures, so the number to go by is the hood manufacturer’s rating and what Aurora Fire Rescue accepts, not a rule of thumb.
Water, window and the rest of the kitchen
Plumbing is a three compartment sink, a hand sink, a pump and a water heater, fed by a 40 gallon fresh water tank and draining to a 50 gallon waste tank. Colorado requires the waste tank to be at least 15 percent bigger than the fresh. Fifty against forty is a quarter bigger, so there is room to spare. The fresh tank is bolted down through the floor with washers so it cannot shift under braking. It sounds like a small thing, but forty gallons of water weighs over 330 pounds, and a tank that walks across the floor on the first hard stop takes the plumbing with it. The fill and drain are on the outside of the box.
Service is through a 5ft self closing window in tempered glass, with a service table underneath whose shelves were flipped so that ticket boxes and cups do not slide off when the truck moves. The walls and ceiling are stainless throughout, over half inch plywood and an inch of insulation, with an aluminium diamond plate floor. LED lighting runs the length of the line so there are no shadows on the griddle. There is rooftop air conditioning, and the generator box doubles as a work surface.
Power, and the panel
Off shore power the truck runs from a 9,500 watt generator in its own box. For this line that is comfortable. The cooking is all propane, so the electrical load is the refrigeration, the lights, the fan and the air conditioning, and the three refrigerated units together draw under 7 amps.
The propane lives in two tanks underneath the truck, which is where it goes on every truck we build. A trailer puts its propane in an external box on the tongue; a truck carries it underbelly, forward of the rear so a knock from behind cannot reach it.
Everything runs through a 125 amp panel with every piece of equipment on its own labelled breaker and all the wiring in conduit. The legend reads fridge, chef base, sandwich prep, window outlet, air conditioning, outlet, lights, fan and water system. When something trips in the middle of service, the cook reads the label and resets one breaker rather than guessing.
Getting a taco truck licensed in Aurora
Aurora is Colorado’s third largest city and it sits across three counties: Arapahoe, Adams and Douglas. That matters, because the health licence comes from the county, not the city.
The health licence comes from your county
Tri-County Health, which used to cover all three, was dissolved at the end of 2022, and each county now runs its own health department. Which one licenses your truck depends on where you are based and where your commissary is. All of them require a plan review before a new mobile unit is licensed and a written commissary agreement.
Colorado’s 2025 fee law sets the ceiling. In 2026 a full service mobile unit licence is capped at $481 a year and a prepackaged only unit at $338, with a plan review application fee of $155. Counties may charge less. Adams County licences expire on 31 December each year and it requires the commissary to be located in Adams County, which is worth knowing before you sign a commissary lease just over the line in Denver.
The city wants a business licence and your sales tax
Aurora is a home rule city and collects its own sales tax, so you need a City of Aurora business licence, which covers sales tax collection. The city rate is 3.75 percent. Combined with county and state tax the total is 8.00 percent in Arapahoe County, 8.50 in Adams and 8.75 in Douglas, so the rate you charge depends on which part of Aurora you are standing in.
The city’s guidance for mobile food businesses sets out where you can and cannot trade:
- Not in residential zones, and not within 50 feet of a single family home.
- Not within 175 feet of an open restaurant unless the restaurant gives written permission.
- On private property only with the owner’s written permission.
- On city property only with a temporary use permit or a vendor agreement. Parks and schools need special permission.
- Between 7am and 10pm.
- In the public right of way, no tables, no fixed infrastructure and no amplified sound.
Aurora Fire Rescue
Aurora Fire Rescue requires a permit for any mobile food vehicle that produces smoke or grease laden vapour, which a griddle truck plainly does. The city is on the 2021 International Fire Code. That detail matters for the next point.
Working outside Aurora
Colorado’s HB 25-1295 took effect on 1 January 2026. A fire safety permit issued by one Colorado jurisdiction is honoured by another if the issuing jurisdiction has adopted the most recent fire code and a certified inspector did the inspection, and you give 14 days notice before trading somewhere new. A Denver retail food licence also now counts as a state licence. Because Aurora is still on the 2021 code while the 2024 edition exists, check with the jurisdiction you are going into before assuming an Aurora fire permit travels with you.
Where a taco truck earns in Aurora
Aurora had about 410,000 people in 2025 and it is routinely called the most diverse city in Colorado. Around 31 percent of residents are Hispanic or Latino and more than one in five were born outside the United States. For a truck selling authentic southern Mexican food, that is not a niche. It is the core market, and it is a market that knows exactly what a proper taco tastes like.
Dates worth building a season around:
- The Havana Street Night Market, last Saturday evening of the month from May to September, 6 to 10pm on South Havana Street, with rotating food trucks.
- Aurora Fest, in June on the Great Lawn at the Aurora Municipal Center, which has a food truck vendor category.
- Event days at the Town Center at Aurora, such as the food truck rodeo on 10 October 2026.
Tacos del Sur also works Lakewood, on the other side of Denver. That is a different county and a different fire authority: Lakewood sits in Jefferson County and is covered by West Metro Fire Rescue. A truck that trades in both cities should check with both before its first service there, and our Lakewood inspection guide covers what they look for.
Most of the steady trade, though, is catering, private events and regular private lot pitches with the owner’s permission, which the city rules push trucks toward anyway. Tacos del Sur leads with catering for birthdays, weddings, graduations and corporate events, and a box truck with a big square kitchen and a 48 inch griddle is built for exactly that kind of volume.
What a build like this costs
Custom food trucks start at $55,000 and custom food trailers start at $40,000. A typical 16ft truck comes in around $72,000 and a 22ft around $110,000. Starting from a used fleet box truck can bring the vehicle cost down, but budget for the extra framing inside the box and for replacing the rear shutter, because those are the parts a step van does not need.
Build time is about six weeks from order.
Frequently asked questions
Can you turn a box truck into a food truck?
Yes. A box truck gives you a square, full height room with no wheel wells, which suits a long cooking line. The trade offs are that there is no pass through from the cab, the rear roll up shutter has to be replaced with a proper door, and a fiberglass skinned plywood box needs its own internal framing before heavy equipment can be mounted.
What size griddle does a taco truck need?
This truck runs a 48 inch griddle with four 30,000 BTU burners on a three quarter inch steel plate, plus a two burner hotplate for pots. A thick plate matters more than a big number on the burners, because it holds temperature when a full order of cold meat goes down.
Who licenses a food truck in Aurora, Colorado?
The retail food licence comes from the county health department, Arapahoe, Adams or Douglas depending on where the truck is based, after a plan review and with a commissary agreement. The City of Aurora requires a business licence that covers sales tax, and Aurora Fire Rescue requires a permit for trucks that produce grease laden vapour.
How much is a food truck licence in Colorado in 2026?
State law caps a full service mobile unit licence at $481 for 2026 and a prepackaged only unit at $338, with a $155 plan review application fee. Individual counties may charge less.
Where can a food truck park in Aurora?
On private property with the owner’s written permission, and on city property with a temporary use permit or vendor agreement. Not in residential zones, not within 50 feet of a single family home, and not within 175 feet of an open restaurant without its written permission. Hours are 7am to 10pm.
Why is the hood longer than the cooking line?
So the equipment can change later. The 8ft hood covers the steam table as well as the griddle and hotplate, so a steam table can be swapped for a second griddle or a fryer without new ductwork, a new suppression design and a new fire inspection.
More reading
- Food truck inspection requirements in Aurora, CO
- How much does a taco truck cost
- Colorado HB 25-1295 and what the reciprocity law actually does
- Used food truck vs a new build
Recent Colorado builds
- 14ft boba tea food truck built for Fort Collins, Colorado
- 16ft gluten free food trailer built for Aurora, Colorado
- 14ft roasted corn food truck built for Lakewood, Colorado
If you have found a used box truck and want to know whether it is worth converting, call or text and we will go through the body, the framing and the line before you buy it. We have built around 500 food trucks, trailers, bus conversions and van conversions, and we deliver across Colorado and the surrounding states.
Jacob Varghese
Zion Foodtrucks
719-722-2537