i bent up the tongue of the trailer somehow (no idea how, there is no way it was my fault or i had anything to do with it... :)), so instead of trying to bend it back i decided to get nuts with a grinder and cut it off. notice my constant companion during this whole process, the little white chair...
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
here's the result of my handiwork....
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
i then hired a welder off of craigslist to come to the house and weld on steel extension arms and a new a-frame coupler. i then added a new tongue jack. i will be painting all of this gloss black with rustoleom paint soon...
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
i also had my new welder friend put a new bumper on (the original one had apparently taken a blow at some point in the last 50 years and was cut off with a plasma torch). he also added a 2" hitch receiver which i will use for a bike rack and/or a cargo basket. finally, he modified a spare tire carrier i got at harbor freight so i can attach it to the bumper for our spare.
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
i've also been working on the electrical system. here is a shot of the new power converter which takes 120 volt power and converts it down to 12 volts for the light fixtures in the trailer. it also has an AC panel which powers 4 new outlets we added in various places. i plan to pick up a small flat panel tv that can be attached to the walls in several places for movie nights when we go camping and other destinations. the converter also charges a deep cycle battery that will be stored on the tongue of the trailer next to the propane tank. i may get an inverter as well so we can convert the 12 volt battery power to 120 volts to run our new mini fridge, toaster, blender, tv, etc... not sure how well that might work, but we'll see...
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
i've been working on the areas where the birch paneling was removed due to water damage. new support wood, cleaning, removing nails, and starting to put new insulation in:
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
finally, i broke one of the front dinette windows when removing the rotted support wood so decided to replace both of them with tempered safety glass. i installed them and then replaced the shrunken original gaskets with new rubber window moulding and sealed them up with black silicone around the window facing edge.
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| From Darcy and Paul's Shasta |
that's it for now, but we are working on the trailer tonight so i will have more pics this weekend. cutting the new birch paneling and hopefully will be putting it tonight. lots more to do, but we are having fun and learning tons...
thanks!
paul and darcy
Posts
So I gave JD the link to him too. We are trying so hard to get out of our hoa so we can tackle projects like this again! You guys are awesome motivation!
ReplyDeletethanks! yes, no hoa makes this project doable right in our driveway. the other night we were cutting on a tablesaw until about 11:30 pm. we expected the cops any time, but knew we wouldn't be getting a letter from the hoa, so kept on cutting! here's a link to what we generally hope the trailer looks like on the outside when we are done. we will probably add some wings down the road, maybe out of a water resistent wood like teak...
ReplyDeletehttp://tour.airstreamlife.com/weblog/Scarborough%20Shasta.jpg
and here is a link to what we generally hope the inside looks like (scroll down to the after pics)
http://www.retrorestoration.com/56shasta.htm
thanks! paul and darcy