Another Saturday

It was back to work this week, so our progress has slowed considerably. Renovations of this magnitude take 500+ hours, so that means at least a year of Saturday afternoons with two of us. Today, we started by scouring a local lumberyard's going out of business sale. We scored 2 sheets of 1/8" bendable birch (hard to find), and 1 sheet of regular 1/8" birch. We'll need more but this is a good start at a great price. Our best deal was 3 full sheets of 3/4" douglas fir marine plywood for $17.50 each (usually $70+).

Jack spent the rest of the afternoon removing flooring in hard to reach spaces, grinding off screws (check out the sparks!),

and jacking up the roof beams to allow the new flooring to be slipped under the outside stud wall.  As with all renovation projects, it is definitely harder than it looks!

Success!!  Replacing the floor is such a huge job.  We will be very happy when we are on the other side of that part of the project.

Meanwhile, I worked on the front picture window.  It was covered with years of grime, moss, and aluminum oxidation.  The tracks were full of insect webs and other yucky stuff. 

I used my power broom ($2.50 blow gun on large air compressor) to blow all the crud out of tight spaces.  Speed Ball (cleaner that will take the skin off your hands if you don't wear gloves) and scrub brush took the grime off the glass and aluminum.  I used SOS pads and wet dry sandpaper to remove the oxidation and polish the aluminum parts, and then finished the whole thing with Windex.    

Now, it looks like this:

One down, eight to go.  Now that I have a process, hopefully it will go faster.

I didn't go after the exterior window oxidation yet.  That will have to wait until the inside is farther along.  With any of these *small* tasks, we find ourselves having to draw the "where to stop" line.

I can see clearly now...

First of all, I have to agree with Keri: Jack does have mad skills. Second, we fortunately have some friends willing to help with the things we don't have a clue about.  Like jalousie windows, for example.... This trailer has jalousie windows, an early 1900s louvered window invention popular with trailer manufacturers in the 1950s and 60s. These windows are most commonly found in the south, and really are not suited for Michigan winters. This is especially true of our trailer, because a number of the louvers are broken or missing. I'm used to getting new glass panes cut down at the local hardware store, but they are usually fairly rough and irregular and wouldn't work well in this application.  Happily, we know a commercial glass specialist, who was kind enough to stop by and give us some advice. Who knew that there are tons of patterns of obscure glass for doors and bathroom windows? We were able to get perfectly sized, straight, clear and obscure jalousie panes from him, all edges ground smooth, and hand delivered securely wrapped in foam. Thank you, JD!  Now, if I can just figure out how to install it...

Finally, something positive...

Oh happy day!! After finding that the furnace, water tank, water pump, stove and most other mechanicals are junk or need significant rebuilding....we plugged in the frig and found it actually works! Considering that RV refrigerators cost more than most of the other mechanicals combined, we are quite excited.

Oh, and for those of you who think we are crazy...you'll get no argument from me.

Day 5 and 6: structure and floor

Jack is obviously doing the tough stuff. Friday and Saturday, he used a floor jack and other tools to lift the trailer enough to allow a 0.75" sheet to be installed underneath. The old floor is so rotten on the perimeter that the outside walls have settled, buckling a few interior walls. So, first order of business is to lift the structure enough to allow the new spacers to be placed underneath.

Day 5 & 6: clean, clean, clean!

By Friday, I'd pretty much removed everything I could for now so I moved on to washing the ceiling and outer cabinets. Most of the trailer cleaned up well. The bathroom is an exception as it has the rough Zolatone like finish, covered with decades of cigar smoke residue. Fred and MaryEllen came over for pizza at night, but MaryEllen first took a scrub brush and heavy duty cleaner to the shower. Check out the lighter color of the shower- that "brown" tinge to the paint is nicotine!! Gross.

Woodland Travel

We'd like to give a shout out to Woodland Travel, and particularly Craig Carlson. They have been in the Airstream business for over 50 years, and are a great source for parts and service for Airstreams and their "silver sisters". Craig walked us through our first trailer overhaul 18 years ago, and has given us lots of great advice about these classics over the years. He has been around Airstreams all of his life, and knows them inside out. We went to visit Woodland today to pick up a few items and get away from the project for awhile. Woodland recently renovated a '67 Tradewind, and it is displayed in their showroom. It looks wonderful!! We returned home with renewed motivation, ready to dig in again tomorrow.

Day 4: More floor removal

With the frig out, Jack moved on to removing flooring on the curbside of the living area. The center strip of floor seen in the photo above seems solid, though I'm sure we'll probably replace it too. The rule seems to be: The floor is rotten in hard to reach areas, and solid in the other areas. While he finished this, I removed the cabinet doors as eventually the exposed metal will all be repainted anyway.

Entry door

While Jack worked on the frig, I worked on removing the moldy paneling on the entry door. Doesn't this look better?

First order of business for today was to remove the refrigerator. It is a replacement refrigerator, and appears to be in good shape. It took longer to remove the cabinet retrofit than the refrigerator itself! Replacement refrigerators always require some cabinet modification, as they never are the same size as the original refrigerator. We'll find out if it works another day, because we need to keep moving on the floor.

Day 3: Getting into the kitchen/dinette floor

Jack's objective: Begin removing the floor in the living area. First, though, he had to remove the sink cabinet (fairly easy) and the furnace (very difficult). Note the large hole in the side left by the furnace. It's big, heavy and very rusty. It definitely needs to be replaced. And now we know what is in the belly pan. Mud. Lots of it. And more wet insulation. It was all too wet to vacuum out, so out came the trusty garden trowel. He plans to replace the floor in the roadside half first, then the curbside. The rotten floor on the roadside has caused the trailer to settle enough that the kitchen/bedroom wall is buckled, so some support work will be in order first.

Day 3: Cleaning out the bedroom

My job for today: Remove bed frameworks and remove paneling in the bedroom. I must admit I needed Jack's help for the heavy lifting! I learned to drill out rivets, even the round headed kind (hate those). This area is in much better shape, though we will probably still replace the insulation and no doubt most, if not all, the floor. The galvanized tank to the left of the first photo is the hot water heater. I'm trying hard to imagine that the wheel wells have no rot, but I wouldn't be surprised if they do. First things first, though. On to the kitchen floor.

By the end of the day, all the living area paneling was out on the driveway to dry in the sunshine. Yes, we will trash it, but will use it for templates for the new paneling first. The same goes for the dinette benches, though the frames may be salvageable. We will attempt to restore the Magic Chef range. When we renovated the Airstream, we replaced the range and soon regretted it. The old stoves have much larger ovens and are more solidly constructed. Internet research yielded lots of how-to information and sources for new insulation, so we'll give restoration a try later.

Day 2: Getting to the floor

We found there is almost no wood left at all under the dinette benches- just the linoleum holding things together. We already knew the door area is rotted out, and probably under the frig cabinet as well. Unfortunately, the rot also extends under the stove and kitchen cabinet. More demolition. I'm not a huge fan of the pink laminate counter top, so I wasn't devastated to learn it also is rotten and will need to be replaced. At this point, I have a suspicion we will be taking this trailer all the way back to the metal. Not terribly unexpected. On the brighter side, it will be easier to redo the plumbing and electrical with everything exposed.

Day 2: Interior demolition gets serious

Above, right and left dinette benches. A 12 volt system and furnace were added by the previous owner. The power inverter and ductwork is visible in the left dinette storage bench. It will all be on the driveway by the end of the day! The kitchen closet, with floor rotten through, is a harbinger of things to come.

Day 2: Exterior shots

Looking to the front of the trailer, you can see missing window louvers. In the back, all 3 of the bathroom window louvers are different styles of glass. However, the exterior over all is in great shape. When picking up the trailer after it was abandoned for 15 years, we found all the exterior lights and electric brakes work fine. On days like this, one must be thankful for these small blessings.

Dinette area

Day 1 continues

More photos from our first day of demolition. I'm just learning to use Blogger, so it may take me a few days to catch up. Our objective for Day 1: remove all knick knacks and modifications.

Day 1: beginning the demolition

It's finally begun to warm up so we are able to work outdoors on our new project. Happily, we also have a week off! Our objective is to get a solid floor under our feet by the end of the week. But first, lots of demolition and removal of pretty much anything porous. Enjoy the photos, but not while you are eating.